Checking DSL line - how?

connection.

I want to do it myself.

The usual proof is plugging the modem into the test jack inside the demarc*. This often involves taking an extension cord (electric) outside and plugging the modem (with its supplied telephone cable) directly into the socket where the telephone signal comes into the house. If you get synch at the demarc, your problem is with the house wiring. For an older home you may need an adapter**.

*Demarc(ation) point: the dividing line between the telephone company's maintnance and the house wiring that you are responsible for. **You may need to make your own adapter, I didn't find one that goes from piercing alligator clips to a female rj11:

Makes plenty sence and may do just that.

But I wonder, if I decide to now terminate DSL (and pay termination fee) and later in warmer weather go hunting for the problem.. is there a way to simulate DSL to check line quality, filters & al? What matters? Resistance? Splice quality?

I plan to intall a "Network Inspection Device" which will really be just a DPDT switch and an extra female wall jack at the earliest point of division of our line (which happens to be laundry room).

I really have every reason to believe the fault is not inside our house, but I'm so annoyed with them. [I'm a chemical engineer and my uncles, both electrical engineers, helped me design and install the filtering branchoffs last summer.]

At one point, when I spoke to telco through the DSL line, they admitted as much but then retracted.

In the past 24 months they have twice accidentally cut my phone line and every time, they want to charge us the $95 bucks and come inside before they find out it's their outside fault.

The "blue" NE USA has third world phone service and it's the intrasingent labor unions who are to blame. Back in 1996 I asked the CEO of Ameritech why their unions didn't create obstacles and he told me they knew it wasn't in their interest. In the same NYC Harvard Club room in 6/01, I asked Bill McDonough the same question (when he, then of ny.frb.gov and Rodney Nichols of nyas.org, spoke on what goes wrong in NYC tek biz) and he, a native Chicagoan, said the Daleys would lock biz, pol & union together in a room until agreement. It figures our pro-Saddam part of the country has Saddam-quality phone service.

- = - Vasos-Peter John Panagiotopoulos II, Columbia'81+, Bio$trategist BachMozart ReaganQuayle EvrytanoKastorian ---{Nothing herein constitutes advice. Everything fully disclaimed.}---

DSL and dial-up modems usually only work with the Line One pair of wires in a wall socket. This is the center pair. Single line home phones are usually wired internally to accept input from either Line One or Line Two. If your DSL signal is coming in on Line Two, you will need an adapter which converts a two line wall socket so that both Line One and Line Two come out of the adapter as to Line One center pairs. Make sure it is not a simple splitter but an actual Line Two to Line One adapter. They usually have three sockets coming out: 1. Line One alone as a center pair, 2. Line Two alone as a center pair and 3. Combination of Lines One and Two as a four-wire socket.

I had to do this to get my dial-up modem to work years ago because we used to have two lines. The one line which I dropped was on the center pair because I did not need two lines when my son moved out. I keep his line because it was not on the telemarketers' lists at the time.