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From: cosell@bbn.com (Bernie Cosell)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom
Subject: Rolm Phone Compatibility
Message-ID: <16563@accuvax.nwu.edu>
Date: 30 Jan 91 13:58:20 GMT
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Reply-To: Bernie Cosell <cosell@bbn.com>
Organization: BBN Systems and Technologies, Inc, Cambridge MA
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X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 11, Issue 81, Message 2 of 8


Here at BBN we have a ROLM VLCBX system.  As it turns out, I'm getting
some grief from the phonedroids about replacing my instrument with a
speakerphone, and so I'm thinking of finessing the whole matter by
simply going out and BUYING a speakerphone --- phones are cheap enough
and easy enough to come by that it is hard to fathom why providing a
'BBN approved' speakerphone should be an expensive hassle, but it is.

Anyhow: does anyone know what the compatibility of 'ordinary' phones
are with the Rolm system?  It looks like the 'official' Rolm
instruments all just have vanilla modular connectors on them, but I
observe that the phone has at least two not-very-standard features:

  1) it supports a "message waiting" light
  2) it has some magic in the switchhook so that it holds the line down long
     enough to ensure that it is really a 'hangup' [and there is a separate
     'flash' button].

Are there random commercial [speaker] phones that are actually fully
compatible with the Rolm system [including the two items above]?  Even
if the answer is 'yes', I'm curious about what'll happen [besides that
I'll obviously lose the above two items] if I just use a real-vanilla
phone --- it won't hurt the system or otherwise not work, will it?


Thanks,

Bernie Cosell    BBN Sys & Tech, Cambridge, MA 02138    cosell@bbn.com