Strangely one of the most frequentely asked questions is "can I use my voice modem as a telephone?". Yes, with STFax!

There are two ways of using a voice modem as a telephone. If your modem has a speakerphone/microphone you can use this as a hands-free telephone (although the quality is usually pretty dire) or you can connect a micro/headphone to the in/out sockets on your modem and carry out a receptionist-style hands free telephone conversation.

To dial another telephone goto the voice menu and select dial or press the dial button on the main interface. You will see the following window:

You can choose a telephone number to dial from the drop down menu (if you have previously entered this into your phonebook) or dial the number manually by pressing the buttons on the keypad. Alter the volume if necessary (you can alter the volume whilst in mid conversation without the other person being aware).

Press dial to dial the number. You should be able to talk in the normal manner and press hanup when you want to end the conversation.

The mute button turns off your modem's microphone, so that you can talk to other people within your local environment, without the person hearing you via the modem. Simply press mute again to speak.

If you want to receive a fax, whilst taking via your modem (as a telephone), press the receive fax button and this will go into fax mode.

You can manually answer an incoming call by click the answer button on the main page or by selecting "Answer" from the voice menu. You should be able to alter the volume as necessary and hangup when you want to finish the conversation.

If you set the preferences to "voice only" (prefs/misc) STFax will answer the incoming call when "auto answer" is set on within the STFax preferences.