Replacing phone with VOIP

[e86s54]

Quote: Originally Posted by Urchina
We've chosen NOT to replace our land line with VOIP, for safety reasons. To wit: if the power is off, or our internet service provider is down, we can't make a call.
Same here. Additionally, if you have a security system, the security firm must have a landline to hook into, unless you set up a wireless line for them that you know will be reliable.

Same here. Additionally, if you have a security system, the security firm must have a landline to hook into, unless you set up a wireless line for them that you know will be reliable.

First I would like to mention that I am a 25 year telecom Eng veteran. I have worked in CATV, wireline, wireless and sat telephony.

Both quotes above are not entirely correct. First, Vonage and others have a feature that will direct your incoming calls to your cell (or number of your choice) should you lose VOIP/DSL service (and most of us seem to have mobiles these days).

Second, Vonage and others have selectable bandwidth usage (quality of service). By selecting "High" quality, your VOIP line will carry low speed modem traffic via a robust protocol. That is typically what alarm traffic is, dialup, handshake to acceptable protocol and short burst of data.

I have had Vonage at home for over a year now and have had no issues.

Regards...

 

[tryan]

I think the concern with land-line-lovers is dialing out ... the UPS on my modem and router have worked fine thru many outages (home monitor dials out just fine). IP providers have generator back-up so the problem should not be on thier end.

Back on the number porting ... when I ported from Comcast to Vonage I was without phone for a day while the two coordinated the swap. That was a few years ago (might be better now).

 

[Bimmerbill]

Ohhh, ooma says 3 to 4 weeks to port a number over. That means I need to get 1 month of Vonage to tide me over.

Maybe a change in phone number is a good thing. Would save me $60 too.

 

[e86s54]

The whole phone number porting thing is kinda off a pain. Plus where I live there is no VOIP service provider than can provide me with a local number. So I decided to go to a toll free number and virtual attendant service. I used ringcentral.com

So I have a voip service with Vonage, but with an out of town number. I have a cell as does my wife and two teenage kids.

So now if anyone wants to reach us, they dial our toll free number and then get provided with a menu..dial one for me, 2 for my wife, three for my son and four for my daughter. So if you dial me during the day, the call routes to my desk at work and my cell simultaneously. After hours, its my home and cell simultaneously. If you select my wife, home and cell simultaniously. If you dial my daughter, she wants the home phone to ring first for 4 rings and then her cell.

So I hope everyone gets the point. If you want to reach any of us, you just need to call our Toll Free number...you don't need to know all our cells or home numbers and if any of them change, I just change then entry in my system (online).

The other nice thing is that if you leave a message on anyone's extension, it emails them the message and sends them an SMS indicating so. So I was able to drop voice mail on my cells at a cost of $10/month for every phone...that paid for the toll free service.

Finally I can call the toll free number from anywhere in north america, enter a code and dial out a number from any phone including pay phones.

Regards...

 

[walkinwood]

Has anyone tried to use Skype to call other regular phone numbers? Also, any experience with using Skype-In? Skype-In gets you a phone number so people can call you from a regular phone.

Skype's computer to computer voice quality (and video) is excellent. I'd like to know if the same holds true for computer to phone.

 

[tryan]

$10/month for every phone...that paid for the toll free service

My tenants would love me to give them an 800 number ... but the site says the $9.99 plan is only good for 100 minutes (am I missing something?).

Could never give the number out to to "everyone". We push 3-4 hundred minutes most months (family of 4). So we'ld still have a porting issue (too many people would have other numbers).

 

[bamsphd]

I think the concern with land-line-lovers is dialing out ... the UPS on my modem and router have worked fine thru many outages (home monitor dials out just fine). IP providers have generator back-up so the problem should not be on thier end.

Last ice storm we lost electricity and cable based internet. However, the plain-old-telephone service stayed up all week, and the Verizon cell phones kept working all week. We personally had electricity back for awhile before cable/internet was restored.

My brother is on a different cable company one town over, and that cable company was dropping portable generators at the bottom of telephone poles as they restored their coverage. His cable/internet was restored before his electricity. However, he then lost cable/internet and noticed that the portable generator the cable company had dropped at the end of his street had run out of gas! His electricity came back on later, but apparently the cable company's equipment was still connected to the out-of-gas generator instead of the grid, because the cable was not immediately restored. The next morning the cable company picked up the generator, and apparently reconnected their equipment to the electrical grid and his cable service came back online.

I've certainly been tempted to drop plain-old-telephone service, but I have not made the jump yet.

 

[tryan]

Last ice storm we lost electricity and cable based internet.

The ice storm we weathered (last Dec) took down lines (and poles!!) through out the area. Phone lines were lieing on the ground severed along with cable and electric lines.

Your cell phone was your best friend!

 

[e86s54]

My tenants would love me to give them an 800 number ... but the site says the $9.99 plan is only good for 100 minutes (am I missing something?).

Could never give the number out to to "everyone". We push 3-4 hundred minutes most months (family of 4). So we'ld still have a porting issue (too many people would have other numbers).

First, that 4 cells at either $6 or $10 a month for voicemail...so just under $40/month saved from paying cell companies for voicemail. My tollfree service is $24/month for 500 minutes/month.

Second, I'm not sure I understand your second question/comment? $24 month for 500 minutes should do it. You don't need to port anything.

To me this was a good solution to all these number issues, but it may not work for you.

Regards...

 

[e86s54]

The ice storm we weathered (last Dec) took down lines (and poles!!) through out the area. Phone lines were lieing on the ground severed along with cable and electric lines.

Your cell phone was your best friend!

Having worked with Cable and wireless systems in Network Operations I can perhaps shed some light on the effects of ice storms and widespread outages.

First, ice storms damage infrastructure universally (pole line distribution & power). So how it affects you directly really depends on how your local plant is deployed. You can have some situations when you will have cable but not phone, or visa versa. CableTV plants are powered "along the way", while most of the phone system is power from the central office. Central offices usually have backup power vs batteries/generators. CableTV power supplies usually have battery backup also.

Cell sites and cellular phone switching systems are generally powered the same as land line phones, but the fact that they are wireless means that they have antennas. Antennas covered with ice can cause high VSWR that can shut down the systems. Back-haul traffic to the switching center mostly rides in the cabling plant and so are susceptible to physical failure also.

Second, in really catastrophic situations (like hurricane Katrina), you can lose all infrastructure and so you need to rely on sat systems who back-haul to distance central offices away from the current calamity. Services like Globalstar, Iridium, MSAT, etc can fill that need.

I guess it all depends on what level of system availability you need. But I know it will be very high and you may be better off focusing on how easy and quickly you can get emergency services as this will be a far bigger issue that communications.

Regards...

 

[Bimmerbill]

ooma set up was quick and easy. Crystal clear voice calls, tested it for about 2 hours of gabbing. Can access my voicemail on my PC and play my messages, and even download them (wonder if I'll run into any legal issues?).

I started the process of porting my existing number over. Hope it goes smoothly.

 

[e86s54]

Another option for number control is Google Voice. You get a google phone number for free that you give to everyone and then manage how that number is handled. It's at the beta stage now, but should be rolled out soon enough. http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=2221A9118B95978F

As far as voice quality goes, VOIP uses some pretty strong compression (more voice information squeezed into less bits). That can pose problems in voice quality. But bandwidth and processor usage can also adversly affect voice quality.

Regards...

 

[calmloki]

Looking at ooma - does it still come with a Scout and ooma hub?
We have a dedicated fax line and fax via one of the computers as well, also have wired phones in the garage, attic, and bedroom. The 4 wireless handsets complete our non-cellular phone system. Thinking that if we were to upgrade our internet speed to T-5 and go to ooma it could be all advantage. Anyone using a fax on ooma for incoming and outgoing transmissions? Using Premier for the extra line and special ring? Anyone take their ooma hub to another location to maintain single # phone service? Thinking ahead to a possible second home....

Costco ooma $200
port phone # $40
ooma Premier $120/year
cost/year = $360 cost for current 2 # landline/year = $840

 

[Katsmeow]

I have Vonage. I use it with a cordless phone with several handsets so we just have the master handset we plug into vonange then the other handset just plug their bases into the electrical outlet. Works great. It is true that if the internet or power goes out...there goes the phone. However, we have the cell phone in that event.

We do also have DSL and for the last 3 years had it with a metered landline phone service since it was required then for the DSL. It costs about $15 a month and we never use it (phone is in the drawar).

ATT now offers DSL for $10 more per month without the phone line so going without the phone line saves roughly $5 a month.

 

[Bimmerbill]

My ooma is working great. I like the blacklist option, and have already added some of those annoying robodialers (car warranty, credit card scam).

I kind of felt bad for the Vonage rep I called when cancelling. She asked why, I said I get free VOIP and she was trying to find a way to keep me. Offered $8.99 a month, and I said I get it FREE now.

Not sure if the blacklist option requires ooma premier or not. $99 a year special right now for it.

 

[Texas Proud]

I have Vonage. I use it with a cordless phone with several handsets so we just have the master handset we plug into vonange then the other handset just plug their bases into the electrical outlet. Works great. It is true that if the internet or power goes out...there goes the phone. However, we have the cell phone in that event.

We do also have DSL and for the last 3 years had it with a metered landline phone service since it was required then for the DSL. It costs about $15 a month and we never use it (phone is in the drawar).

ATT now offers DSL for $10 more per month without the phone line so going without the phone line saves roughly $5 a month.

The AT&T $10 per month is for people who have not had it before.... and only for the first year... it is $20 otherwise...

I am on the $10 per month... but will probably get a new number and increase the speed after the year... and then port my phone number to someplace else...

Maybe getting a second phone now is not that bad...

 

[CoolChange]

Hoping this is not too much of a hijack:

I am looking for a new VOIP solution myself. I have been using Skype for several months (mostly to dial into insanely long, boring conference calls that have 800 number dial-ins). But, recently, I have been having a lot of trouble (garbled sound, dropped calls, etc.) if my Internet connection is not perfect. I started using Skype not only because they are 100% free for this use but also because of their reputation for being able to compensate for this kind of thing better than most other providers. This no longer seems to be a focus for them since I have been hearing similar issues from other Skype users recently.

So, I am looking for a new VOIP provider which will not drop calls when the Internet connection quality is not perfect (speed, latency, etc.). I realize that call quality will suffer as connection quality degrades; but, I would think that someone would have the technology (ideally software only) to handle this more gracefully than just dropping calls.

Background: At home, I currently use Charter Communication's HSD service which is great at times but seems to have significant issues almost daily in the early afternoon as well as whenever we have any kind of weather (high winds, rain, etc.). When I travel, I experience a wide range of connections ranging from barely better than dial-up to much better than my home connection.

I would think this kind of issue (quality of Internet connection) might plague most of our global travelers as well as some of our expatriates; so, I am hoping any suggestions, information, etc. will be broadly useful.

 

[Kronk]

I've been on ooma for maybe a month or so now. The phone number porting worked fine. No problems, but then I haven't tried anything weird like the 2nd number or faxing. There is a slight latency, but I'm not sure if it is the same as a normal phone line would be. The quality has been great.

calmloki, have you checked out their forums? The following thread might be of possible interest: https://www.ooma.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=1184&start=0. Short answer is that it seems to be able to work.

We've got the "old" setup, which is the Hub + Scout. We don't have the Scout hooked up, as we just have a cordless 3-phone setup plugged into the Hub. The "newer" Ooma Telo, I'm not sure if that has the Scout capabilities or not.

 

[calmloki]

I've been on ooma for maybe a month or so now. The phone number porting worked fine. No problems, but then I haven't tried anything weird like the 2nd number or faxing. There is a slight latency, but I'm not sure if it is the same as a normal phone line would be. The quality has been great.

calmloki, have you checked out their forums? The following thread might be of possible interest: https://www.ooma.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=1184&start=0. Short answer is that it seems to be able to work.

We've got the "old" setup, which is the Hub + Scout. We don't have the Scout hooked up, as we just have a cordless 3-phone setup plugged into the Hub. The "newer" Ooma Telo, I'm not sure if that has the Scout capabilities or not.

Thanks, hadn't been on the ooma forums - good link on faxing issues and fixes.

 

[tryan]

How long did it take ooma to port an existing number? Thinking of dumping Vonage on the home phone.

Using ooma at the lake; works great. The real test will be a power outage. Simulated one and it worked fine with a UPS on the modem, router and home monitor. We'll see.

 

[Kronk]

How long did it take ooma to port an existing number? Thinking of dumping Vonage on the home phone.

I think they gave an estimate of 3 weeks or so, and they were a bit quicker than that. But it still was a couple of weeks. Actually, looking through my records it was exactly 2 weeks.

 

[walkinwood]

Has anyone tried to use Skype to call other regular phone numbers? Also, any experience with using Skype-In? Skype-In gets you a phone number so people can call you from a regular phone.

Skype's computer to computer voice quality (and video) is excellent. I'd like to know if the same holds true for computer to phone.

Since this post, I have subscribed to Skype-In (your own phone number) as well as unlimited calling to the US & Canada and am very pleased with the quality of the calls. It cost me a total of about $60 for the year. I also got a plantronics .audio 610 USB headset which is awesome.

I've used the service for hour-long conversations with no break-up in the audio.

 

[easysurfer]

Was surfing the web and see that there is a competitor to Magicjack.

I don't own one myself but thought I'd post the link:

TK6000 VoIP Device | netTALK.com, INC.

Happy to see a direct competitor to Magicjack as in several areas Magicjack can use improvement.

 

[jimnjana]

Was surfing the web and see that there is a competitor to Magicjack.

I don't own one myself but thought I'd post the link:

TK6000 VoIP Device | netTALK.com, INC.

Happy to see a direct competitor to Magicjack as in several areas Magicjack can use improvement.

I just picked up magic jack, I was considering nettalk, but from what I can find out, magic jack is avail in all area codes, net talk is not. Replacing one land line phone with magic jack for florida. Will still have a land line phone in GA and VOIP in vacation rental. Now have to decide on internet fax provider.

 

[DallasGuy]

Another option for number control is Google Voice. You get a google phone number for free that you give to everyone and then manage how that number is handled. It's at the beta stage now, but should be rolled out soon enough. YouTube - Broadcast Yourself.

Regards...

Last weekend I was able to convince someone on Twitter to send me an invitation to use Google Voice...and so I set up an account last weekend. There are several reasons to use Google Voice, but the main reason I use it is for making FREE long distance phone calls from my landline in the lower 48 states (2 cents a minute for international calls). I was skeptical about the free long distance phone calls but it's legit. The way it works is after you get your account set up, you log on to your account, go to the call screen, enter the phone number you want to call and then click on the Connect button. At that point, your landline phone rings, you answer your phone and then Google Voice calls the number you want to connect to...and it starts ringing. It works pretty good....and like I said before, it's free. One small negative I've noticed so far is that the sound occasionally breaks up a little...for example on a 50 minute phone call I made earlier this week, the sound broke up occasionally up for a total of approximately 30 secords. If anyone uses a landline for long distance and they pay per minute charges, this is a great option to eliminate long distance phone charges. Another negative for some people might be that they have to initiate the long distance phone call from their computer.

If you want an invitation to use Google Voice, go to their web page and request one...I've read that it takes 1-2 months to get the invitation from Google.
https://services.google.com/fb/forms/googlevoiceinvite/

Also, if you know someone that already has it, they might have an invitation available.