This topic

Using Full Fibre 100 with third-party router and Digital Voice

KMKM — Tue, 17 Jan 2023 13:44:33 GMT

Hi,

We are moving home and in the new property we’ve ordered full fibre broadband and it comes with digital voice home phone. In our current house we don’t use the BT HomeHub as we run our own email and web servers and prefer to use a DrayTek router for the flexibility it offers. When ordering the new package the person we spoke to assured me that we could still use an external router with full Fibre broadband and wouldn’t need to use the Smart Hub 2. Hopefully this is correct information. Could anyone confirm this is the case?

I’ve now just received a follow-up email about Digital Voice. In the instructions it says I’d need to use BT’s latest Smart Hub for Digital Voice to work. Which is obviously a concern if I won’t be using the Smart Hub. So is this simply too restrictive a statement and I can plug the Digital Voice handsets into a third party router such as the DrayTek Vigor 2865? Or is Digital Voice going to be useless to me and I should cancel this part of the subscription?

I tried asking BT's online chat about this, but they just wanted to arrange for someone to visit the property, which seemed pointless...

Re: Using Full Fibre 100 with third-party router and Digital Voice

Keith_Beddoe — Tue, 17 Jan 2023 13:50:24 GMT

@KMKM

Welcome to this user forum for BT Retail phone and broadband customers.

Digital Voice only works with the Smart Hub 2, nothing else can be used.

See https://community.bt.com/t5/Home-phone-including-Digital/Digital-Voice-FAQs/td-p/2207485

Re: Using Full Fibre 100 with third-party router and Digital Voice

Anonymous — Tue, 17 Jan 2023 13:49:08 GMT

DV only works with the SH2.

Although if you're running web servers maybe you should be looking at a business package?

Re: Using Full Fibre 100 with third-party router and Digital Voice

Keith_Beddoe — Tue, 17 Jan 2023 13:54:26 GMT

@KMKM

As @Anonymous has said, you really need a BT Business service, that does allow IP phones to be used via their Cloud Voice service.

If you are operating a business, then that is not permitted on a residential account anyway.

Re: Using Full Fibre 100 with third-party router and Digital Voice

KMKM — Tue, 17 Jan 2023 14:03:39 GMT

We aren't running a business, we just run a mail server for our family emails, and a web server for our photo albums etc. So a business package would be complete overkill for our use. And I presume the Smart Hub 2 can't be plugged into a third-party router in some way to get the best of both worlds? If not, it sounds like we'll have to cancel the Digital Voice part of the order. What about the broadband part? Could someone please confirm that using the BT Full Fibre 100 package with a third-party router and no Smart Hub 2 works OK?

Thanks.

Re: Using Full Fibre 100 with third-party router and Digital Voice

licquorice — Tue, 17 Jan 2023 14:10:04 GMT

Yes, you can use a third party router without a Smart Hub for broadband only. You can then just get a third party VoIP package if you wish to have Voice capability.

Re: Using Full Fibre 100 with third-party router and Digital Voice

KMKM — Tue, 17 Jan 2023 14:12:51 GMT

Excellent, that's good to know. I wasn't bothered about the VoIP part anyway. It was just being bundled in with the fibre broadband order as BT seems to be pushing Digital Voice rather than copper landlines.

Re: Using Full Fibre 100 with third-party router and Digital Voice

Keith_Beddoe — Tue, 17 Jan 2023 14:18:21 GMT

The analogue phone service is closing down in 2025.

Re: Using Full Fibre 100 with third-party router and Digital Voice

Anonymous — Tue, 17 Jan 2023 14:21:17 GMT

@KMKMwrote:
And I presume the Smart Hub 2 can't be plugged into a third-party router in some way to get the best of both worlds?

You can only do it the other way round, so the SH2 is the primary router. As it has no bridge mode I wouldn't be surprised if there were then issues getting your servers visible to the outside world through two boxes. But there's a 14 day cooling off period so you should be able to give it a try & cancel DV if no joy. Or if it's being bundled at no cost, just not use it.

Re: Using Full Fibre 100 with third-party router and Digital Voice

KMKM — Tue, 17 Jan 2023 14:22:55 GMT

Hopefully by then they will offer a way for people to use third-party routers with their offerings. Because forcing everyone to use BT routers seems crazy, particularly when they aren't particularly good. If the worst comes to the worst we'll just have to use mobile phones instead of landlines at that point.

Re: Using Full Fibre 100 with third-party router and Digital Voice

KMKM — Tue, 17 Jan 2023 14:27:57 GMT

I think there's likely to be a world of pain trying to route a DrayTek router via a SH2 without a bridge mode. They charge for DV so if they won't provide a real landline I think we'll just go without a landline and use mobile. Maybe if enough people refuse DV they will change their restrictive practices and open up the service to other routers. Or provide an adapter that can be plugged into other routers.

Re: Using Full Fibre 100 with third-party router and Digital Voice

licquorice — Tue, 17 Jan 2023 14:30:05 GMT

No they won't. It is a deliberate decision in order to provide a more secure VoIP solution.

Like many others, you have failed to understand that BT is a mass market ISP and for 99% of its customer base it provides all their requirements. They are not going to change their business model and spend money to suit a very tiny minority of their customers.

Re: Using Full Fibre 100 with third-party router and Digital Voice

Keith_Beddoe — Tue, 17 Jan 2023 14:32:45 GMT

This is affecting all providers.

The reason for this, is explained on this two page website.

https://www.draytek.co.uk/information/blog/the-end-of-analogue-phone-lines-pt1

Re: Using Full Fibre 100 with third-party router and Digital Voice

KMKM — Tue, 17 Jan 2023 14:32:55 GMT

Oh well, it sounds like it will have to be a mobile-phone based "landline" then. Saves me a bit of money paying BT for DV I suppose.

Re: Using Full Fibre 100 with third-party router and Digital Voice

licquorice — Tue, 17 Jan 2023 14:34:56 GMT

It won't save you a lot I'm afraid, possibly a maximum of £5/m if that.

Re: Using Full Fibre 100 with third-party router and Digital Voice

KMKM — Tue, 17 Jan 2023 15:05:54 GMT

How “Smart” is the Smart Hub 2? Does it let you set up port-forwarding/redirection to different devices on the LAN? And have Dynamic DNS support built in? Is there a manual online describing all its functionality. The HomeHub was pretty hopeless but before rejecting the SH2 I should at least check out whether it’s equally feature-free or has improved since the HH.

Re: Using Full Fibre 100 with third-party router and Digital Voice

licquorice — Tue, 17 Jan 2023 15:21:17 GMT

Yes, it has port forwarding capability and limited DDNS support (DynDNS, NoIP, ChangeIP, EasyDNS, Zoneedit DNS-O-Matic). The DHCP range can be amended and has address reservation capability (although that can sometimes be a bit flaky, better to use static addresses)

The big downside for many is the inability to give the WiFi bands different SSIDs.

Re: Using Full Fibre 100 with third-party router and Digital Voice

KMKM — Tue, 17 Jan 2023 16:09:28 GMT

Thank you for the information. That's a bit more encouraging than I thought it might be.

Re: Using Full Fibre 100 with third-party router and Digital Voice

Mr_Incredible — Mon, 27 Mar 2023 22:02:15 GMT

That an an inability to change DNS servers.
And an inability to enable DNS Rebinding if there is a need to (re)direct a DNS lookup to a local IP through the router. But I think that will have a limited use case!

Re: Using Full Fibre 100 with third-party router and Digital Voice

WiredAlex — Fri, 31 Mar 2023 18:13:17 GMT

Let's be honest, it's a deliberate decision to provide vendor lock in, not a more secure VoIP solution. As any security expert will tell you, open standards get far more scrutiny and are inherently more secure than proprietary, closed standards. BT could have chosen to adopt an open standard here, which would have allowed customers more flexibility when choosing their equipment, including handsets, which will just end up in landfill now when people move to a new provider.