Thread: Phone dead but I-net fine

ADSL is more robust than the phone signal.

I'm not kidding, this is what the Telstra tech told me when I had the same problem a couple of years ago. ADSL was fine, phone went from crackle all the way to dead.

I've had this also. In my case it was a problem back at the exchange as far as I was aware.

There is some sort of line condition causing the LI or EN device back at Telstra's exchange to Block itself out "ABL" Autoblock and hence you've Lost Dialtone, crackle and noise is a sign of line condition a bad line, you may have a gel affected joint or Water in Pit somewhere?
but your Line back to the Exchange is still intact which mean your are sending/recieving the ADSL frequenscies , but I bet your ADSL is running slower due to high error checking caused by line degredation.

Hi all, thanks for that infomation. The phones went from a background buzz to no dial tone at all over about three days. I e-mailed Telstra and an automatic reply suggested an "isolation test" which I had already done, ie. unplug everything and see what happens when only a phone is re-connected. Due to updating phones over the years and not throwing out the older ones, I have a number of working handsets to choose from. Also handy when the power goes off as the old technology still works.We also got struck by lightning Thursday last week, which killed the base station of the phone and most of our entertainment gear.Luckily, not the computer, as I habitually unplug it before leaving for work. However, the older phones went on working until this problem reared its head.Thanks again, 130man.

don't forget to check your phone bill when it arrives.you have to ring and tell the billing mob about the "free" calls or they charge you..

Hi Tracker, good point. Will check carefully when the next bill arrives. Cheers, 130man.

ADSL only needs one good wire of the pair to work, as opposed to voice needing a good pair. So yeah ones probably earthed somewhere.

Hi JSP, you are probably correct as you know more than I do. We are promised repair by next Thursday at the latest so we will see. In times gone by we had a Telstra tech living locally, we would give him a ring, he'd say report the fault to Telstra,he'd turn up a short time later, fix the problem and be on his way. Then when the paper work caught up to him he could send it back immediately as fixed. Good system but now of course service is less important than cost cutting so the brass can earn outrageous sums and we have to join the queue for scarce techs.That's progress. Cheers, 130man.