Fax machine won't work

[Rory.scott]

I know it's old technology but my new all in one printer (Canon Pixma310) has a fax capability. I've connected it to the virgin bow on the wall and then couldn't get a dial tone on the phone. When I rang home from my mobile, my mobile would call, no problem but nothing happened on the home phone. Canon support have gone home for the weekend and Virgin tech support have no ideas. Can some-one save my sanity?.........Please

[BenMcr]

Sorry for the stupid question but a normal phone plugged into the Virgin line works? Right?

[Rob]

Dodgy lead between the fax and wall socket, or dodgy adaptor / splitter thingy.

How have you got it connected, using one of those splitter / doubler things plugged into the wall socket, or fax attached to the wall socket with phone attached to the fax output?

[Rory.scott]

yes the phone works fine, until I run it through the printer then it's all dead.

---------- Post added at 19:51 ---------- Previous post was at 19:49 ----------

fax to the wall then phone to the fax - dead. phone to wall - no problem

[Rob]

try a doubler / splitter thing so the fax and the phone are effectively both plugged directly to the wall socket. Phone attached to the fax would normally only be needed for antiquated interruption of a fax to speak to the person at the other end during the fax call.

[Rory.scott]

Cheers Rob that seems to have got the phone working, just got to work on the fax now!

[Rob]

Most faxes need some form of switching thingy if they are on a shared phone / fax line, to be able to send the call to the fax rather than the phone.