Can I use DSL on my 40 + years phone lines ?

Question

My area is upgraded for DSL.

Answer 1

A pair of copper wires in good condition is a pair of copper wires in good condition, regardless of the age. The question is, what is the condition of the wire running to the outlets in question?

The house I'm renting right now is about 70 years old, and I have every reason to believe the phone lines were wired with the house, and we have DSL working just fine. However, I have seen other locations where the wires were in bad shape, or the NID outside the house was cracked and the connections were wet, or other problems such as that. To get a rough idea, when you make a regular voice call, does everything sound crisp and clear to you, or do you hear static and other odd noises like that? If everything is crisp and clear on a voice conversation, then if your area supports DSL you should be OK, regardless of the colors of the wires. If you hear some snapping, crackling and popping on the phone line, you may want to ask the phone company to replace the NID outside your house and even consider running new wires to where you have phones. After all, you can run them along the outside of your house and through a wall easily enough, and you'll just be using cordless phones inside anyway if you're like most people these days, right? ;)

Answer 2

The normal phone uses the red and yellow colored lines in your phone. Older houses do not have the 4 color phone lines that you need. but a 40 year old house is not that old. should be fine.