Fax machines

A fax machine on this shelf was a scanner, a modem, and a printer in one box, built to dial a phone number and send a page. It wants a phone line that passes the audio tones of a fax call.

Voice-over-IP lines often garble those tones unless the adapter is set for a fax codec. A machine that dials, connects, and then drops at the first page is frequently the line, not the roller. The paper path is the other half. Plain-paper fax uses a toner cartridge or an ink cartridge and a normal sheet. Thermal-roll machines, already old by 2010, print on a coated roll that darkens with heat and fades in a file folder. Jams live in the separation pad. If the machine grabs three sheets, that pad is glazed.