[VoIP] Fw: [C/O X-Bar] BLAST from the PAST: MF Tones STILL Heard on Network

[Jayson Smith]

Hi,
I thought you guys might be interested in this.  It comes from the
Centraloffice group.
Jayson.


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Mark J. Cuccia" <markjcuccia at yahoo.com>
To: <telnum-l at mjrdom.else.net>; <centraloffice at yahoogroups.com>;
<local-calling-guide at yahoogroups.com>; <singingwires at yahoogroups.com>;
<Strowger at yahoogroups.com>
Cc: <markjcuccia at yahoo.com>
Sent: Thursday, November 30, 2006 9:50 AM
Subject: [C/O X-Bar] BLAST from the PAST: MF Tones STILL Heard on Network


> I was told that the New Hope Virginia Telephone Co-Operative still
> uses OLD style MF tones when one dials a "vacant" number on intercept
> in their Stromberg-Siemens DCO switch. The MF tones aren't actually
> connecting things within the network, other than that the Stromberg
> DCO switch does MF into its intercept machine which then gives the
> digit-by-digit auto-quote of "the number you have dialed", based on
> the digits that were MF'd into the intercept machine based on what
> was dialed by the calling party.
>
> New Hope Telephone Co-Operative in Virginia, OCN 0239,
> http://www.newhopetel.com/
> is NOT to be confused with Alabama's New Hope Telephone Co-Operative,
> OCN 0308, http://www.nehp.net/
>
> The Stromberg-DCO switch in New Hope VA is NWHPVAXADS0. The only
> c.o.code for New Hope VA is 540-363. All ten "thousands" blocks are
> available to New Hope (VA) Tel Co-Op for assignment, but I don't know
> which "thousands" blocks are currently in use for valid line-numbers.
> Obviously, back in the old "Step" days, possibly Stromberg SXY ??,
> they only assigned from one particular thousands block, with maybe
> a duplicate block for assignments to the few payphones for "coin-line
> identification" to prevent collect calls to payphones, etc...
>
> But a vacant number is +1-540-363-8123.
> And it does NOT return billing/answer/charging "supervision".
>
> Note that sometimes, you might get an "all circuits busy" recording
> when trying to call into there. It's obviously a very small town rural
> area, and AT&T and other IXCs probably have very few trunk groups to
> this central office. OCN 0239 New Hope Virginia Tel Co-Op has ONLY
> 540-363 New Hope VA as its coverage area, within the VZ/BA/CP-Va
> Roanoke VA LATA #244. There is some local/EAS calling with some nearby
> VZ/BA/CP-Va and VZ/GTE/Contel ratecenters.
>
> But even in late 2006, you can still hear 1950s/60s/70s-era "MF"
> multifrequency tones loud and clear, "somewhere" in the North American
> Public Switched Telephone Network, even if it's only where the far-end
> central-office simply uses it to "MF" into a vacant-number auto-
> intercept machine.
>
> mjc
>