Fax Problems.. please help

[ZeusGT]

Hey,

I have a Minolta C250 with the optional FK-502 Fax board installed. All the sudden the customer can send all day long with the machine, but they cannot receive faxes.

I can call the fax from my phone and I get the normal handshake protcol. I am running into several of these machines that are doing this and I don't understand why.

Does anyone have any ideas on what I need to do?

Thanks

[soltec]

use a high quality fax cable, not the standard telephone ones konica supply with the Fax Kit, the best ones we have found is from RS components, the cables are £12 in the UK approx, we have never had a problem with them. Usually with the standard cables you have no problems sending out but you can have problems coming in.

[mo0651]

Does it error out? or not answer at all. I have changed the phone line from a four wire to a two wire. That fixed similar problems.

[pepper38_cnd]

When this is happening unplug the phone line from the C250 and call again, see if something still answers, customers have a habit of sharing the fax line with other things like security systems and point of sale terminals and if they get set to the answer mode your not going to get faxes. There handshakes often sound similar.

[ZeusGT]

one thing that I have found out while trying to diagnose this is it will only send if you push the on hook dial and listen to the handshake between the two. Now, if you try to scan it from the top and simply push in the phone number, it will just sit there and do nothing and finaly error out.

If you look into the job history while it's doing this it just says waiting and never dials out.

I've tried to "dumb it down" by lowering the baud rate to 14400 and still get the same thing. If I go to the fax test mode and test the send feature, it says everything is ok.

I feel that there is a setting that just isn't right with this stupid thing. I know it can send being that if you do it manually via the on hook feature, everything sends just fine, but it you try to do it automatically, it will not try to send anything and just sit there for about ten minutes and error out.

It will not receive at all and the error that it states is invalid protocol. It's from a known good working C250 from down the street.

Any ideas?

[pepper38_cnd]

Try turning Off or On Dial tone detect. But this should have nothing to due with recieve.

[hondapol]

did you find a solution to this problem? I have one that does the same !!

[Mr Spock]

Check the polarity of the wall jack. I have seen many of these are reversed and cause the same issue.

[nmfaxman]

Did the customer just change to VOIP?
VOIP requires T.37 or T.38 compatability.
Fax is going bye-bye.
Scanning and email is faster and more reliable.
Email never runs out of paper or toner.

[Stirton.M]

Did the customer just change to VOIP?
VOIP requires T.37 or T.38 compatability.
Fax is going bye-bye.
Scanning and email is faster and more reliable.
Email never runs out of paper or toner.

I agree. Voip can be an issue. Analog converters sometimes work, but not always. Best result is to put in an analog line for the fax, or upgrade to a newer model with the updated protocols. As it is, KM Japan has made it clear none of our machines officially support VOIP, though they can be manipulated creatively to "work". Generally not always so.

And line polarity is a very valid issue as well. Though not likely if this is a recent issue and the machine has been there a while.

Check for multiple connections. The more electrical contacts between the machine and the outside phone line can introduce more noise due to poor conductivity of the connections. Splitters can also cause major problems. The fax should only be by itself. Anything else, like a mailer for example, should be chained through the copier's phone port on the fax card.

And of course, there is the obvious but seldom realized issue, the phone line the fax is connected to has a different phone number, though I get it that you eliminated that particular issue.