atcomsystems.ca/forum Forums Telephony Discussion Phone & VoIP Systems Avaya - Lucent Telephones & Systems Questions on a Merlin

I really love the Merlin old school phone systems. I know nothing about telecommunications but I am a fast learner. I want to be able to run a couple of lines in my home but apparently its only ethernet. I didn't know if I could just plug a regular telephone line in but clearly I don't know what I'm talking about. I did some research and I guess I would need a control unit. Is that correct? Any help on the matter would be greatly appreciated.

Dave

Merlin telephone systems interface with traditional forms of telephone service.

The old classic models, 206, 410, 820 and 820D2 require standard loopstart POTS lines.

When you get into the Merlin Legend and Magix, you can add groundstart, T1, BRI, PRI/ISDN, DID and OPX.

Yes you need a control unit and pots lines.

To clarify to the original poster, you referred to the connection to Merlin phones as being Ethernet.

No, this is not correct. The phones use an 8P8C (four pair) modular plug, similar to those used in Ethernet networks, but they utilize completely different protocol to communicate with the mandatory control unit. Each phone must connect directly to the control unit by either plugging the phone's line cord directly into a station port on the control unit, or by extending this via a proper cable run using the 568B wiring standard (often incorrectly referred to as the AT&T 258A standard-this was just a wiring adapter that AT&T made).

Once the phones are properly connected to the control unit, you may then connect any type of standard (POTS) line(s) to it. These can even be ones that are derived using IP gadgets, such as cable modems, Verizon FiOS, Vonage, Magic Jack, Ooma, ATAs made by many manufacturers, or of course, real loop start telephone lines. These connections are very clearly marked on the Merlin control units because this system was designed to be user-installed.

Since the Merlin system dates back to the 1980s, you should be able to obtain a control unit relatively inexpensively.