Who uses VOIP??

**thinair** · 06-15-2005, 08:17 PM

I'm thinking of subscribing to a VOIP (Voice Over IP) provider (Primus so far) and I was wondering if anyone has had any personal experience with VOIP at all. I plan on still keeping my landline, but for $36/mo. we get unlimited calling in CAN/US, and 400 minutes to a few select countrys (Portugal and France are listed, and are the only two contries that interest me).

Do I have to swap routers, or can I just use the VOIP gateway with my existing setup....?

digiital · 06-15-2005, 08:40 PM

Another port-chop?

Might want to wait about 3 weeks Rogers going to release their VOIP(If your on Rogers Cable). Also look at Yak Yak, I beta tested their service and it was pretty good. I have a few friend who have used/ and are still using it and they have no issues. As for connecting things , you would feed your internet connection into the VOIP box then from the VOIP Box into your router. Or if you want to be safe, put it behind your network(Behind your router).

The other option to look at is Vontage, but there are so many out there its not funny. But normally the BIG boys have the better rates.

**thinair** · 06-15-2005, 08:55 PM

I'm the original maxbimmer porkchop.

I'm with Sympatico, and I can't see them being in such a hurry to release a VOIP service (being a tradional phone service provider and all).

Betray · 06-15-2005, 09:08 PM

i dunno no need for it yet, so havnt been in the market... i know my mom uses it, but it takes up bandwidth so i aint tellin about it yet

digiital · 06-15-2005, 09:21 PM

Hahaha, well add another to the MB family of porkchops. Well, atleast my bloodline is.

I think you might be surprise to see Bell provide VOIP as odd as that might sound.

Quote:

Originally Posted by thinair

I'm the original maxbimmer porkchop.

I'm with Sympatico, and I can't see them being in such a hurry to release a VOIP service (being a tradional phone service provider and all).

vinay · 06-15-2005, 10:05 PM

I use vonage.ca .. love it..

good / solid service.... i put their box "behind" my network, and gave it a static IP

then I did quality of service on my router to make sure phone traffic on the network is always prioritized

Deep 3.2TL · 06-15-2005, 10:52 PM

Vonage is more expensive then Primus, by $10 on the FULL packages, don't know how service compares. I've been VERY interested in getting this as well as my wife's family is all in Vancouver and Montreal. We use London Telecom for their unlimited cross canada and us for $20 +$3 network fee. for a few bux more I could have a second phone line in the house and I like that idea...

Deep

**thinair** · 06-15-2005, 11:09 PM

What sort of VOIP gateway do you guys use, was it provided for you?

Also, can I get a cheap one without any routing functions?

mkgino · 06-15-2005, 11:40 PM

Hey man, I used to use it all the time. with a cable connection its amazing, just like a regular phone. Also I got this, so I could hook up my cordless to the computer, so you can walk around while you are talking.

http://www.phonebridge.com/

Jari · 06-16-2005, 12:54 AM

I'm using Vonage canada. I took the telephone adapter to Finland and left it there at my brothers house. It works great. He called me today using it (local call) and the sound quality was mint. The customer service at vonage sucks though. Expect to sit on the phone for an hour or more if you need help.

Furious · 06-16-2005, 01:19 AM

nelson talk to me this friday about it, who else better to ask than the guy who putting in the facilities and plant for VOIP for bell,

oh and for the rogers boosters, in the telecommunications world we all know that VOIP wont work properly down the horrible plant that they have, for some maybe, for most good luck. why else do you think they bought sprint canada? they need access to the telephone plant.
the reason bell hasnt released theirs (and its already avalible) is becaus they, for once, are actually doing some R&D before sending it out but lemme tell you , some of the techs working on the inside are telling me that they are getting rediculous speeds of 40-90MB , bell is going to be releasing 2 speeds to residential i believe 11MB and 22MB but just knowing that being cabable of even greater speeds is amazing, wait it out its worth it, ive called on VOIP phones alot and they are seemless, almost like your on a real cooper line.

digiital · 06-16-2005, 09:16 AM

Oh please do tell me why it's not going to work?

Now I will tell you why it will work.
Rogers is NOT using the same bandwidth as their internet service. So it doesn't matter how much stuff your downloading or people in your area. They have created a totally separate internet backbone for JUST voip. Which allows them to increase the audio quality so they don't have to worry about having the call degraded since it's not fighting other traffic on that channel. Second, the VOIP device is able to handle all of your phones in the house. In most cases alot of the VOIPs out there now (ie: Yak Yak) are only able to handle no more then 2 phones connected to it, since it's not able to provide enough juice to ring all your lines at home. Third, built in battery backup, on the VOIP modem and the infrastructure as well. Unlike other VOIP providers they(Rogers) can almost guarantee that the system will be up 99% of the time. If something does happen to fail on the VOIP backbone, the VOIP device will fall over to Rogers HiSpeed channel.

The Reason Rogers bought (which isn't final yet) Sprint is to take advantage of having their own telco/Internet backbone in Canada to provide cheaper rates, example: 1 cent calls across Canada. Since they don't have to pay a third party. Plus think about it this way as well. If Rogers owns Sprint, and Sprint provides Local line phone service, guess who will also provide DSL?(Rogers DSL? Hummmm). As well now that you don't HAVE to have a Phone number to get DSL hooked up. They can hook you up to DSL and Also provide VOIP.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Furious

oh and for the rogers boosters, in the telecommunications world we all know that VOIP wont work properly down the horrible plant that they have, for some maybe, for most good luck. why else do you think they bought sprint canada? they need access to the telephone plant.

**thinair** · 06-16-2005, 11:13 AM

Well, maybe I will hold off for a little bit then, this isn't something I NEED right now. I'm using about $35-40/month right now on long distance, so it's about even with Primus VOIP, plus I'd get the extra line.

I have no issue with Bell what so ever, so maybe I'll wait for them and see how their rates are.

ClayMan · 06-16-2005, 12:14 PM

perfect! my family's moving to a new hous eand i was thinking about VOIPing it (and having NO landline)... was gonna post in the vonage forums, but i figure, it looks like we have a larger variety of experts here!!

-we're gonna need multiple receivers throughout the house, figure about 5-10. will that work?
-if one person is talking on the phone, and another picks up on another handset.. wha thappens? will it be like normal phones, eavesdorpping?
-will all the features of the phones function properly? caller id, call waiting, hold,etc.
-any of you using dry DSL? like i said, i don't want to keep a $50+ dollar copper line.. i want 1 DSL line + VOIP
-what happens in a power outage? is there any connectivity at all? maybe at least for 911 emergency calls? if I have a UPS protecting my VOIP infrastructure, would that solve it?

digiital · 06-16-2005, 12:18 PM

http://www.rapidtel.com/voip_packages.html

They have some pretty good packages.

http://www.digitalhomecanada.com/ind...=263&Itemid=55