Could you find me a "gadget" that will route my incoming phone calls
to my own personal, digital answering machine (that's sitting on my
desk next to my computer) without having "call waiting" service with
my phone company?  I've checked the computer and electronic stores to
no avail.  Surely, if I can download pictures from space, I should be
able to have my answering machine take a message when I'm online
instead of callers getting a busy signal.  DSL is not available in my
area at this time, which would solve my problem.

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Request for Question Clarification by crabcakes-ga on 21 Oct 2003 22:00 PDT

Hello no1noz, 

A telecom tech friend of mine tells me in order to do what you want, 
you must have call waiting. Since the busy signal a caller hears is
generated at the central office (co), and not your home, the only way
to bypass this would be to have call waiting. Most telephone companies
charge around $5-$7/month for this service.

If you were to get call waiting, I can recommend a device, for around
$80.00 that will either allow you to answer the call or send it to
your answering machine.

Regards,
crabcakes-ga

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Clarification of Question by no1noz-ga on 12 Nov 2003 21:45 PST

To crabcakes-ga - there is no clarification to this question. See my
comments regarding your suggestion about getting "call waiting" or any
other service from the phone company.  You didn't do too good on this
one, but don't feel bad because no one has an answer apparently. 
Contacted the listed sponsored links and got nowhere.  That's why my
name is "no1noz".  Thanks for you effort.

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Request for Question Clarification by crabcakes-ga on 12 Nov 2003 21:51 PST

Hello no1noz,
Now I need a clarification.....I am not clear as to what you wanted me
to clarify! Is there something I can do for you here? You did not want
to obtain the call waiting service, so I could come up with nothing
else.
Thanks, crabcakes-ga

Right no matter what you do (call waiting, forwarding, voicemail),
your phonebill goes up $5 a month.  But maybe your neighbors have
wireless routers you can tap into?  Ask them.

Thanks crabcakes-ga, but I'm not giving the phone company another
dime.  I guess people will have to get used to the old "busy signal"
or I'll try snsh-ga's suggestion to find a friend with a wireless
router.  There's a wide open opportunity for a 101 hacker to figure
out how to get around this annoying situation and make some big bucks.