Home Office Setup Of Sorts - Now Need Landline Help

[kellysmyrk]

Ok, please excuse any complete lack of knowledge/understanding on this subject, I have basically just got lucky so far (in that it works) and now come to a stand-still!

Basically I have Sky home phoneline etc and with two kids and a husband who likes gadgets, we have fibre broadband (Sky) and lots of stuff plugged into it.

Now, I have moved my home office to the end of our garden and run a cat5 cable there to provide internet that runs two PCs. The problem is, my husband has insulated my new office so well (foil lined) that I cannot get a mobile phone signal whilst working and need a landline put in there to take calls.

My broadband comes into the house, into the Sky router which didn't have enough ports so was advised to get netgear 18 port switch, this runs the house fine and I have cat5 extension running to the office, once in the office, in order to run two PC's, it meets with an 8 port switch - all works lovely.

Now my question is this, is there a way to extend my landline to the office using this setup - no phone sockets down the office, just internet via the extension cable. I've been told so far that a) nope can't be done (with technical explaination) b) yep, just add a broadband filter and you're good to go (no idea on this to be honest) and c) yep get an adapter for ethernet to phone.

I'm sure that I can run an external phone extension down the garden and have a secondary socket on it but if there is a way of doing so using the already in place cables etc, that would be better than digging the garden up again.

Wireless not an option as no signal gets into the office. Don't really want to take calls over the PC (voip?), just want to get a landline extension down there and it's driving me nuts lol.

I have no technical understanding (sorry) but do feel that option C is the one, just have no idea what adapter etc it would be or even if its possible.

Any advise in really simple and easy to understand terms would be so helpful please - please go easy with me, I'm 40+ and this technology just doesn't make sense - I like to plug in and go lol.

Thank you for any assistance you can offer.

 

[theyeti87]

I think your option is to either have the phone company come and install a land line for you, out to your office, or to use VoIP service such as Vonage.

I think VoIP will be your best option if you have reliably stable internet.

 

[USAFRet]

An Ooma might be what you're looking for.
Yes, its VOIP. No, it's not "through the PC"

Connects directly to the router, feeds a regular phone. I have a typical cordless, with a couple of satellite stations.
$5/month. With a reliable internet connection, it is seamless.