28 December 2015
BUILD IT YOURSELF
The printer/copier/fax machine in my home office shares the phone line with normal
phone service. The phone service is through the cable company, so the phone line
originates at their signal box which is also sitting on the desk. If the fax machine is left
connected to that line, things don't work well. It answers all calls — fax or not — and it
also seems to prevent incoming calls to my cell phone and perhaps from others.
There must be some combination of settings to make all this work together, but the
fax is not used often and my time is limited, so I have been just connecting and
disconnecting the phone lines on the rare occasions when actually sending or
receiving faxes. The jacks for these connections are not conveniently located, so I
frequently forget to disconnect the line when the fax is done. This yields complaints
from the other frequent user of the phone: my wonderful wife. So, a hardware
solution seemed to be the most practical.
By E. Paul Alciatore III
Fax On! Fax Off!
THE FAXER
