Does anybody use a VOIP service?

[cornyl]

I was thinking about getting VOIP for my home. I was doing some research on line about the sound quality of VOIP services.
It seems that all the VOIP services basically suffer from the data seperating and
combining audio problems.
If anybody out there has had good sound quality without dropouts with their service I would love to here about your expeiriences.
Thanks!

 

[FredA]

I use a MagicJack and like it.
I've not converted my whole home, but use it as an alternate line and while traveling.
I just used it at over a hotel's wireless and worked fine.
I'll try it from Israel next month.
Think it's a good deal - intend on sending one to college with my daughter.
Try it, you'll like it.....

 

[DexterLB]

I use an Ekiga account (the way to access VOIP from linux)
Actually there's even a site: gtalk2voip.com. With it's services you can make calls from voip to googletalk, yahoo, jabber and stuff like these.

 

[BayouRat]

I was thinking about getting VOIP for my home. I was doing some research on line about the sound quality of VOIP services.
It seems that all the VOIP services basically suffer from the data seperating and
combining audio problems.
If anybody out there has had good sound quality without dropouts with their service I would love to here about your expeiriences.
Thanks!

I have had the ATT Call Vantage VOIP for about 4 years now. It's great. I wired it into the whole house. It was easy. Just disconnected the old phone service and plugged in the VOIP router they supplied.(This is different if you have DSL.) I even have it behind my firewall. I use Cox Cable for my internet ISP and they have pretty good up time. The only complaint I have is when my ISP's service is down. But when that happens I just use my cell phone.

 

[...]

I also use vonage, and have been quite satisfied with it.

There is the issue that when our excuse for an ISP's modem craps out you can't get calls, but you can set it up to just give users a normal answering machine recording and then e-mail you an audio file with their response.

What I especially like about vonage is that the viop gateway they gave us is actually a very full featured router (more features than a high end consumer router, but less than a real router or hacked firmware wrt54g etc) Of course you probably don't even know what NAT is, but it really comes in handy to have a router that can do everything I want it to.

 

[lessgravity]

I've had Vonage for almost 4 years now. I have no complaints.

 

[cornyl]

Thanks all for your input.
Since this is my first go around with VOIP I think I might stick with the major carriers like Vonage or verizon products.

 

[maxpower]

I have Vonage. Vonage has a real nice feature that will foreward your calls should your network be down. I have it going to my mobile. If the ISP/router/modem are having trouble calls go to my mobile. To my knowledge this has happened twice.

I am on the limited plan at $14.95/month. Some months I go over and have to pay by the minute. So far my 18 month average is $23/month. Before I made the switch to VOIP my average was over $40/month!

 

[tquigg]

As an E911 Communications Officer who has worked in an emergency dispatch center for 26 years, I can tell you from experience, what ever VOIP provider you use, make SURE that you check to make sure you have no 911 issues! Many E911 Comm Centers are experiencing issues with VOIP 911 calls (our center included). We recently had a resident of our small community subscribe to Vonage. When she called 911 she got the Seattle Emergency Dispatch Center.... about 400 miles away! It took Vonage two weeks to get the routing issue settled. In the mean time, what would they have done had their been an emergency?



Best Regards

 

[Fore Check]

As an E911 Communications Officer who has worked in an emergency dispatch center for 26 years, I can tell you from experience, what ever VOIP provider you use, make SURE that you check to make sure you have no 911 issues! Many E911 Comm Centers are experiencing issues with VOIP 911 calls (our center included). We recently had a resident of our small community subscribe to Vonage. When she called 911 she got the Seattle Emergency Dispatch Center.... about 400 miles away! It took Vonage two weeks to get the routing issue settled. In the mean time, what would they have done had their been an emergency?



Best Regards

Wow, I'd have never thought of that. Thanks for the tip!!!!!

(I moved recently and I'm still investigating best options for home phone service for the long run. VOIP is a possibility.)

 

[melvyn]

I used to use Vonage when I lived in an area with cable internet. At first the service was every bit as good as a standard phone, but after a while the call quality went bad, to the point of being unusable. It turned out that my connection was suffering from a lot of packet loss and frequent periods of long ping times. VOIP relies on a connection with minimal packet loss and low latency, two things that I did not have, so call quality suffered. Vonage support wasn't much help - they blamed the cable company, who in turn blamed Vonage. Funnily enough, at the time the Vonage call quality went to heck, the cable company started to offer their own VOIP package... Hmmm, coincidence? In the end I dumped Vonage and went 100% cellphone, then I moved and the only broadband I can get is through HughesNet satellite which has such high latency that no VOIP (or VPN either) will work.

The only good thing about Vonage was the price. I was on the $24.99 package so I got free calls to Europe so I could talk to my family. Funny thing is, the cost of calling internationally on my cellphone is still less than the Vonage monthly fee.

tquigg: I had to use Vonage to call 911 a couple of times, and both times I was routed to the neighboring county's call center, then routed back to my local 911 service. It didn't take long, but in a life-or-death emergency could be an issue.

 

[tquigg]

Yup. Exactly the type of problem that folks in our area were experiencing with Vonage VOIP when they dialed 911. It wasn't coming to us, but rather being routed to a call center on the other side of the state! Take it from someone in the emergency services business who has experience fielding emergency VOIP calls. Please do your homework and make SURE that the company you go with has their stuff together!

 

[rbeckey]

I recently switched to Comcast's VOIP phone service. After a bit of a rough start due to a bad modem, everything has been good. I cannot tell the difference. Comcast sent a notice stating that their service did work with E911. I haven't tried it yet, thank goodness.

 

[Tucker5246]

I recently switched to Comcast's VOIP phone service. After a bit of a rough start due to a bad modem, everything has been good. I cannot tell the difference. Comcast sent a notice stating that their service did work with E911. I haven't tried it yet, thank goodness.

We use Comcast as well, and hear no difference in sound quality. The fact that all long distance and many other services are included is a big plus too.