Re: [hylafax-users] routing rcvd based on to #

["Jay R. Ashworth" <jra@baylink.com>]

On Wed, May 14, 2003 at 05:59:23PM -0400, Stuart Herd wrote:
> Given the above info  which i'll admit i need to brush up on can anyone
> determine if i do get the
> Multitech DID modem at http://www.multitech.com/PRODUCTS/MultiModemDID/
> it will do what i need?

Almost certainly not.  If that modem does what I think it does...

[ looks ]

Yep.  It's designed to terminate a very special (and these days, fairly
hard to come by) type of line called an "Analog DID trunk".

Here's some copy on that, from http://www.brc.co.il/hello.asp?go=didmore

> An analog DID trunk line is different from a standard analog loop-start
> line. With analog DID trunk lines, the battery (or power) to the line
> is supplied by the CPE (in the case of a fax server, the CPE is your
> Brooktrout fax board). With a standard loop-start line the power is
> supplied by the central office - this is why damage can occur from
> connecting a loop-start line into the DID port of a fax board. In
> addition, DID trunk lines only support inbound calls. For that reason,
> fax servers utilizing DID trunk lines for inbound routing would utilize
> loop-start lines for outbound fax transmission.
 
Obviously, not necessarily the best solution.

The problem is that ADID lines are one-way, and pretty pricey -- and
you need more than one of them, if you get a lot of faxes.

The only other solution, alas, is digital trunks, like an ISDN PRI.
And then, while the line may not be all that bad (for the number or
trunks you get for the price) you need all kinds of pricey gear to
share that line between your faxserver and PBX -- which you'll probably
need to do to justify the costs.

Worse, your phone system, if it speaks digital at all, probably speaks
(D4/ESF) T-1, rather than the newer more functional ISDN PRI (which also
goes over a T-1 span, though we usually don't call it that.  That makes
things even worse.

Short version: DID is difficult to impossible to accomplish practically
on the low end, and -- due to the influence of the telcos -- will
likely remain that way.

---

I love Multitech to death, and they're reported to like HylaFAX, but
I'm not sure why *that* was the DID niche they decided to try to fill...

There is *one* possible solution, though I don't know anyone who's
personally implemented it: the USR Courier I-Modem v.everything ISDN
BRI (2B+D) modem can *theoretically* do all this stuff, if you can get
the proper service from the telco (multiple numbers and called number
delivery) for a price you can afford.

I don't know whether the current HylaFAX DID stuff supports it, though.

Anyone else know?

Cheers,
-- jra
-- 
Jay R. Ashworth                                                jra@baylink.com
Member of the Technical Staff     Baylink                             RFC 2100
The Suncoast Freenet         The Things I Think
Tampa Bay, Florida        http://baylink.pitas.com             +1 727 647 1274

   "If you don't have a dream; how're you gonna have a dream come true?"
     -- Captain Sensible, The Damned (from South Pacific's "Happy Talk")

____________________ HylaFAX(tm) Users Mailing List _______________________
  To subscribe/unsubscribe, click http://lists.hylafax.org/cgi-bin/lsg2.cgi
 On UNIX: mail -s unsubscribe hylafax-users-request@hylafax.org < /dev/null
  *To learn about commercial HylaFAX(tm) support, mail sales@hylafax.org.*