HELLO & WELCOME

[sipmeup]

Current setup is Plusnet Fibre Broadband Unlimited (about 57Mbps down and 18Mbps up) with a 22 ping. 1 base and 1 additional BT Studio 4100 handsets. Main phone line junction box in upstairs bedroom with a phone extension run downstairs into the hall where the phone base station is connected. There is also a data extension kit run through the wall directly into the next bedroom where I have my home office / entertainment suite where I spend the majority of my time at home. In the office I have my dsl-ac68u modem/router (router mode only) connected to the data extension kit box. I also have an additional 8 port netgear unmanaged switch. I also have a raspberry pi2 which until recently was being used as a gitlab server however I've recently moved that my main pc in a virtual machine. My main pc runs Ubuntu 15.10 linux and my laptop antergos linux. This all makes me sound more technical than I really am. I do a lot of copying and pasting

Looking at things I'm thinking I will need Obihai 200 (can't envisage needing two connections) with line adapter. I will then need to run an phone extension kit from the main socket into the office so that I can place the Obihai near my router. Having said that from reading things do I need some sort of special cable as the connection of the back of the device is US style and if so what is it that I need and does it come in long cables or will I have to fit a box in my room and then use another lead between the extension box and the device? So basically swapping the base and additional handset locations.

I will be getting a Post Office Line Rental Saver deal which works out at £12 per month and includes weekend calls as standard (£2.50 extra and I can evenings and weekends) which is a significant saving on my current TalkTalk package which is nearly £23 per month. I mention this because that means some times it will be better to route calls through the normal landline service and other times through VOIP. I believe you cannot automate this with the Obihai however I have a raspberry pi 2 going spare as I've recently moved my last project off it on it's own VM on my main computer and I've seen that there is RasPBX which might allow me to do that if I did get my setup working and wanted to refine things a bit more. Is this possible?

Any comments or opinions on my proposal?

[WelshPaul]

If you want to hook your PSTN line up to your OBi then I strongly recommend you get the OBi110 otherwise you're going to need to purchase the OBiLINE adaptor to go with your OBi200 at an additional cost of £25.

Be warned though, there have been many, many complaints about the OBiLINE adaptor suffering from severe echo on inbound/outbound calls and/or random DTMF tones be played during calls. None of which happen with the OBi110!

Having said that from reading things do I need some sort of special cable as the connection of the back of the device is US style and if so what is it that I need and does it come in long cables or will I have to fit a box in my room and then use another lead between the extension box and the device? So basically swapping the base and additional handset locations.

You will need one of these: https://www.broadbandbuyer.co.uk/produc ... r-rjp-bts/

Just make sure that you buy one with a Ring Capacitor:

This isn't an OBIHAI requirement as such, all VoIP ATA's require them when used in the UK.

I mention this because that means some times it will be better to route calls through the normal landline service and other times through VOIP.

Why not have a read of this post: OBi110 - How to Swap Lines Depending on Time of Day

[sipmeup]

Thanks Paul.

I was only going for the latter combo because I felt it was more futureproof however I'd rather have reliable sound so I will go with the 110. I'll get the Amazon converter that way everything's coming from the same site.

The post you linked to looks interesting. I must admit my first question was you can run cron inside a router so I enabled my ssh access and sure enough cron is there. I think I can what the plan is here. As my weekend calls package will run from 6pm on Friday to 6am on Monday I would issue the PSTN script to update the restore.xml with the setting in teh PSTN config when it 6pm on Friday and when it hits 6am on Monday to I would issue the SIP script to again update the restore.xml and if I go for the weekend and evenings call package then I'll just run the cron daily. Pretty clever thinking but we'll see how I get one when I get it all

Thanks for your help.

[WelshPaul]

One thing I should of pointed out (I totally forgot) is that the OBi110 comes with a US to US phone cable for connection to a working PSTN line...

You will also require a US to BT adaptor such as this: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/171227707032? ... EBIDX%3AIT

Personally I have experienced mixed results using such adaptors, I have always ended up having to use a RJ11 to BT cable (2 pin) that I have salvaged from a working DECT phone.

[sipmeup]

No problem Paul. I think I have the right cable anyway. RJ11 end fits in the back on my DECT phone and close inspection of it shows just two gold bars on the connector which I'm guess means it's 2 pin. I think it's an old dialup modem cable.