Home Phone Fibre Switch Advice

[sounds]

Greeting,

I've just got my date for the swap and its in a couple of months, so am trying to work out what is best to do and am looking of experiences and or advice.

Like many, my router (upstairs) and my main home phone are on different floors but both at the front of the house. Let me add I have multi-room and the wires run from the box on my house wall on the outside of the house to get upstairs.

I'm exploring all different ways to overcome the issues as I don't keep my router powered on overnight or when away  but do keep my main phone and answering machine powered on. Ideally I just want to keep one plugged in all the time.

What ways have people overcome the phone/router in different rooms?

Is there a way around the only router or phone plugged in issue? 

As a side issue, isn't the fact people are going to have to keep both phone and router powered on if thats the case a little perverse in the current green climate of cutting down on electricity?? Or does the hub use very little power?

Any relevant comments welcome, 

Thanks in advance

[Akua_A]

Hi @sounds 

Welcome back to our community forums and thank you for your landline switchover query.

Due to the way, the landline is connected after the landline switchover,  https://www.virginmedia.com/help/landline/fibre-phone-faqs Your phone will be plugged into the back of the hub. This means that if your broadband is down, your landline would be affected. If you need an emergency backup landline you can find out more here https://www.virginmedia.com/help/landline/how-to-get-a-virgin-media-fibre-phone If you need your landline in a different room to your hub, we would advise, wireless landline devices. That way your master landline device remains connected to the hub, while the secondary units can be placed where you want in the home.

Please let me know if you need any further help.

Thanks,

[sounds]

Many thanks for replying but sorry dont wish to appear rude  I know all of that and none of it answers the questions I posed.

[Akua_A]

Just to clarify, to overcome the phone/router in different room issue, you can use wireless landline devices. This way the master device remains connected to the hub and the secondary devices can be placed wherever you want in your home.

Unfortunately, there is no workaround for the way the landline is connected to the hub. If you wish to move the location of your hub itself in your home to adapt to this change, our team can help.

As mentioned prior, because the landline is connected to the hub, if the hub is switched off or goes off, so would the landline. 

Please let me know if you need any further help regarding this.

Thanks,

[VMUser1812]

The answer to the second point is alas, there is no work around. The hub has to remain powered up at all times for the phone to work.

As regard the cabling, somehow we need to get a thin 'phone' wire cable from the back of the hub up to where the phone currently is, or more specifically, where the wall box is, that the phone is currently connected to. The obvious and easy way is to just run it internally, around door frames, up the stairs etc. Will work but not the best looking,

There is another potential way this could be done, the box on your outside wall has the existing phone wiring which runs up to the phone socket, it also has the coax cable which is running to the hub. So imagine that we could run a phone cable alongside the coax from the hub and through the same hole in the wall (the cable is thin so may well be able to get it through with minimum effort). Once outside it is spliced into the phone wire in the omnibox already. That way the phone stays exactly where it is, plugged into the same socket. You have an extra bit of wire running from the hubs location to the existing hole in the wall - no new holes, no trailing internal cables!

Now, of course, without knowing the exact setup in your house, it's not possible to definitively state if this is possible or practical - but certainly worth investigating.

[goslow]

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@sounds wrote:

Greeting,

I've just got my date for the swap and its in a couple of months, so am trying to work out what is best to do and am looking of experiences and or advice.

<snip>

Any relevant comments welcome, 

Thanks in advance

---

VM should offer to modify your phone wiring free of charge, as part of the switchover process, to keep your extension sockets working.

VMUser1812 has described what is probably the best way to do this with least disruption if feasible for your home layout.

There are some power consumption figures for the hub in this past topic

https://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Networking-and-WiFi/Power-consumption-SuperHub3-both-modes/td-p...

As already mentioned though, if you turn the hub off overnight the phone line will stop working.

My default cut/paste reply for phone extension queries is below. By modifying the phone wiring (rather than moving the hub) you get to keep all equipment in its existing location.

Ask VM (via the VM forum team on here, when they reply to this topic) to modify your home phone wiring so you can use your existing landline extension sockets via the phone connection from the VM hub.

VM should offer to do this free of charge for you as part of the switchover process.

Make sure they make modifications to your phone wiring so you can keep each piece of equipment in the same place (rather than the offer which sometimes crops up on here to move the hub to a different location)

Refer here

https://www.virginmedia.com/help/landline/switchover

Do I need to book a technician visit?

You’ll need to book a free technician visit if...

• You rely on your landline for accessibility needs or don’t have a mobile to make an emergency call – we’ll provide you with an Emergency Back Up Line so you’re always able to call emergency services.
• You’ve got connected devices such as a burglar alarm linked to a control centre, use a telecare device, or have other phones connected to extension sockets. You’ll need to contact your provider and let them know about the switch if you have any of these to make sure they’re compatible with a fibre service.
• The Hub and your home phone can’t be placed near each other.

[Psychohetty]

Hi, 

How would this work for me when I have my router in my living room and my master phone plug in the hallway along with my care alarm which is connected to it?

TIA

[VMUser1812]

It won’t work for you in any way, shape or form, you will need to, ever so slightly, press VM to do what they are obliged to do anyway, which is to send a tech out with the appropriate skills and time to run additional wires in your home. 

This has always been the case, but I have noticed a slight uptick in posts from forum staff members which simply advise that ‘you’ spend your money on new wireless DECT phones or you ‘move’ your phone next to the hub. They may also suggest that they could move the hub to be in a more convenient location with respect to the phone - more convenient for them that is.

Now it’s not difficult to see why, you purchasing new phones or you moving your existing phone is zero cost for VM, them sending someone out costs money, especially if it is someone who is knowledgeable about, and is allocated the required time to, run additional phone wires, certainly isn’t zero cost for them.

You can see why they might be somewhat reticent to offer this, up front, whether it is a formal instruction from up above, or something they have just been ‘encouraged to do’ in an informal staff meeting or memo, well who can tell?

[Lee_R]

Hi @Psychohetty,thanks for posting and welcome back to our community.

Sorry for any concerns you may have regarding the landline switchover. You can find many answers, here.  I'd like to take a look on your behalf. I am going to send you a private message. Please do keep an eye out on your inbox.

Regards

Lee_R