I found the recent OT discussion about VoIP phone service very interesting, since I, too, have been interested in getting such a service, hopefully one that would be cost effective enough for me to dump my overpriced traditional telephone service. I haven't actually used any of the VoIP alternatives yet, but here is what I've learned thus far. I tried the $139.99 www.woot.com link that Louise provided and found that it was for a refurbished Ooma device with VoIP service, but the ad also said that it was sold out. In a subsequent message, Terry Plemons said, "Its $40.00 at Best Buy. You need only an internet connection." but did not specify what device or service was $40.00 at Best Buy. I stopped by Best Buy in Austin yesterday (Friday) and found that the Ooma device with VoIP service was currently sale priced at $200 and that the regular price was listed as $250. The Ooma device apparently is designed to provide wired telephone service over the Internet. You plug your existing landline telephone into a telephone connector on the Ooma device (instead of plugging the telephone into a traditional phone line), and you use an Ethernet cable to connect the Ooma device to your existing high-speed Internet service (either a DSL modem or a cable modem, depending on which type of Internet service you use). Since Ooma connects directly to the Internet (not to your computer), it should work even if your computer is off, disconnected, or nonexistent. The purchase price of this device is relatively high compared with some of its competitors, because it includes "lifetime" service and does not require any monthly or yearly fee (unless they convince you to buy their "Premier" service). In order for it to work, however, you still will have to buy high-speed Internet service somewhere, so you still will have to pay some ISP for that. From what I've read about Ooma, it's supposed to have exceptionally good sound quality for a phone service, but as you might expect, high quality requires a high data rate. According to the requirements I've seen in the fine print of Ooma ads and on the box, it requires high-speed Internet service with "minimum 256Kbps upstream" data rate. At first glance, this doesn't look very demanding, since even the slowest "high-speed" Internet services advertise data rates faster than that. The problem is that the prominently advertised data rates of most Internet services are downstream (not upstream) rates, and when you read the fine print, you find that their claims for upstream rates are much lower than for their downstream rates and that for some of the cheaper "high-speed" Internet services, the claimed upstream rates are less than Ooma's required minimum. Furthermore, when you read the fine print from most ISPs even more carefully, you find that their claimed data rates are not guaranteed minimums, but are actually upper bounds on what they might provide. They typically advertise data rates "up to" some appealing value. What they actually provide can vary, and in some cases, may be significantly less than what customers think they are buying. The bottom line is that not all "high-speed" Internet services meet Ooma's stated minimum requirement, and if you are trying not to pay any more than necessary for Internet service, you might find that it's not easy to determine which services will or won't be adequate for Ooma. One alternative suggested by Terry Plemons and Fritz Holt is magicJack. The initial cost of magicJack is much less than that of Ooma, but it requires a computer and involves a small yearly service fee. The magicJack device costs about $40 and includes the first year's service. Subsequent service costs about $20 per year. The magicJack device plugs into a USB port on your existing computer and uses your computer to access the Internet through your existing "high-speed" Internet service. The device has a telephone jack, into which you can plug in any ordinary land line telephone. A major difference between magicJack and Ooma is that magicJack depends on your computer to operate and, hence, only works when your computer is running and connected to the Internet. The last time I checked, magicJack was supposed to work with Windows computers and with Intel based Macintoshes, but would not work with the older PowerPC based Macs. I'm not sure what Internet service data rates are required to support magicJack. I'm hoping that its upstream data rate requirement might be less demanding than that of Ooma, but, thus far, I've not found that specified. I see now that magicJack is also offering a free download of some VoIP software called magicTalk, which is advertised to provide "free calls to US phone numbers and other magicTalk/magicJack users anywhere in the world". This is labeled as a "BETA" version and appears to be something very new. I just discovered it on the Internet tonight and don't know much about it yet. There also has been some early information released about a new device called magicJack Plus, which is supposed to be a new improved version of magicJack which is similar to Ooma in that it does not require a computer and can connect directly to your Internet service via an Ethernet cable. The preliminary information I read indicated that this new device with first year's service would cost about $50 (only $10 more than the original magicJack) and that subsequent service would still cost $20 per year. I'm not sure whether magicJack Plus is actually available for purchase yet or whether it is still in the testing phase. That's about all I've been able to find on this topic thus far. I hope some of you will find it helpful and that the rest won't find it too boring. If any of you have additional information or actual experience with how well any of these VoIP services work in combination with which types of "high-speed" Internet services, I'd like to hear from you, perhaps off list if you think it's too OT for Texascavers. (Notice that in reality, most Texascavers subscribers don't object to, and sometimes even participate in, OT discussions when they find them interesting. The complaints begin whenever people get bored, or worse yet, whenever someone feels offended by what someone else says. Then even genuinely cave related topics are liable to get denounced as OT, so use your own judgement about how far to continue this genuinely OT thread on Texascavers, unless ..., perhaps, you can find a way to relate it to cave telephones. ;-) Rod -----Original Message----- From: Terry Plemons Sent: Aug 12, 2011 1:22 PM To: Louise Power Cc: sheryl.ri...@gmail.com, Texas Cavers , greater_houston_gro...@yahoogroups.com Subject: Re: [Texascavers] OT - VoIP Phone service Its $40.00 at Best Buy. You need only an internet connection. On Fri, Aug 12, 2011 at 1:14 PM, Louise Power wrote: > I don't know anything about the device or the service, but I just saw it > on www.woot.com for $139.99. In addition, they have the world's coolest > t-shirts. > > ------------------------------ > Date: Fri, 12 Aug 2011 08:55:00 -0500 > From: sheryl.ri...@gmail.com > To: texascavers@texascavers.com; greater_houston_gro...@yahoogroups.com > Subject: [Texascavers] OT - VoIP Phone service > > > Do any of you us VoIP phone service? I really need a home phone because my > cell service here is horrible. But, I do not want to give Verizon $100 a > month for a home phone. > > Thanks. > Sheryl > --------------------------------------------------------------------- Visit our website: http://texascavers.com To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com |
