what's the best VOIP provider?

[danica89]

i'm trying to compare prices, services and promos. what's the best deals in the VOIP industry? any comments, suggestions, thoughts and rants are welcome.

[tokenuser]

VoIP is a mixed bag, and you really need to be clear on what you are asking for and why.

Vonage is the most common one out there as a commercial supplier with a monthly contract. I am not sure about their viability in the long term though - and due to recent patent infringment lawsuit rulings against them from Verizon, I would suspect they are bleeding money.

You local cable company probably offers a "Digital Telephone Package" which (funny enough) is just VoIP. Advantage of these deals is not so much the service, but the fact it is bundled, and is cheaper if you have cable+internet+digiphone.

From this point on it gets more interesting - you are into the realm of Skype, Gizmo, Google, and Yahoo (and a slew of others) that offer PC based VoIP services. This is a home brew market that can be a lot of fun, but will only be as "commercial grade" the amount of effort you put into it (ie the ability to use the service without a PC being turned on via a WRG54 Router Firmware hack, the ability to use a handset, incoming/outgoing calls via Skypein/out, personal PBX systems via Asterix, etc). Homebrew is interesting, but always keep a backup plan - because tech is only as reliable as the effort you put into keeping it running.

The problem with VoIP over a convention phone line is that if you lose power, you lose the phone service. Also 911 calls are an issue - they have no idea where you are calling from (though this has improved, its still not an absolute phone number to physical address relationship).

Confused yet?

There is a lot to learn, but think about WHY you want VoIP. If it is as a replacement for a landline, I would strongly suggest using a cellphone instead; but if it is an educational exercise, go for Skype - you'll have a lot of fun.

BTW - I was involved in a VoIP implementation project for a business using Cisco gear back in 2000, and use a private VoIP solution to connect back to my home office (I have a phone on my desk that acts just like a regular PBX extension). these are private implementations and work really well (mostly). I will say the biggest issue is that when I am online, even with port forwarding, my phone sucks down the bandwidth, so if I am doing a lot of internet traffic (common when I am demoing our software), I need to use a landline - otherwise the connection is just too choppy to be particularly useful.

[danica89]

so it seems like the VoIP industry wont be around for a long time? i know the technology is still new and has a lot of its flaws that's why i dont think VoIP providers should let customers pay for their services since what they're giving is an untested and imperfect service which might provide more problems rather than more good. I need to find a VoIP provider which gives free service.

and yeah, it is confusing

[tokenuser]

On the contrary, VoIP will be around for a long time, but the Vonage model is heading for collapse in the face of bundled services from cable providers, or home brewed solutions like Skype.

[danica89]

why did verizon file a lawsuit against vonage? did vonage copy verizon's technology?

[snowdust]

have you guys tried voip.com? they offer one of the best promos around in the VoIP industry.

here's the link: http://www.voip.com

[danica89]

does voip.com work on dial up? how come no one's replying..

[tokenuser]

Originally Posted by danica89

does voip.com work on dial up? how come no one's replying..

What more do you want us to say?

Are you seriously thinking of running VoIP over dialup? Unless you are running broadband, don't even bother. Broadband is a requirement, not a recommendation.

Instead of trying to save money on long distance, invest in a broadband connection, THEN save the money on long distance using VoIP.

[danica89]

fine.. oh well. i ought to try voip.com first since snowdust told me that it works on dial up.. thanks anyway.

[tokenuser]

Originally Posted by danica89

fine.. oh well. i ought to try voip.com first since snowdust told me that it works on dial up.. thanks anyway.

Try it out - whats the harm (unless this was a viral shill promotion by voip.com). I have implemented commerical voip solutions in large scale corporations. A modem (dialup NOT DSL) connection at a maximum of 53kb might work, but the performance will be degraded, and call clarity will be lousy.

Your call, but picking up the landline phone to make a call over VoIP kinda defeats the purpose.