The central office is a mechanical or electronic switching system that provides dial tone phone service to your particular geographic area. In most cases, it is housed in a nameless, faceless building. This building may house multiple switches, including ones that belong to other phone service providers.
With regard to your question about grounds: Each phone line is usually delivered to the premises over a perfectly-balanced twisted copper pair. Unlike electrical wiring, the only time that either of these wires is associated with a ground is through an intentional and temporary connection. In the previous descriptions, the CO switch and the customer's PBX "talk" to each other by "touching" one wire or the other to a true earth ground. A lot more communication than voice occurs over that copper wire pair, and it happens very quickly.
Telco power plants have the positive side of the output grounded. This confuses many people because they are so familiar with automobiles, which are predominately negative-ground.
Visit Atcom to get started with your new business VoIP phone system ASAP
Turn up is quick, painless, and can often be done same day.
Let us show you how to do VoIP right, resulting in crystal clear call quality and easy-to-use features that make everyone happy!
Proudly serving Canada from coast to coast.
