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Skype Killer - Magic Jack - $20.00 a year phone service

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Mitch101

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wtf where do you buy the majic jack? it sells for 40+$ i saw it on sale here for like 30$ i think .. who knows how long this service will last and it has adds on the side of it..!
 
Mitch, a number of people have used it and loved it. Just like any "voip" service, it helps if you know what you're doing. They take a bit of knowledge to get working just right, unless you get an entire package with things like QOS already set up for you to ensure call quality.
 
Bought this thing last week. Sound quality is very good. The only neg that I see is it has to be attached to a computer to work. If your PC is off you have no phone service.
 
That's awesome guys and I figured I needed a PC 24x7 because of it being a USB device connected to a PC. I am a few weeks away from building a HTPC and a Low Powered Server which either could double as the PC for this.

I belive you can order it online with the 30 day trial screen.

As for worrying if they go out of buisness heck 2 months of service now costs me about $54.00 (AT&T Call Vantage VOIP) so anything beyond that works for me and Im saving money.

If all the VOIP carriers got together they could IP to IP and bypass the phone companies on many levels until everyone is VOIP. Wishful thinking.

QOS doesnt work with my current VOIP router even if I DMZ it. Boo.

I do have one question does it store incomming messages on the PC or on the carrier or a combination of the two?
 
Originally posted by: Mitch101
That's awesome guys and I figured I needed a PC 24x7 because of it being a USB device connected to a PC. I am a few weeks away from building a HTPC and a Low Powered Server which either could double as the PC for this.
Click to expand...
That's exactly what I did for Skype, although (IIRC) its costing me ~$40-50 a year.
 
i've used it for about a year now, no real problems. it went down for a day or two, but no big deal. i suggest rebooting the pc you have it on every once in a while. for the money it's hard to beat. i paired it with grand central to have a local phone #
 
For those that don't know, use of this device requires the install of spyware and ad delivery system. I don't know how frequent the popups are or how invasive the spyware is, but due to the fact they really try to hide this info, I've avoided the product.

Non honest advertising FTL
 
news to me, I have it on a media pc so don't really care. but there are no pop up ads. Actually I don't see any ads at all. while it's running there is a program running that shows a dialpad and who's called recently and a banner that tells you information, but it isn't ads. it's stuff like "don't upgrade to vista sp 2" or "click here to optimize magicjack"
 
No doubt they'll increase ads in the future. They've got to make money.

I'm not a fan of any solution that requires a PC running 24/7 to keep the phone up. If you don't mind, the price is right.
 
It can give you an idea of starting a business and sel cheap, monitorless PC for this service. I'd put $150 as based price for such PC. So a consumer should cover its price for a year of service comparing to vonage
 
I cant see how they are going to go out of business, but I can see Skype or another company buying them.
 
A trip to Germany a few months ago put me over the fence on getting one and I'm VERY glad I did. In the airport waiting for my connecting flight I connected to the free wireless internet, hooked my Magicjack up and plugged in the corded phone I brought along with me. I was sitting in Starbucks for an hour calling friends and family using my Magicjack, all the while, people were walking by me near the window and were staring at me with confused faces. It was priceless. For almost 2 weeks in Germany I had my Magicjack hooked up which gave me a US phone over there which was very cool indeed.

Getting the Magicjack also enabled my wife and I to cancel one of our cell phones and now we have a house phone instead. We're saving over $35/month doing this and we just share the cell phone. When I purchased the Magicjack for $40 with a year of service they offer the Platinum upgrade for $50 which gives you another 4 years of service, a total of 5, for $95 with shipping. If you break that down you're talking $1.58/month! The Magicjack has all the features of land line phones like caller ID, call waiting, voice mail, call forwarding etc.

Overall, I'm VERY pleased with mine.

However, be sure to read everything before purchasing one. For instance, my parents' area code still isn't available. Magicjack does give you a one-time phone number change for free but will charge $10 the next time. They are adding area codes all the time so you may have to wait, or just get one and change it when it becomes available. Also, be sure you'll have 911 service.
 
skype killer? I think not. and by a long shot. I hope this company can handle all these new users while providing decent voice quality AND improving on it. then again, i saw some overtanned eldery guy peddle this cr@p "as seen on tv". skype pro's $51.40 got me unlimited talk with a LOCAL phone number of my choice (and I can add more) with call forwarding, caller id, call waiting, 9-way conference calling, and best of all, NO PC REQUIRED. Gotta love my belkin wifi skype phone! heck, even my smartphone supports skype via wifi. why do you need to drag your computer everywhere you go, right? just my 2centz.
 
I've had a MJ for about 6 months and while its not a Skype killer, it is a VOIP killer. There is no 'spyware' or 'adware'.
Its simple...if you have a PC that you run 24/7, or near to it, this is the best deal for home phone service you will find by a long shot. However, I still prefer Skype for mobile use.
Skype has managed to "handle all these new users while providing decent voice quality AND improving on it" so its not exactly rocket science - just because its sold on TV doesn't make it "cr@p".
 
Looks interesting. I wouldn't mind trying it and pairing it with grand central. Unfortunately my recent attempt to signup for grand central was shot down with them saying they are currently not accepting new members.
 
Originally posted by: Gast
For those that don't know, use of this device requires the install of spyware and ad delivery system. I don't know how frequent the popups are or how invasive the spyware is, but due to the fact they really try to hide this info, I've avoided the product.

Non honest advertising FTL
Click to expand...

Spyware? What spyware? I didn't notice any spyware installed along with the software.
 
Can anyone vouch for the ability to run this to multiple phones in the house?

If I have one of those expandable handset systems can I plug it into the base and make calls from any of the handsets in the house?

I'm assuming that it's not as flexible as Vonage that is a "whole house" phone where I can plug into any phone jack in the house and use it.
 
It should work with expandable handset sets. It may work if you plug it into the house to ring phones on any jack. Probably will only ring 2-3 phones though this way because of lack of power. Just be sure to unplug your main phone line coming into your house before you try that.
 
'vi edit' - I'm not sure if this is exactly your question, but.... I have it plugged into a base station and then use 2 cordless phones for coverage around the house without issues.
It does not interface with the phone jacks in the house since it creates one phone jack at you PC - where I have the base connected.
 
Theoretically if you disconnect the phone line coming into the house, you can back jack the Magic Jack into an existing phone jack and any phone plugged into any other phone jack would work. You would just be feeding the system from the MagicJack rather than the Telco line. I picked one of these up a week or so ago and have made probably 2 hours worth of calls with no issues. I setup a Pentium2 300Mhz machine with 128meg of ram and it works great.
 
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