VOIP: Yea or Nea? Your advice requested...

[shiny!]

I got such great advice here about e-readers that I thought I'd ask you guys about VOIP.

I'm thinking of keeping my DSL with CenturyLink but dropping my landline in favor of VOIP.

For what I'm currently paying now for DSL and a phone line with no features, I could get VOIP with features like Caller ID and Call Forwarding, plus afford a cellphone with ting.com for emergency use.

Is anyone here using VOIP? If so, how do you like it? What's good about it, what's bad about it? Did you port your phone number?

What providers have you used and how do you like their service? Are calls clear? How's the reliability?

What equipment do you use to connect?

Google Voice is free (for now), but I'm concerned about Google data mining and privacy issues. Vonage is expensive but gets good reviews. By any chance does anyone here have experience with Vitelity, Flowroute.com or voip.ms?

What haven't I asked that I should know about?

TIA!

[jiimbergin]

Re: VOIP: Yea or Nea? Your advice requested...

I got such great advice here about e-readers that I thought I'd ask you guys about VOIP.

I'm thinking of keeping my DSL with CenturyLink but dropping my landline in favor of VOIP.

For what I'm currently paying now for DSL and a phone line with no features, I could get VOIP with features like Caller ID and Call Forwarding, plus afford a cellphone with ting.com for emergency use.

Is anyone here using VOIP? If so, how do you like it? What's good about it, what's bad about it? Did you port your phone number?

What providers have you used and how do you like their service? Are calls clear? How's the reliability?

What equipment do you use to connect?

Google Voice is free (for now), but I'm concerned about Google data mining and privacy issues. Vonage is expensive but gets good reviews. By any chance does anyone here have experience with Vitelity, Flowroute.com or voip.ms?

What haven't I asked that I should know about?

TIA!

We use our cable company, Charter. It works fine. One of our daughters uses Verizon and that is fine. One son has had vontage for more than 7 years and it works fine, although in the beginning the sound was not quite as good. There is simply a box that connects to both the internet cable and also to a phone jack. That is all there is to it.

[mfyahya]

Re: VOIP: Yea or Nea? Your advice requested...

I would recommend a provider that uses standard voip protocols and doesn't lock you into using their device.
This would allow you for example to set up your smartphone to also make and receive calls over wifi with your voip line with an appropriate app (useful while travelling). Or even set up a software PBX if you're more adventurous.
There are many providers of varying quality. Two reliable ones I can recommend are axvoice and broadvoice

Note that you will lose your voip line during power failures since your modem and voip adapter run off the grid. There are also some issues around 911 calls. See this Wikipedia link . For phone hardware anything from Polycom is great quality.

[shiny!]

Re: VOIP: Yea or Nea? Your advice requested...

We use our cable company, Charter. It works fine. One of our daughters uses Verizon and that is fine. One son has had vontage for more than 7 years and it works fine, although in the beginning the sound was not quite as good. There is simply a box that connects to both the internet cable and also to a phone jack. That is all there is to it.

Thanks. I don't have access to cable where I live, but it's good to know that VOIP is becoming fairly commonplace.

[shiny!]

Re: VOIP: Yea or Nea? Your advice requested...

I would recommend a provider that uses standard voip protocols and doesn't lock you into using their device.
This would allow you for example to set up your smartphone to also make and receive calls over wifi with your voip line with an appropriate app (useful while travelling). Or even set up a software PBX if you're more adventurous.
There are many providers of varying quality. Two reliable ones I can recommend are axvoice and broadvoice

Note that you will lose your voip line during power failures since your modem and voip adapter run off the grid. There are also some issues around 911 calls. See this Wikipedia link . For phone hardware anything from Polycom is great quality.

Thanks, mfyahya. I'm thinking about getting an unlocked Obihai SIP adapter and plugging it into my phone and router. That way I won't need to buy a special phone or install any software. Is there a special advantage to using a software PBX, assuming I could figure out how to set one up in Linux?

[ER59]

Re: VOIP: Yea or Nea? Your advice requested...

I and all my friends used to use Skype. My daughter used it to have math lesson with her teacher in India. It used to be very good. However, MS is adding advertising to it. I am looking for alternative as well.

Ekiga, formerly GnomeMeeting, is the best known Linux VoIP clients. .... OOvoo is a combination VoIP, video-conferencing, and IM program ...

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/networking...-services/2488

[aaron]

Re: VOIP: Yea or Nea? Your advice requested...

I have used Vonage for years. It is good, so long as you have reliable (and reasonably fast) Internet connection. It is pricey, however.

I suggest you call your phone/dsl company and ask them about VOIP services. Tell them you can get VOIP much cheaper. They will either offer you a better deal or sell you their own voip service. Check your DSL contract too... you may be getting a hidden deduction because you also have phone service with them. You might get sticker shock.

If Google Voice works for you now, then I would suggest that. At worst, they will sell it for 10 or 20 bucks. And, for now, you can test it for free. (in my experience, it is a great service as well).

[FrankL]

Re: VOIP: Yea or Nea? Your advice requested...

I've used one of the Betamax clones (Voipbuster) and it was ok-ish. I didn't port/buy an incoming number to use with it.

I used it with a POTS phone using a Linksys PAP2T adapter, and call quality was average and sometimes an echo would be heard on the other end (not my end). Might have been due to the settings used in the PAP2T, I never really looked much into it. My current ISP provides VOIP integrated into their ADSL modem, so I haven't bothered with either the PAP2T or voipbuster since. It sure was a lot cheaper than non-VOIP phone calls though, especially for international calls.

[flintlock]

Re: VOIP: Yea or Nea? Your advice requested...

Yea. I use Ooma. http://www.amazon.com/Ooma-Telo-Free...&keywords=Ooma

You can buy the box for $149 now and that is pretty much the last money you will ever spend on home phone service with the exception of the small taxes the govt gets each month. At least until the box dies. Ours is still going strong several years later. Good sound quality. Includes nice little voice mail retrieving machine. You can also retrieve VM online. This is not really our primary phone as we mostly use cell phones now, but my kids use it and really have had no complaints. Ported my old land line number over with no issues. Small fee involved for this.

I would caution bundling services with cable or other providers. Not only is it really no better quality in most cases, but you will be less inclined to fire them for poor service in the future if it means having to set up everything all over again. I have heard from several of my customers who have had issues with Uverse and Comcast VOIP. (Most likely operator error). A lot of VOIP issues may also have to do with internet service, not the VOIP itself. But the Ooma type box could not be easier to set up. Just plug in and set up in about a minute. Plan on a nice set of cordless phones if you don't already have some. Most of the problems I see in my business regarding VOIP arise when trying to tie these into the old wired connections in the home. I think I've saved close to $1500 on phone service so far. I'm sure there are other similar systems out there, this is just what I've used and found satisfactory.

[globaleconomicollaps]

Re: VOIP: Yea or Nea? Your advice requested...

I and all my friends used to use Skype. My daughter used it to have math lesson with her teacher in India. It used to be very good. However, MS is adding advertising to it. I am looking for alternative as well.

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/networking...-services/2488

I'm using an older version of skype. I use version 5.5.0117. Here is a little hint about how to disable autoupdate This was the last version that had free support for the screen share feature. The problem with alternatives to Skype is that Skype provides the ability to call a regular phone ( with a payed subscription). With Skype you are getting a network of routers and T1 lines, not just an app for your computer.

[shiny!]

Re: VOIP: Yea or Nea? Your advice requested...

Checking out Ooma now, and comparing it to the Obi with a VOIP provider like Flownet, Anveo or Vitelity... thanks!

[ER59]

Re: VOIP: Yea or Nea? Your advice requested...

Thank you! I'll look into it. I used to talk to my friends all over the world for free and the quality was pretty good. Having the ability to call a regular phone is very important because my old relatives in russia do not use computers.

[lektrode]

Re: VOIP: Yea or Nea? Your advice requested...

I have used Vonage for years. It is good, so long as you have reliable (and reasonably fast) Internet connection. It is pricey, however.

...

+1
have used em since 2005, mostly to offload celtel demand; read: when at home/in the office, i use it to make outgoing/1-800 calls, esp - helps keep me from bouncing off my celtel plan limit (1000mins/mo fer 55bux, verizon)

have their 300min/mo plan = 12bux/mo + taxes and some BS 'intellectual property fee' = appx 16bux/mo tl
and on a good month manage to bang em for upto double that on 1-800 calls = freebies, that would o/w be celtel usage.

but the best part is that overage is only .05/min - vs celtel overage at .35/min.
and so i very seldom/ever go over on either.

bottom line: i would rec em, and they give you a free 3ch router (or did, back in 2005, which i had em upgrade in 2007 ;)

[photoncounter]

Re: VOIP: Yea or Nea? Your advice requested...

I had vonage for ~4 years, that I used only to make international calls. Just cancelled the service as international call card rates have dropped significantly + I didn't use it as much. Basically it started to feel expensive. Their call quality was good, but like someone already mentioned, good internet connection is a must.

Have you looked in to Magic Jack ? I have never used it, but heard good things: http://www.magicjack.com/plus-v05/

[javaljav]

Re: VOIP: Yea or Nea? Your advice requested...

You'll have to make sure your Centurytel DSL line rate is decent say ~3 mbps and noone is going to be streaming videos while you talk. Check to see if someone in your area are getting good 3rd party voip (Obi, Vonage etc..) experience.

I have Obihai linked to Google voice for 1+ year. With basic (15mbps) Fios, working out well so far even when netflix is running. A few times it dropped calls, especially when I am logged on to VPN and in a conference call fire up a Livemeeting etc. Probably a sudden surge knocked out a keep-alive packet and I got dropped from a bridge. Never been dropped in a person-person call (no bridge). I wouldn't recommend it if you are on official calls a lot - especially with folks from the other side of the ponds.