Rog13GTCS

Any one using VOIP at your home? I'm looking to ditch the land line, but the wife would like to keep a phone for emergencies, even though we have cell phones...anyway. I've been looking at Google Voice, Ooma and Vonage. Anyone have experience with any of these services? I would like to hear the good the bad and the ugly.

• Google there is an approx $50 piece of hardware to purchase but their service is free, no 911.
  
• Ooma - $110 for hardware, free service, but pay local taxes <$5 a month includes 911
  
• Vonage - $40 for hardware, $10 a month for 1 year. Not sure after that.

Currently, I have ATT phone and on the TV/Internet side we also have Uverse. If I cancel my phone are they going to further shaft me by raising my Uverse rates? So tired of these guys.

Jazzman442

VIOP really Sucks. I'm in IT and I will tell you if you have the bandwidth and there is hardly any jitter then it will work. If you don't run from it..

Also remember the prices you are quoting are for the device and service. You are paying for the networking service separately.

shurtual86

Just get a magic jack, same ish, especially if you don't really use it. The only downside to VoIP is that it relies on your Internet connection, so if your Internet goes out or your power, so does the phone .

tukatz

We ported our land line number over to one of our cell phones so there would be no change there. Now we use our two cell phones and a cordless handset system to which our cell pones connect via bluetooth. We can use any of the cordless handsets around the house to make or take calls, as well as our cell phones. We have a DSL only line from Qwest for internet. Our TV signal comes from an antenna or over the internet.

Moustang

VOIP for "emergencies"?




Really not a good idea relying on a phone that doesn't work if the power goes out for emergency use.

carfreak666

I have had vonage for 2+ years... apart from the obvious drawback of not working when power/internet is out, it has worked great for us. They also have visual voicemail and extensions that basically enable you to use your cell phone to recieve/make calls. Shop around though, most independent sellers are offering free equipment and $9.99 for first three months and then 39.99 after that...

Joeywhat

VOIP for emergencies just won't work. Your cell phones will be infinitely more reliable.

tbone004

We use Magic Jack, so far it has been okay. We have had some people not been able to get through, but they can call my cell phone if they really need me. I use a Google voice number that rings both the home and cell number that I give to business, once they start spamming my phone they can be block easily from Google.

One other thing is you can't dial conference numbers, haven't tried in a while. But needed to dial in to a WebEx meeting once and it blocked me and wanted me to upgrade, I have used my PC or cell since.

Like others have mentioned, make sure you have a good solid internet with decent speeds or you won't be happy. I forget every now and let my downloads take the whole bandwidth pipe and my son yells at me to throttle the download I have going. I have 25 down and 5 upload, normally it is good experience if I am not doing the above.

Noilly Pratt

I have 2 VOIPs at home. Vonage for work (I work at home) and one through our cable provided for the home. Both are reliable and I've had no problems. The Vonage gives me nearly worldwide (well, all the world I need to phone) free phoning for $40 per month, and the home one is about $25.

If I get a Vonage voicemail, a neat feature is that it will e-mail me the message.

As mentioned before, it's a pain to have no phone when the power is out, but that is a rare occurrence, and I have a pay-as-you-go cell phone for emergencies.

Jim74656

just so everyone is clear (and this is coming from a tech in the field that worked for a Major cable/phone/tv providor) if you have a box thats called Arris (at least this is what we used at Charter) and I know that Insight (now known as Time Warner Cable) also uses the Arris modems (known as MTA) those "phone modems" are still a form of VOIP as far as the device communicating over the network with an IP address, however for those of you who are complaining that your phones don't work in an emergency the MTA (if so equipped) should come with a back up battery and if your box DOES NOT have a back up battery then you can request one, charter (at the time) charged only $40 for the battery with install and that included tech coming out and installing the battery and the new box with battery and setting it up correctly...( have one at my house and while we have maybe two power outages in the time we lived in our house for 10 or so years (give or take) we like knowing that the battery is there if our power happens to go out for some reason (and during a business call its quite frustrating to loose the call and loose $1K every minute your with out communication abilities)


but your "land lines" are in some form a VOIP system, and if you don't believe me just ask your cable service provider if you heve phone service with them they should know....


also I want to add that the E911 services are going to be different with your traditional "VOIP" verses the landline or similar system, magic jack I have used and its (IMO) not great for 911...I would use a land line or a cell phone and keep the land line as the go to phone because your battery while good for mobile phones won't last forever and having a land line is a good back up

MKPony

I agree with what everyone is saying about power outages but also remember you need an old corded phone connected or a battery backup for your cordless phone for a power outage too.

That said, I have used Ooma for several years and have been very pleased with that, again it is very much dependent on your internet connection. With Ooma (available online or at Costco) basic service is taxes and fees only with other optional (premier service for call blocking and other things, international calling) add ons. You also need to make sure your service address is correct for 911 to work properly.

Rog13GTCS

Thanks for the replies and input. What kind of band width would be the minimum or would be recommended?

As for my "emergency" comment. We think we still want the ability for 911 so at the moment that is a requirement. I understand what you are saying about power outages. I dont want to discuss the infinite scenarios: if they power is available or not. I recognize it as a risk.

Our natural tendency is to use our landline over the cell. The wife isnt ready to chuck the line and go total cell. That is why I'm looking at voip. I want to make sure I understand what to expect if we go this route.

My base ATT bill is $65 a month without making a long distance call , and I'm more than ready to dump it.