I know there have been several posts on this but want to ask for myself. I keep getting the phone upgrade letter. I use the jacks in my house for just old school land line. I have my own answering machine and don't need any bells and whistles. I believe I have the Cisco DPC3010 modem and connect that to my own router for wifi. From what I am reading I have to upgrade my internet modem to one with a phone jack and plug that into an outlet to distribute dial tone to the rest of the house. My problem with that is that I do not have a phone jack in the room that we use for the office. We only have a phone jack in the master bedroom, living room, and kitchen. What happens in this case, and is it not possible to just continue the way I am?

Hi KAJ, Migrating from a Circit switch (NIU) to a Packet switch (eMTA) will require a technician appointment. The technician will install an MTA inside the home for your phone service. The phone service would come from the Telephone port on the back of the MTA. You may connect a phone direct to the Modem's telephone port, or see if the modem can send the phone service through the inner wiring in your house by plugging a phone cord from the modem to the telephone jack on your wall.

Thanks for the info but that totally disrupts my setup. I do not need or want the house phone in the room where the internet connection and cable modem is. That is a home office that uses a different IP based phone. So there is no option to just leave things as they are and continue using the phone lines in the wall?? The other problem with this is safety. Right now one of the best things still about even having a land line is the fact its always powered. In a power outage a person can plug in an old style push button or rotary phone and they will be powered and work. This would take that away.

I am in the situation as KAJ. Modem coaxle is in one part of the house and nearest phone jack is in another part. Even further away is the NIU. There is NO physical way to get the telephone line from the back of the new eMTA modem without cutting through walls / ceilings to a existing phone jack, and I will NOT allow Cox to cut open my house. I have already wasted hours attempting to get anyone at Cox to answer just one question: When will they rip the NIU off the side of my house and my phone will go dead? NO ONE will answer that question. So, I will keep my phone until Cox kills it, then I will switch service providers.

@KAJ, You can plug the main cordless phone base into the modem and then use cordless phones throughout the house. However, this could become an issue if you are dealing with a large home and need a lot of phones throughout the home. The only other option would be to send out a tech to reinstall where the phone modem is at in the home. Thanks, Allan - Cox Support Forums Moderator.

I just spoke with someone at Cox (after getting my FINAL REMINDER notice today). They can't tell me when service will stop with the old system. They said my fax should work. They told me to call my alarm company about the new phone system and didn't know if it would work (I had to go to Level 2 support to find that out). I don't think they understood the need to rewire my house to support the service change from outside to inside. They just told me their technicians are trained to do this. My existing Cornerstone NIU is inside of a shed and they said the tech would have to decide if the new unit could go there. They tried to tell me my existing unit is powered from my house and so it wouldn't be different that the new unit is powered from the house. I corrected them that power to my NIU comes from Cox. They don't seem to understand that not being powered by Cox and requiring a battery that I have to pay for is a downgrade. They're trying to tell me that the 7" x 6" x 3" unit is small. They did encourage me to go to the Cox store to see one (that's about a 20 min drive away for me). Cox: what a mess this is.

Phone upgrade Letter | Cox Community

22 Replies

DustinP
Moderator
Hi KAJ,

Migrating from a Circit switch (NIU) to a Packet switch (eMTA) will require a technician appointment. The technician will install an MTA inside the home for your phone service. The phone service would come from the Telephone port on the back of the MTA. You may connect a phone direct to the Modem's telephone port, or see if the modem can send the phone service through the inner wiring in your house by plugging a phone cord from the modem to the telephone jack on your wall.
KAJ
New Contributor II
Thanks for the info but that totally disrupts my setup. I do not need or want the house phone in the room where the internet connection and cable modem is. That is a home office that uses a different IP based phone. So there is no option to just leave things as they are and continue using the phone lines in the wall?? The other problem with this is safety. Right now one of the best things still about even having a land line is the fact its always powered. In a power outage a person can plug in an old style push button or rotary phone and they will be powered and work. This would take that away.
Phil_in_Phoenix
New Contributor
I am in the situation as KAJ. Modem coaxle is in one part of the house and nearest phone jack is in another part. Even further away is the NIU. There is NO physical way to get the telephone line from the back of the new eMTA modem without cutting through walls / ceilings to a existing phone jack, and I will NOT allow Cox to cut open my house. I have already wasted hours attempting to get anyone at Cox to answer just one question: When will they rip the NIU off the side of my house and my phone will go dead? NO ONE will answer that question. So, I will keep my phone until Cox kills it, then I will switch service providers.
Allan
Moderator
@KAJ,

You can plug the main cordless phone base into the modem and then use cordless phones throughout the house. However, this could become an issue if you are dealing with a large home and need a lot of phones throughout the home. The only other option would be to send out a tech to reinstall where the phone modem is at in the home.

Thanks,

Allan - Cox Support Forums Moderator.
EvaFam
New Contributor
I just spoke with someone at Cox (after getting my FINAL REMINDER notice today).

They can't tell me when service will stop with the old system.

They said my fax should work.

They told me to call my alarm company about the new phone system and didn't know if it would work (I had to go to Level 2 support to find that out).

I don't think they understood the need to rewire my house to support the service change from outside to inside. They just told me their technicians are trained to do this. My existing Cornerstone NIU is inside of a shed and they said the tech would have to decide if the new unit could go there.

They tried to tell me my existing unit is powered from my house and so it wouldn't be different that the new unit is powered from the house. I corrected them that power to my NIU comes from Cox. They don't seem to understand that not being powered by Cox and requiring a battery that I have to pay for is a downgrade.

They're trying to tell me that the 7" x 6" x 3" unit is small. They did encourage me to go to the Cox store to see one (that's about a 20 min drive away for me).

Cox: what a mess this is.
Phil_in_Phoenix
New Contributor
I completely agree EvaFam. I've spoken with Century Link for only phone service and they can use the existing NIU, hook up on the outside of the house, not need to go inside and cost $22 month. I also spoke with a level two tech at Cox and according to him, my existing phone service with Cox will remain operational the rest of 2018 and possible all of 2019. It's a waiting game to see when the service goes dead and I switch to Century Link phone service.
KAJ
New Contributor II
Boy this is a mess. Some of you are in WAY worse state than I am. Landlines are more rare today, but people that have then have them for a reason and for Cox to do this really is not what I would consider a land line anymore. Good to know about Century Link. That might be the way to go to keep the existing wiring working the way it is. So can any one of you help me understand. Does this new piece of equipment replace the existing cable modem or is it an additional piece of equipment? If I'm forced to do this I"m wondering if I could put it in a place that I actually have a phone jack.....course I'm sure I would need both....cable jack and phone jack next to each other in any case.
Phil_in_Phoenix
New Contributor
In answer to KAJ. For me, it's an addition modem in the house where the internet co-axle is located and will need access to a phone jack.
LatitiaS
Moderator
Hi KAJ,

It is not required to replace your modem but as technology changes, it may require customers to upgrade their modems. The telephone modem has two internal telephone jacks, so in the event there is not a phone jack near the modem, one could simply connect a phone to the device and have telephone service. On the other hand, if there is a phone jack nearby the technician can run a line from the modem to the phone jack. This allows all the phone jacks to become active. Hope this helps.
KAJ
New Contributor II
Just a bad situation all around having to run phone service from the COAX connection in the house. At least its a separate box so it doesn't have to go in the same room as the cable modem,............ because I would want the jacks in the house to be live and the landline in another room. I assume that the line can be split so a contour box and this MTA can run out of the same Cable jack? This was never what was expected when using COX for phone.