Hi all,
I'm new to this board and hopefully will find it helpful. I'm having a problem with the phones in my house. We have perfectly working phone jacks upstairs, but downstairs I'm having a problem. We had no problems at all until about a month ago. My phone is totally dead. However, when I receive a call (it still rings upstairs so I know I'm getting one), the caller ID will light up with the phone number, but I cannot answer the phone. I thought the phone cord was busted, so I bought a new one. When I tried that, I ran into the same problem, a dead phone. I really have no idea what to do as this is the first phone problem I've had. We do not have the wire maintenance plans offered by phone companies because we have cable phone (still run off phone jacks). Any suggestions (basic please) would be greatly appreciated. Thanks so much!
Cherin

Hi.
Perhaps you've already done this and I just missed it in your post, but try plugging in a known working phone into the jack that doesn't seem to be working. Take one of the phones that works from upstairs, and plug it in where the phone is not working. It sounds like the phone is bad, to me, not the line.

If the caller ID works, that'd be my first guess anyway.

If you've already done this step, post again so these experts can help out more! :)

- j

I had a problem a month ago where the phone was sometimes dead. Sometimes it would ring, but when I picked it up to answer it would hang up. Most of the time, the phone worked.

Turned out it was a short in one of the lines. There are old security system wires hooked to the phone box, and by checking each I found the one that was giving a problem.

So... after making sure the phone is fine (testing with another, taking it to another jack or another house that's fine, etc)... if you are able to pull off the lines and check then for a short, id start there. If not, you could still pull them off and replace one, see if it works then. If not, try another. Then there's the phone and the jacks.

If you have parts around, like me, you could just pull off all the old lines, hook up a new line at the box with a new jack and any filters if you need them, and try it out.

Good luck. I'm guessing tkrussell will have some insights here too.

I just went and checked with another phone and the line is still dead. I went into the basement where the wires are and everything looked fine. I looked outside where everything is connected and again, it looks fine. But, I really don't know what I'm looking for or how to test for a short in the line. I'm so lost. Please help :)

I'm a little confused here. You have a wall jack, plugged into that jack is a phone AND a CallerID box or is the callerID built into the phone?

If the callerID (either built in or separate) works, then the line is not dead. It is possible that its weak. Also the 2 wires (Red and green) that are all that's necessary are called tip and ring. The ring wire (red) may not be working.

If you know what wires are connected from the terminal to that jack you can try connecting the Black to Green and Yellow to Red at both the terminal and the jack. If that doesn't work, you may need to run a new phone line from the terminal to that jack.

An alternative, albeit maybe a more expensive one, is to get one of the new expandable phone sets that use a base station plugged into your VoIP adapter and cordless extensions that don't need phone jacks. I have one of those in my home and they are great, one advantage is they work as an intercom between all the handsets.

Hi :)
Ok, what I have is the caller ID built into the phone. I'll try switching the red and green wires with the yellow and black and see if that works. I do have some of those phones you are talking about, but I think the distance is too great from upstairs to downstairs. Thanks for the advice. :)

If you have a 2.4Ghz phone then you should be able to connect from any decent sized house. If you have 5.8Ghz, it will go even further.