VOIP Phone service

[msparks]

Anyone use VOIP phone service?

I found a pretty good deal through tigerdirect.com that has first 2 months free, plus free activation, plus I get to keep my local number, all for $19.99 per month.

It's through Packet8.

Currently with bellsouth I pay over $70 per month for my unlimited long distance and local service.

 

[Doug]

It won't last. It's too expensive. Overtime it will get a little cheaper, but not enough for the service you will get. Don't expect the service to be as good as your POTS line now. VOIP has been in the works for over 10 years, it has improved with fiber optic being overly abundant, but it still has a ways to go. So many companies have gone under by having all their eggs in the VOIP basket. IMHO, it won't last. Too $.

 

[Pablo]

I though the whole argument for VOIP was the superultralow price???

 

[drive it forever]

I have a friend who has vonage. He says the customer service *&#%$. Sometimes his voice is a little choppy and robotic.

 

[JustinH]

we use vontage here. I make roughly 5,000 minutes in long distance calls a month. I run an internet business. Its not a regular phone thats for sure, its good sound quality, but sometimes sounds like a choppy cell phone some times. Its cheap as dirt, and I love it though.

 

[Doug]

quote:

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Originally posted by Pablo:
I though the whole argument for VOIP was the superultralow price???

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the companies are not making money. They have so much tied to R&D. A few things to consider; I'll give you some inside advice. I am a Sr. Tech Support Engineer(fancy title, eh?) for the 3rd largest local phone service provider. We are implementing some VOIP as a trial. On average, our complaints are higher with the VOIP customers than regular land line. Complaints as; choppy conversations, popping noise, etc. This is due to the packets of data getting corrupted/interfered with from other IP packets. Just like you with high speed internet, you can get problems with your pages downloading, due to the same thing. This is IP, it's packet based, IMHO, it won't change.
The BIG problem with VOIP phone service is you will NOT have E911 features. ALI and ANI are what the 911 operators use to look at your address and name. Right now, all VOIP customers are routed to the admin line at the PSAP(911 answering center) Therefore, they have to ask you who you are and for your address. Not good...

 

[Doug]

One more thing...If you do port your number over, it could take OVER a month. Trust me, Bellsouth is in no hurry to give your number away...

 

[sxg6]

voip is still in its infancy, of course there will be things that need to be worked out, i guarentee itll make land lines obsolete

 

[Doug]

quote:

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Originally posted by sxg6:
voip is still in its infancy, of course there will be things that need to be worked out, i guarentee itll make land lines obsolete

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They've been saying that for OVER 10 years, still nowhere close to that. Maybe in another 15 years? Doesn't matter what they come up with, still hard to get away from a network that's already in place. Look at cellular, look at our technology, yet calls still drop, there are many areas that have no coverage, etc.

 

[wwillson]

I work for a very large phone/networking company. Both my home and business line are VoIP and my wife can't tell the difference between VoIP and POTS. Believe me, if she could tell I would know. The company I work for has spend hundreds of millions of $$ so far on VoIP research, engineering, design, and implementation. I can absolutly promise you that VoIP will supplant TDM over time. Why? If you knew how much a DMS, 4E, and 5E network costs to maintain, you would understand why carriers are all implementing VoIP. Besides, the features and flexibility with VoIP are awesome. I now spend most of my time designing wide area networks for customers that are running VoIP - it's here to stay.....

Wayne

 

[wwillson]

Anyone want a demo? I'll call you - send me a PM....

 

[XS650]

quote:

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Originally posted by wwillson:
Anyone want a demo? I'll call you - send me a PM....

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I speak to some people in other states that use VOIP and can't tell adifferenece when I'm talking to them. One thing they all have in common is good fast internet connections.

 

[Not the Autorx Frank]

Been using Vonage here for 4 months and love it...

$28 per month unlimited and a free month with every referral.

We have comcast broadband internet with 4 cpus hooked up w/ the phone also and works good even w/ all 4 cpus using the net.

 

[labman]

I have had Vonage for a year and a half, and I love it. It and high speed cable run $72.20 a month for full featured local service and unlimited long distance. The first long distance call I made using it, my daughter commented on how much easier to understand I was. I can understand others better now.

My local non Bell telephone company stunk. I was paying $40 for local service with pulse dialing and number only caller ID. Their switching equipment would miss numbers when I dialed. If I wouldn't have escaped to Vonage, I may have burned their office down by now. They of course did not let me transfer my number. Good and well, my new number is now a local call for more people in the county than the old one. Unfortunately, it is a toll cal for those stuck with the local company.

 

[wwillson]

quote:

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Originally posted by Doug:

quote:

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Originally posted by wwillson:
I work for a very large phone/networking company. Both my home and business line are VoIP and my wife can't tell the difference between VoIP and POTS. Believe me, if she could tell I would know. The company I work for has spend hundreds of millions of $$ so far on VoIP research, engineering, design, and implementation. I can absolutly promise you that VoIP will supplant TDM over time. Why? If you knew how much a DMS, 4E, and 5E network costs to maintain, you would understand why carriers are all implementing VoIP. Besides, the features and flexibility with VoIP are awesome. I now spend most of my time designing wide area networks for customers that are running VoIP - it's here to stay.....

Wayne

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Your talking maintenance on a pstn vs. implementing new switches. Since the pstn is already in place, it's relatively inexpensive to maintain. Most RBOC's have had their network in place for a looooong time. Sure, we've migrated and cut older dms10's & AXE10's to newer 100's and 5e's. It will be a loooong time before the RBOC's get hit badly by VOIP. You're talking about providing service for 200 million POTS customers, NO voip company is even close to being able to provide that.

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Doug,

First of all Merry Christmas. I don't work for an RBOC. Instead I work for a LD company that MUST compete against the RBOCs that have had a fantastic legislative run in the last 10 years. We have about 140 full 4Es that are VERY VERY expensive to maintain. Is a matter of fact, we will decommision the first 4E in about 18 months, and continue until they are all gone. We are replacing the 4Es that cover an area about 1/2 the size of a football field. With VoIP switching systems that you could probably fit in your bedroom, and handle twice as many calls as a 4E. We now have hundreds of commercial and tens of thousands of consumer customers turned up on VoIP. These customer basically have completely decoupled themselves, for the first time, from the RBOCs high priced monopolies. The RBOCs last mile monopoly is slowly being eroded.

Here we come....

Again, Merry Christmas.

Wayne

 

[seotaji]

quote:

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I found a pretty good deal through tigerdirect.com that has first 2 months free, plus free activation, plus I get to keep my local number, all for $19.99 per month.

It's through Packet8.

---

You can get the same deal through their website. Don't be fooled by tigerdirect. Nothing but scammers.

I've had Vonage for 6 months now and while it's had some issues (the robotic sounds, popping, etc...), they've all been caused by downloading LARGE (10GB+ files a over 300kbps) for long periods of time. I've never had any problems when using my broadband connection normally. It's been so reliable that I've decoupled myself from the local bell.

The cost savings are enormous. Though I wish the international LD rates were cheaper (they are about 2-3 cents cheaper usually). Also if you refer your friends, they get a free month and so do you. If you're lucky, you get two.

What's great about VoIP is that you can use it the same way you use your POTS line. Every phone in my house is connected to the VoIP box using the house wiring. All I had to do was disconnect the phone line outside. Wonderful.

 

[Doug]

quote:

---

Originally posted by wwillson:
I work for a very large phone/networking company. Both my home and business line are VoIP and my wife can't tell the difference between VoIP and POTS. Believe me, if she could tell I would know. The company I work for has spend hundreds of millions of $$ so far on VoIP research, engineering, design, and implementation. I can absolutly promise you that VoIP will supplant TDM over time. Why? If you knew how much a DMS, 4E, and 5E network costs to maintain, you would understand why carriers are all implementing VoIP. Besides, the features and flexibility with VoIP are awesome. I now spend most of my time designing wide area networks for customers that are running VoIP - it's here to stay.....

Wayne

---

Your talking maintenance on a pstn vs. implementing new switches. Since the pstn is already in place, it's relatively inexpensive to maintain. Most RBOC's have had their network in place for a looooong time. Sure, we've migrated and cut older dms10's & AXE10's to newer 100's and 5e's. It will be a loooong time before the RBOC's get hit badly by VOIP. You're talking about providing service for 200 million POTS customers, NO voip company is even close to being able to provide that.

 

[michaelc80]

I've had Vonage for several months now. After the first month, we switched to it exclusively and dumped our POTS line. The service is superior, the sound quality is far better (we live in the country) and it is significantly cheaper ($30 compared to nearly $70 for POTS). We use it for our alarm system and fax with no problems either.

I've heard some people say that the sound quality is not as good as a POTS line, but I suspect that has to do with the Internet connection more than Vonage. Get a decent broadband connection (I have a 1.5MBS wireless) and you'll be fine.

 

[labman]

A few additional thought about phones. My wife and I are not young, early adopters. No it is the old folk clinging to their cheaper, almost land line. Both our kids have abandoned conventional phones and have nothing except cell phones.

VOIP is not perfect. For one thing, you are dependent on both cable and electricity. Without an UPS, you can't call the electric company to tell them the power is off. On the other hand, POTS isn't what it used to be even for people with real phone companies rather than my local joke. I feel I had no other choice. I fought not being able to connect ever since I started using email in 1992. I originally signed up with the internet service provided by the local joke. They are one of the major providers in the area. They are milking their ''captive'' phone customers to expand into cable and internet. They still do not offer digital cable, but fortunately I have Brighthouse cable. My thinking was that if I had problems, with the phone and ISP under the same ownership, they would work together to fix it. Dumb, dumb, dumb. The same old crap about ''It is your equipment''. It went on for years without me knowing where the problem was even after I changed to another ISP. You would think with 4 different computers, different OS, and 7-8 modems over the years, if the problem was my equipment, one system would have worked. Finally one night when I complained one more time to my ISP, they told me their equipment had no record of me dialing in. The phone calls to their data number never went through. After a long struggle, I convinced the phone company it was a dialing problem. They tried, but could not fix the problem. Finally I found an out.