VOIP - Lingo or Vonage?? What do you use?

[shoozleboy]

I'm looking at adding a 2nd phone line to my house for my personal use and to see how well the VOIP technology works.

Does anyone here use it now? If so, how does it sound? I have heard conflicting reports as to it sounding like your regular POTS lines and also sounding like you're in a bottle ....

Eventually, I wouldn't mind moving my main line to a VOIP if it works well as a 2nd line. I was looking at Vonage and Lingo's services for comparsions, and I do have a cable modem, not a DSL service, so I'm covered there.

Any feedback as to experiences with it would be much appreciated.

Thanks.

[JSB]

I'm looking at adding a 2nd phone line to my house for my personal use and to see how well the VOIP technology works.

Does anyone here use it now? If so, how does it sound? I have heard conflicting reports as to it sounding like your regular POTS lines and also sounding like you're in a bottle ....

Eventually, I wouldn't mind moving my main line to a VOIP if it works well as a 2nd line. I was looking at Vonage and Lingo's services for comparsions, and I do have a cable modem, not a DSL service, so I'm covered there.

Any feedback as to experiences with it would be much appreciated.

Thanks.

I good friend of mine needed a Cleveland local number (even though he is out in the burbs) quick for his small biz. He stoped at BestBuy or CC and within 90 minutes was up and running on Vonage.

Sounds digital... like most cell phones... not to bad though. My buddy likes that the number is unlisted... voice mail is saved a .wav (i think) file and email to him.

If your going to cut the cord on you landline... I am not sure if these VOIP have figured 911 service yet. Or if they have, does it play nice with your local 911 center??????? I am not sure... something to think about.

JSB

[SquirrelDip]

I'm also very interested. Not so much on the providers but on the hardware - I'm looking for a cheap source for the voip hardware (either ip phone or voip gateway to standard phone) and using one of the free services like http://www.freeworldialup.com/

Thinking of getting friends/family hooked up for free calls between us...

[Capmaster]

I use Skype VOIP. It sounds great

[SquirrelDip]

I use Skype VOIP. It sounds great

So do I and I agree that it sounds great. Problem is that da wife refuses to do any talking via computer (and same with many relatives). If they can pick up a regular phone (or what looks like a regualr phone) then it stands a chance in the house.

I was thinking of using a gateway device and tapping it into line 2 of the basic house phone line. A two line phone (or a phone wired to line 2) could be plugged in anywhere to use the voip.

[Ripper2860]

I use Vonage and have never had a problem. Great sound quality and can use QOS to reserve bandwidth for Voice transmissions if you are a download hog.

They do have a national 911 service and you have to declare your emergency and verify your address. They in turn dispatch the appropriate local emergency service and copordinate with local 911 services. I don't beleive they have a 411 servicem, but I'm not sure.

The v-mail and wav e-mail/v-mail is great for forwarding messages to relatives, etc. Outstanding reporting and logging of al inbound and outbound calls.

Also -- if your brodband goes down or there is a problem reaching your VOIP box -- calls are automatically routed to a number you specify -- cell, etc. So you never miss a call.

Fax option and call forward /hunt works great too !

BTW -- I have one VOIP modem and have it connected to the wall rather than a phone. All phones in the house use VOIP / Vonage while connected to their normal wall jacks !!.

I am telco free (Cable) and loving it. None of those riduculous taxes levied to subsidize pork belly projects.

[Roundabout]

I haven't used any VoIP services since the days of Dialpad (remember them? :P ) and I've heard that Vonage is among the best of VoIP>POTS services. But there's also others such as AT&T and ones like Packet8. The Packet8 service is a bit cheaper than Vonage ($19.99/mo vs $24.99/mo for Vonage), and they give you the adaptor and two free months of service and a free VTech dual handset cordless phone system. See pg. 10 of this weeks CompUSA ad, here's a scan of it:



There's at least a couple of others out there with similar services. There's going to be more competition in this space in the next couple of years, and POTS may well go the way of the dodo before long if this continues.

[bazooka]

If I ever get a friggin headset, I will use Skype as well.

[shoozleboy]

I use skype for computer to computer calls and I like it, but you can not call the computer from a landline phone - you can call a landline from the computer using skype.

I'm looking at what Ripper did, hook up the house phones through the regular wall jack and use a regular cordless phone. Vonage has that $14.99 a month plan that gives you 500 of minutes anywhere which is more than I need for a 2nd phone line.

I see that BB has the vonage equipment for like $75 - I'm hoping to find it cheaper. I think Vonage loans you the gateway if you subscribe to them...

[hudsonf]

I'm very happy with Vonage. Never had any problems with it. I live in the rural area and it works better than the regular phone because of the poor condition of the phone lines.

[Innershield]

I just hooked up vonage about a week ago. It is awesome. i was very skeptical about getting it. i was afraid the quality would be subpar. It's not. It sounds just like a regular phone line. And you get every option for $25/month. they do have 911 but you have to activate it on their website and you have to enter your address because your address will not come up automatically if you don't.

[ViRaL1]

I haven't really bothered because until further deregulation I'm stuck having a home phone line in order to keep my DSL. I don't need a second phone line, so there's no real incentive to spend the extra money. If I could have my same DSL and a choice of phone companies, I might give it a try.

[Ripper2860]

** Deleted **

[Innershield]

why not go with cable? It is faster and cheaper usually!

[shoozleboy]

Just an update - I picked up a Linksys PAP2 Vonage start up kit at Best Buy last evening for $60. There's a $50 Vonage rebate and a $10 BB rebate on it (I know what some of you think of rebates - but I didn't buy this because of the rebates, I bought it cause it was the cheapest way to get hooked up with Vonage)

Link to item:

http://www.linksys.com/products/product.asp?prid=651&scid=38

I'm going to fabricate a wire that will run from the telephone port of the PAP2 adapter to my phone punch down block in my A/V box in the basement... that way I can run the phone through the wall jacks to a couple of rooms for me to try out the service. I was thinking the garage and the 'man room' for starters. If that works out, then maybe a few months from now, I can hook up the house number to vonage and dump Verizon and their ever increasing costs yet always decreasing services.

I'll hook up to the $14.99 a month plan for the second line for starters... I'll decide after a while if I like it enough to bump up to something more permanent.

Thanks for the info that you guys shared.... I'll let you know how it works out.