Faxing- One reason not to upgrade to Windows Vista Home Edition

Need to order Samsung toner for your fax machine? Just look online! While many faxes can be sent electronically, you can get cheap Samsung CLP-300 toner online, so why not stick to traditional faxing. You'll be amazed at the discount HP toner and ink you can buy online.

8-19-07 found a couple of programs that do it for you. Here is one site with 2 programs: http://www.rkssoftware.com/index.html
And here is another http://www.angelfire.com/wizard2/hkeylocal/faxby.htm
and one more http://www.brothersoft.com/Utilities_Fax_Just_The_Fax_5966.html

No more faxing from Windows? If you used the fax feature in Windows XP, don't consider upgrading to Vista unless you buy the more expensive editions. As of this writing, fax is only included in the Business, Enterprise and Ultimate editions, NOT HOME or Home premium!!!

I love the ability to send and receive a fax directly in windows or Word without having to have a separate fax machine. This feature was included in both editions of XP. Now it seems MS considers it a business necessity but not for homes. How stupid, but typical of geek thinking.

Boy do I need to add some clarification here. I was swamped with questions about faxing with broadband. I forgot that few of us use dial up anymore. So here is the skinny.

Lets cover "Receiving" first. I'll cover sending later.

Windows fax works the same as fax machine in your house. It accesses the local phone line and dials a number or answers the phone as requested. This is true whether you use Windows built in fax or a 3rd party program as suggested in The Windows Secrets Newsletter (Thanks Scott).

You must have a working modem installed. I actually had to go and buy one! You must then connect your phone line to the computer. If you are new to computing, you may not remember the old dial up days.

You do not have to be on line. You can be on line with broadband. There is no interference since broadband does not use the phone line. You cannot be using the phone line for other purposes when you try to fax as you will get a busy signal. And you cannot fax over broadband with Windows fax. There are ways to use broadband for faxing, but it requires getting a new number (no area code choice) and paying a monthly fee. Windows fax is free except you still have charges for toll calls. If broadband faxing interests you, Google for "Internet faxing" to find answers.

All this having been said, the best way to set up windows to fax is to have a second line dedicated to faxing. You can use one line, but it creates extra problems just as trying to use a fax machine on one line at home if you have tried that. BTW, I refer here to using it at home, but it works at work too if you have access to a dedicated outside line. We have a small business that receives a lot of faxes. We have dedicated line just for the fax and we get a lot of advertising junk as well as a lot of Phishing (scanning for fax number to broadcast junk)

Also be assured you cannot get a virus from receiving a fax.

So lets cover how Windows fax works. After you have it set up as noted below this is what happens. You can set the program to answer automatically (best if you have a dedicated second line) or as noted below, you can set it to answer manually (best for one line).

If you set the options to send and receive, then when the phone rings, one of two things happens. For auto answer, the computer answers the phone and accepts the call. If you also DO NOT CHOOSE TO HAVE THE FAX PRINTED, it is stored in the computer for you to decide if you want to print it. This is where you save money printing all the junk faxes. We get a lot of them.

If you have selected manual answering, the phone rings in the computer and asks if you want to answer it. Obviously the computer must be on and you must be close enough to select "Answer".

That's why I like the dedicated second line. I leave my computer on all the time. It receives faxes 24/7 with no response on my part. When I check the machine in the morning, I review the faxes and delete the junk and do not waste paper printing them as a fax machine will do. And fax paper ain't cheap!

Now if you don't have the ability to have a second line, then you should do this: If you know a fax is being sent, just ask them to call twice. Call once to tell you a fax is coming and then let the computer answer it the second time. Many of you have done this with a fax machine. The one advantage of a real machine is many of them can distinguish between a voice call & a fax call. Unfortunately windows does not. Maybe some of the 3rd party programs can, but I don't know.

Now for sending faxes. Actually this a little easier with a dedicated machine. You just put the fax in and dial the number, hit send and walk away. Not quite so easy with Windows. There are 2 kinds of faxes. One you create in the computer (usually in Word) and the other is a paper you want to copy and send.

First the paper you create in the computer is easier. You select "Print" and on the printer selection drop list and select "Fax" as the printer. You may also see another fax choice if you have a multi-function printer installed. Use the one that says "Fax", not HP fax or Brother Fax, etc.

Selecting this option will open the fax wizard. You then have to enter the required information or select from the phone book if you are using Windows programs (Outlook, WAB). After you complete the wizard, it will open your phone line and listen for a dial tone. If it hears the tone, it will dial the number and if successfully connected, send the fax and hang up when done. If it does not complete successfully, it will try again in a few minutes and keep repeating until it succeeds. (It gives up after a while)

Now if you have a paper that you want to send, you must first get it in the computer. To do this, you need a scanner. Many of us have multi- function printers these days with built in scanners. Actually if you have one with fax capability, set it to send but not receive. Be sure you have a phone line plugged into the printer. If you have a scanner, but without fax ability, then scan the document into Windows. Then choose Print and in the print selection, choose Fax and proceed as above.

You may also select to scan the document into word and fax from there.

In XP, the feature may not be installed by default. If you don't see it under Start/All Programs/Accessories/Communications then it needs to be installed. This how it looks if you are using the default Windows XP start menu:

Fig 1

And this is how it looks if you have the classic (9X) style:

Fig 1A

To install it if it is missing, Open the Control Panel, Add/ Remove Programs and click on Add/Remove Windows Components in the left column.

Fig 2

Clicking on the Add/Remove Windows Components opens a new dialog box (Fig 3)

In this dialog box, you should see that the selection box in front of Fax Services is empty. Click the box in front of Fax services. (DO NOT CLICK ANY OTHER BOXES or you will change other things) Then click next. You may be asked to insert your XP CD. If you don't have it, you can use any XP CD from another computer. (It must match your version, Home or Pro- If you have Home, you must use another Home CD & same for Pro)

Fig 3

The computer will prompt you for the final steps to install the fax program. Once you have fax installed, you must configure it on first use.

Look back at Fig 1 and open the fax console. (Start/All Programs/Accessories/Communications/Fax/ Fax Console)

It should start the Wizard. If it does not, and opens the console directly, then go to Tools, Configure Fax as shown in fig 4.

NOTE: DO NOT SEND FAXES WITHOUT COMPLETING THE CONFIGURATION WIZARD. IT IS ILLEGAL TO SEND AN UNIDENTIFIED FAX.

Fig 4

Go thorough the Wizard as noted in the following figures. Click Next each time.

Fig 5 Click Next after each selection as you go through.	Fig 6 Enter a name (Your choice) and a fax number. No other information is required. Next
Fig 7 Check the boxes for Enable Send & Receive. Choose if you want manual or auto receive. If you choose auto, select the number of rings. Next	Fig 8 Next Fig 9 Next Put your fax number in the noted locations. This is what is required legally. These are technical identifications required by the FCC.
Clicking Next takes you to the next step. Do not double click as it will take you through two steps. Steps 10-12 can be clicked through by clicking Next at each step if you just want to review each fax as it comes in and then decide to file, print or delete them. If you want to file all faxes, then continue through 10-12.	Fig 10 Next Do not check the Print box unless you want to waste paper. Clicking this box means every fax will be printed automatically. If you want to do this, just use a regular fax machine. (You can choose to print a fax when you view it) Check the Store box, then click Browse.
Fig 11 Next Select where you want faxes to be placed. I create a separate folder for faxes. Click OK when done.	Fig 12 Next Now this window reappears and the location is noted in the box. Click Next.
Fig 13 Next	You can now send a fax directly from Word or from a scanned document. In Word, select print and select the fax printer. When your phone rings, If you set the answer to manual, the computer will notify you and ask if you want to answer it as a fax. Fig 14 If you set it to answer automatically, It will answer after the number of rings you selected.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

10-19-07 update: I tried downloading and installing a number of programs to use with Vista. The only program that worked with Vista was Snappy Fax. If you have a long distance service, it works fine and is relatively low cost. My problem is I did not have long distance. I use a prepaid calling card and I could not get Snappy to work with the calling card, so I decided to apply for long distance service and use my XP machine for the fax ability that is built in.

Since I did not need Snappy Fax anymore, I decided to uninstall it. The problem is that not everything was removed. First, I kept getting reminders to buy the program. The uninstall did not remove that. Then I went to msconfig and found an entry still there. So I went to regedit and looked for any entries for Snappy and found a number of them. So as I point out on other pages, just doing an uninstall is rarely complete.