Forum Discussion

andrewilley's avatar
andrewilley
Fibre optic
29 days ago

Digital phone line, ethernet phone cabling question

We currently have our main landline phone (answerphone and handset) and the master Virgin telephone socket in the lounge, and there is a very short coax cable through the wall to the outdoor wall-mounted Virgin cable termination box.

Conversely, the Virgin Hub (which is in modem mode) is tucked away in a back office room on a rack/shelf with various other network kit (Netgear Wi-Fi access point, 10-port switch, NAS,  home automation, UPS, etc).

All cabling is embedded through the walls, nothing is surface mounted. There is gigabit Cat-6 network cabling throughout, including from the networking rack shelf through to the lounge where there is a secondary 5-port gigabit Switch feeding the TV, Virgin Cable box, BluRay player, surround system, etc. 

When it comes time to switch to VOIP telephony, is there an option for an ethernet-connected breakout box to plug the phone into, which I could simply plug into the existing Switch in the lounge? It won't be at all practical to run extra RJ11 cabling from the Virgin Hub location to the answerphone base in the lounge (they are five rooms / four doors apart). Nor would it be possible to move the answerphone/phone baseunit onto the rack shelf, as we use it in the lounge not in a cubbyhole.

Andre

  • Adduxi's avatar
    Adduxi
    Very Insightful Person

    You can do this "if" you port your phone number to a proper VOIP supplier. 

    The VM is not VOIP per se, as they are only using the Hub to relay the phone line to the VM exchange (sort of)    If you can't port, then perhaps a cordless base station at the Hub, and the phone handset elsewhere?

  • Hi Andrewilley 👋 welcome back to the community forum! 

    Thanks for posting these concerns about your landline setup when the switchover comes. Once you are notified of the switch, if you need an engineers appointment to help re-arrange the setup in your home we will be able to book this in. 

    It may be that we set up an extension via the existing telephone socket, or we can re-locate the hub for you. 

    If you have cordless handsets, only the base station needs to be connected to the hub - so this may also be a solution for you. 

    You can find a bit more general information about the switch here 👉 https://www.virginmedia.com/help/digital-voice-switchover 

    Sadly there's not a lot we can do in the meantime, but please do get back in touch when you are notified of the switch and we will offer further support!

    Wishing you all the best. 🌞

  • Re-locating the Virgin Hub is not an option. It's in modem-mode and needs to connect firstly (and only) via Cat-6 to my Netgear Nighthawk router, which is then the master network point/firewall/DHCP server/etc from which everything else in the house is connected. There is only one Cat-6 link from the network shelf to the lounge, so to move the Hub would require running a second return Cat-6 cable - which of course is the whole problem.

    Putting the phone baseunit in the network rack area shelf is also not a viable solution as it is the answerphone base unit (with call counter display so you can see when there is a message) and is also the charging station for the lounge telephone handset. I guess if Virgin would provide us with an extra charging base to go in the lounge that would be a partial solution, but still not ideal as we only ever listen to messages by pressing the Play button on the base unit (which would no longer be accessible). Not sure my wife would take kindly to being told she has to regularly check for messages on the tiny telephone handset display! ;)

    I think the least-problematical solution might be to bore a new hole from the lounge to the cubbyhole area. It used to be an external wall prior to an extension being built, and now I look at the configuration it might actually be relatively easy with a very long masonry bit (which I presume Virgin engineers carry)? Then we could just run a four-core phone cable from the Hub's RJ11 connector in the cubbyhole into the lounge with minimal messy internal wiring.

    Andre

    • Molly_T's avatar
      Molly_T
      Forum Team

      Thanks for getting back to us Andre! 

      Just to set expectations, we don't provide handsets as part of the landline service, so this wouldn't be offered. 

      Apologies for being a bit limited in the support we can provide for this, as we can't see the layout of your home and furniture on here. The engineer team should be able to help arrange with an alternative setup 🤞, we'd just need to get an appointment booked in when the time came. 

      All the best. 🌞

       

    • SpacePhoenix's avatar
      SpacePhoenix
      Fibre optic

      Cordless phones normally have a charger cradle for each handset in addition to the main handset. You might be able to get one that shows on the screen of every handset if there are any message. Some models you might be able to access any messages from any handset.

  • goslow's avatar
    goslow
    Alessandro Volta

    If I was going to install any kind of new cable connection, I would try to make it an ethernet cable and use a patching kit to patch the voice connection over the ethernet cable.

    https://www.amazon.co.uk/PCSL-Brand-Telephone-Structured-Cabling/dp/B007UGF3EU

    Hard to say much without fully appreciating the layout of your home but ...

    If an ethernet connection is not possible, do you know where the existing phone cable from the lounge is connected to next? You mention the master socket in the lounge and coax going a short distance to the outside box. If the phone cable from the lounge master socket goes to the outside omnibox, does it make the task any easier to run a phone cable from the VM hub location to the outside box and make a join in there to the cable feeding the phone socket to the lounge?

    You should set your expectations to quite a low level as to what a VM tech might do for you in rewiring your telephone sockets. We occasionally read reports on here of a telephone rewire job well done by a VM tech for a happy customer. More often though, as reported on here, the VM tech has little/no idea about telephone wiring and will not spend time taking a complicated route to hide cables. The usual approach is surface mounted cables via the easiest/quickest route for the VM tech.

    If the aesthetics are of high importance you might want to consider getting a local contractor to do the wiring mod's for you who may well have better knowledge and time to do a proper job in the way you want.

  • I did all the original network cable running in the house myself. Luckily we got the property before selling our old one so I was able to run the wires neatly behind plasterboard and through walls while a small extension was being added. Made the Virgin installer very happy when he arrived to find concealed coax already routed directly to all the box locations, and even boxes screwed to the walls; he just needed to connect the cable from the road and terminate the coax runs (I used their own stock boxes & cables, given to me in advance by the guy who came out to do the pre-install survey). Installer said it was the easiest install he'd ever done. :)

    So I'll probably just get the tech to drill a hole (as my drill won't be long enough) and I'll connect and terminate the RJ11>phone wires myself, unless he feels like doing it. Now I've worked out the logistics of the room layout, that cable run will actually be very short and tidy - but if they go the surface route it's about 20m of skirting boards and four door frames to tackle.

    Do we know when this digital switchover will happen by the way - is it discretionary timing by the consumer, or dictated by local exchange schedules?

    • Graham_A's avatar
      Graham_A
      Very Insightful Person

      andrewilley Do you have an existing telephone extension socket anywhere near the Hub location?  If so the Hub can be plugged into that and all the master telephone socket will continue to work.

      This is what was done when my landline converted.

      • andrewilley's avatar
        andrewilley
        Fibre optic

        No, the Hub is in a new build part of the house and I didn't worry about extending the phone sockets into there as our phones are all cordless, and we only wanted one base-unit located in the lounge, so it didn't seem worth bothering at the time. But I think running a new wire through the wall will do the job.

        Andre

    • goslow's avatar
      goslow
      Alessandro Volta

      VM has its own schedule for migrating landlines. You should receive notification of it a few months before it is due. Nearer the time, VM should send you an adapter for the VM hub.

      Sometimes VM converts a traditional landline connection to a VM connection when a fault is present on the traditional landline (as an alternative to fixing the fault). Some people do seem to have been able to request an early conversion to a hub connection but is seems a bit random as to how/when/if this is offered. Usual response on here seems to be to wait for the planned rollout.

  • Tudor's avatar
    Tudor
    Very Insightful Person

    My hub5 is n modem mode under the stairs. I use a RJ11 to Ethernet cable into my patch panel. This is patched over Cat6 cable to the back upstairs bedroom where I have a Ethernet to old type telephone adapter, where the phone base station is plugged in. If have phone handsets all over the house and in the shed at the end of the garden.

    Hope this gives you some ideas.

    • Tudor's avatar
      Tudor
      Very Insightful Person

      This is what you need:

      https://www.amazon.co.uk/DRUT-Socket-Leaded-Telephone-Adapter/dp/B0BXJH871T/ref=sr_1_17?crid=2Y13PVUKU6PEO&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.1OW-4WjOHyuhlwT5AHXyR9eRvlbMOsvX_OsmURz7mHHKffCNr4ER1_uUNhjhLrSX6CT7iTulkuj8tbW4mInSJPBPw9nybnuJQAQTAYLuEoY7E7EUxCF_PjcyI7JnZnC3CT1KlxDYQV3h0-EZEX0IRVeas3dlJyWtI1u9tf6Ti3gRUUT97LRLf8O3qKbWlp9RsmFIOXvahnAcq54U_d05d_PPk93xNpOCBBNg_Rnlp3s.8dmywNQszQevy2bhyoJWho6e1WNTaN6dVTDcNkVGKfs&dib_tag=se&keywords=ethernet+to+telephone+adapter&qid=1740166671&sprefix=Ethernet+to+te%2Caps%2C246&sr=8-17&xpid=nVendDEV9-cQm