> Alan Cox wrote:
> > > If it is illegal, I wonder why mainstream stores are permitted to sell
> > > "international traveller" modem kits with adapters for a wide range of
> > > countries..
> >
> > In the UK at least it is an offence to sell a modem unless it is marked with
> > either an approved or unapproved sticker and a conformance statement. But if
> > you say it doesnt conform then fine it doesnt conform. Furthermore a lot
> > of setups don't require conformance.
>
> Let me expand a bit on that.
>
> You can hook a non-conforming modem/whatever to a PBX. As long as it
> works, that's fine. If it doesn't, it's your problem.
In the UK this is not true, unless the PBX is free standing. If the PBX is
connected to the PSTN you may only connect approved products to it. In many
countries a PBX is considered an adequate barrier, to avoid approvals issues with
attached equipment.
The wording in the UK approvals documents talks about "direct and indirect
connection to the PSTN". Your computer is indirectly connected to the PSTN, but
that obviously doesn't need approval - one of the key things a modem does is
provide a barrier to ensure that. There were some efforts to resolve this woolly
wording, but I don't know what happened.
> The Netherlands only cares about Dutch conformance. So you're
> perfectly allowed to sell an international traveller kit that doesn't
> conform in the UK. Now that we're both EU, things might start moving
> towards the one conformance test and one approval, but we still won't
> care wether a modem blows up the exchange in the USA....
"Now" is an interesting word, here. The UK and the Netherlands were already in
the EU when their national approvals processes were developed. There is an
EU approvals process, but it still seems immature.
Steve
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