Faxing over AT&T U-verse Internet Service Phone Line

Nate2_1 · ‎03-26-2010

I managed to send a fax from my PC to a real fax machine, over an AT&T U-verse phone line (non-DSL AT&T U-verse internet service).
Usually, due to phase differences, faxing over an IP-based phone line doesn't work, so land-lines are always recommended for faxing.
Also faxing from a PC to other PC-based faxes are a little more problematic over IP-based phone lines.

Worked for me with Winfax 10, and also the Windows XP Fax client (this needed some modem speed changes to a lower speed to 9600).

Has anyone got this to work at higher speeds?

smyrnaguy770 · ‎07-06-2010

I have not tried fax (yet).

I have two (2) Uverse voice lines in my home. They were recently converted to Uverse voice from POTS. Both of the two numbers are served off of the two different phone ports on the one Uverse residential gateway.

I was able to dial out from a PC modem on one of those lines into a dial-in modem on another PC on the other line (point-to-point protocol) using kermit. In that configuration, after negotiating with the other modem, kermit reported

dialing side: CONNECT 31200/ARQ/V34/LAPM/V42BIS

dialed system: conn='31200/ARQ/V34/LAPM/V42BIS'

That's not too shabby. Then I tried dialing in from a remote system (in California) to one of the PC's here in my home (in Georgia). Same protocol setup. Just (obviously) different equipment (POTS, not Uverse) on the other side of the country.

dialing side: CONNECT 4800/ARQ/V34/LAPM/V42BIS

dialed system: conn='9600/ARQ/V34/LAPM/V42BIS'

There was some sluggishness on the cross country connection until both sides finally seemed to be happy with their modem negotiations and allowed me to login.

So, at least locally, using ppp and not fax, I can say that I established higher speeds. Of course, that was just in a test arena. If I need to dial into a customer's system for remote support from my home office, I hope the speeds will be at least 9600 and the faster the better. (Modem support of ancient systems can be so very painful.)

smyrnaguy770 · ‎07-06-2010

I just tested sending a simple one page fax using Win XP with BVRP phone tools (some app that Dell loaded up on the system when I bought it years ago) and the system's internal fax modem. Seems to have worked with no issues over my Uverse voice service. Don't know if it was accurate or not, but it claimed to have synched with the receiving end in California at 14400. I'm still waiting for the folks out there to arrive and tell me if the paper on their end looks ok.

Nate2_1 · ‎03-26-2010

HP appears to have a faxback test for their HP fax machines.

Info at http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?docname=c00259105

smyrnaguy770 · ‎07-06-2010

That HP fax back service is pretty neat. Worked for me just fine with my Uverse voice lines, both outbound and inbound faxes.

Nate2_1 · ‎03-26-2010

smyrnaguy770 wrote:
That HP fax back service is pretty neat. Worked for me just fine with my Uverse voice lines, both outbound and inbound faxes.

How did you manage to receive the fax?

When I tried, my AT&T voicemail answered, played the outgoing message, and when it heard a fax tone, played an additional AT&T message that said that my mailbox does not accept faxes!
Googling around, I see AT&T trying to peddle an additional service ($$) to enable voicemail boxes to accept faxes.

I guess I will have to turn off the AT&T voicemail to allow my fax switch to redirect the call to my PC fax.
Which means I am back to using my digital answering machine, instead of AT&T voicemail.

cheer · ‎10-20-2007

Nate2 wrote:

smyrnaguy770 wrote:
That HP fax back service is pretty neat. Worked for me just fine with my Uverse voice lines, both outbound and inbound faxes.
How did you manage to receive the fax?

When I tried, my AT&T voicemail answered, played the outgoing message, and when it heard a fax tone, played an additional AT&T message that said that my mailbox does not accept faxes!
Googling around, I see AT&T trying to peddle an additional service ($$) to enable voicemail boxes to accept faxes.

I guess I will have to turn off the AT&T voicemail to allow my fax switch to redirect the call to my PC fax.
Which means I am back to using my digital answering machine, instead of AT&T voicemail.

No idea what fax-enabled service you're referring to; I'm not aware of any such service for U-Verse.

But really...if your fax machine doesn't pick up first, of course it's going to go to voicemail. And if your fax machine DOES answer first, then it's going to put out a fax tone.

I'm not sure how you expect any of this behavior to change. When you use the answering machine (presumably connected to the fax machine) then the fax machine has the intelligence to pass voice calls through to the answering machine, but I'm not aware of any fax machine that will pass calls through to voicemail, VoIP or not.

Nate2_1 · ‎03-26-2010

cheer wrote:

No idea what fax-enabled service you're referring to; I'm not aware of any such service for U-Verse.

But really...if your fax machine doesn't pick up first, of course it's going to go to voicemail. And if your fax machine DOES answer first, then it's going to put out a fax tone.

I'm not sure how you expect any of this behavior to change. When you use the answering machine (presumably connected to the fax machine) then the fax machine has the intelligence to pass voice calls through to the answering machine, but I'm not aware of any fax machine that will pass calls through to voicemail, VoIP or not.

Might be a good idea to get acquainted with other AT&T services:

AT&T Unified Messaging is a revolutionary messaging service that provides a single mailbox where you can receive and manage multiple types of messages, including email, AT&T voice mail, wireless voicemail and faxes. You can access this mailbox from any compatible computer with Internet access or from any touchtone telephone.

With AT&T Unified Messaging, you keep life simple - no more checking multiple voicemail or answering machines, fax machines and e-mail inboxes. It's all in one place!

If a normal answering machine picks up first, the call can still be redirected to a fax machine or (PC fax) via a fax switch.

That's what I had been using for years.

And my voice callers do not hear a fax tone, ever.

So my fax never did answer the phone first.

One can even send a fax in the middle of a voice call, and the switch knows how to take over when it hears the fax tone.

AT&T U-verse voicemail does recognize it was an incoming fax.

I actually heard the AT&T recorded message (from the sending fax machine speaker) that said my voicemail box does not accept faxes.

smyrnaguy770 · ‎07-06-2010

Nate2 wrote:

smyrnaguy770 wrote:
That HP fax back service is pretty neat. Worked for me just fine with my Uverse voice lines, both outbound and inbound faxes.
How did you manage to receive the fax?

When I tried, my AT&T voicemail answered, played the outgoing message, and when it heard a fax tone, played an additional AT&T message that said that my mailbox does not accept faxes!
Googling around, I see AT&T trying to peddle an additional service ($$) to enable voicemail boxes to accept faxes.

I guess I will have to turn off the AT&T voicemail to allow my fax switch to redirect the call to my PC fax.
Which means I am back to using my digital answering machine, instead of AT&T voicemail.

Sorry for the late reply. To answer your question, I configured the fax application on the PC to answer after the first ring. So it picks up long before it would roll over to voicemail due to no answer. Your fax machine (real or software) must have a way to customize the number of rings before pick up.

If your fax machine is still not picking up fast enough, maybe you can call support and ask them to increase the number of rings before rolling to voicemail. I don't know if that is possible, but it would seem logical that they would have a way to do this.