Fax Quality and Reliability on T1/E1, BRI & Analog Phone Systems

Until now, users of Asterisk^® and other PC-based systems with T1/E1 or BRI connections needed a separate external analog line at an additional cost if they wanted reliable fax service. Fax machines connected to a PBX using T1/E1 or BRI connections would run inconsistently at best because the analog interface supporting the fax machine were not synchronized with the PSTN timing.

Sangoma's latest AFT hardware & firmware revisions include an option for the analog card to receive its clocking from a T1/E1 or BRI card via a simple two-wire jumper cable.

1. Synchronization Cable
2. Hardware Requirements
3. Firmware Requirements
4. Driver Requirements
5. Configuration Requirements

Synchronization Cable

Standard Two Pin Jumper cable, also available from Sangoma. 

Install the cable on to the board jumpers RED cable uppermost both sides as shown in the picture.

Hardware Requirements

List of currently supported hardware:

          AFT A101/2/4/8dm: All AFT T1/E1 cards with HW Echo Cancellation
                   - hardware echo canceler is mandatory

AFT A500d: BRI card
         - If the card is being used as a clocking source then hardware echo canceler is mandatory
         - If the card is receiving the clock then the hardware echo canceler is NOT mandatory

          AFT A200: Quad Port Analog FXO/FXS Card, (upto to 24 ports)
                   - hardware echo canceler is optional for analog cards
 
          AFT A400: 12 Port Analog FXO/FXS Card, (upto 24 ports)
                   - hardware echo canceler is optional for analog cards
 
          AFT B600: 5 Port Analog FXO/FXS Card  (Note: Sync cable goes on jumper JP6)
                   - hardware echo canceler is optional for analog cards

Please note that AFT A101/2/4/8 and A200/400 cards that were shipped before June 1st, 2007 do not support this feature and are not field upgradeable!

This feature is only supported on Maxim based T1/E1 AFT cards (AFT A101dm/A102dm/A104dm/A108dm).

Firmware Requirements

The minimum AFT hardware firmware requirements that support clock synchronization.

          AFT A101dm --- V31
          AFT A102dm --- V31
          AFT A104dm --- V31
          AFT A108dm --- V31
          AFT A200      --- V10
          AFT A400      --- V10
          AFT A500      --- V31

Latest Firmware Download

Driver Requirements

Latest Stable and Beta releases support the external clock sync feature.
You can download the wanpipe drivers here:

Latest stable voice & data drivers (Linux) ------------- Download Stable Here
Support: T1/E1/Analog

Latest beta voice & data drivers (Linux) --------------- Download Beta Here
Support: T1/E1/Analog/BRI

Latest voice & data drivers (FreeBSD) --------------- Download Beta Here  
 

 
Configuration 

All T1/E1 & BRI cards supporting this feature will automatically provide the clock, and therefore no additional configuration is necessary.
 
The latest STABLE and BETA wanpipe releases have updated configuration utilities (wancfg and wancfg_zaptel) to configure AFT Analog devices for external clock sync.

The Analog Cards must be configure with RM_NETWORK_SYNC option.  This option configures the Analog card to accept the clock from the jumper cable.
If the clock is not present, the analog card will not start!

AFT T1/E1 + Analog Fax

• Use the wancfg_zaptel configuratoin tool.
  You will be promtped for this option if there is a T1/E1 or BRI card with HWEC in your system.
  -> Refer to Asterisk Wanpipe Configuration for T1/E1/Analog  

AFT A500 + Analog Fax

• Use the wancfg_smg configuration tool. 
  You will be prompted for this option if there is a BRI card with HWEC in your system.
  -> Refer to Asterisk Wanpipe Configuration for BRI

Manual Configuration
In the configuration files for Analog cards only, please add RM_NETWORK_SYNC = YES as follows:

#================================================
# WANPIPE2 Configuration File
#================================================
#
# Date: Tue Apr 24 16:59:04 EDT 2007
#
# Note: This file was generated automatically
#       by /usr/sbin/wancfg program.
#
#       If you want to edit this file, it is
#       recommended that you use wancfg program
#       to do so.
#================================================
# Sangoma Technologies Inc.
#================================================

[devices]
wanpipe2 = WAN_AFT_ANALOG, Comment

[interfaces]
w2g1 = wanpipe2, , TDM_VOICE, Comment
[wanpipe2]
CARD_TYPE       = AFT
S514CPU         = A
CommPort        = PRI
AUTO_PCISLOT    = NO
PCISLOT         = 9
PCIBUS           = 1
FE_MEDIA       = FXO/FXS
TDMV_LAW        = MULAW
TDMV_OPERMODE   = FCC
RM_NETWORK_SYNC = YES
MTU             = 1500
UDPPORT         = 9000
TTL             = 255
IGNORE_FRONT_END = NO
TDMV_SPAN       = 2

[w2g1]
ACTIVE_CH       = ALL
TDMV_ECHO_OFF   = NO
TDMV_HWEC       = NO