Vonage coming to a Circuit City near you

[Nitemare]

link

Down with telco's

 

[Freejack2]

Cool, been a Vonage subscriber for quite some time now. It's nice to be getting all the services and paying less than half what I paid for Verizon's crappy service.

 

[Nitemare]

Originally posted by: Freejack2
Cool, been a Vonage subscriber for quite some time now. It's nice to be getting all the services and paying less than half what I paid for Verizon's crappy service.

How's your service so far?

 

[StageLeft]

Too little, too late. There is little to be had in savings for somebody like me, especially when I have to weigh it against the inevitably less reliable service of such a thing vs. a landline.

 

[StageLeft]

Ah, I'm so full of it.

$14.99/month Vonage Basic 500 Plan

What is the catch or catches? After signup, how much will I ACTUALLY be paying each month for this? I don't care about long distance, but I currently pay _$35 dollars_ month for BASIC phone service with only caller ID. I need C.ID. I'd love to tell bellsouth where to stick it. How much will using the phone compromise my upload speed, for when I'm gaming? I only have 128kbps up 🙁

 

[Freeze]

I'm intrigued. How does this work exactly? I'm use Comcast to get online and I have a router. Does their device plug into the router and work or is there something else involved? I'm checking out the Vonage website as I reply... Thanks!

 

[Nitemare]

Originally posted by: Skoorb
Too little, too late. There is little to be had in savings for somebody like me, especially when I have to weigh it against the inevitably less reliable service of such a thing vs. a landline.

How much do you pay a month for a landline?

I'm practically paying the same price for just a basic local(non-long distance) plan land line & voice mail.
$14 + $4 + We rape you with all sorts of fees and non negotiable charges ~= 35 a month

 

[Nitemare]

Originally posted by: Freeze
I'm intrigued. How does this work exactly? I'm use Comcast to get online and I have a router. Does their device plug into the router and work or is there something else involved? I'm checking out the Vonage website as I reply... Thanks!

They give you a cisco device that you plug your phone in

Click me, Skoorb

 

[StageLeft]

OK How much crap do they throw on their rates in terms of taxes and other ass-happy crap?

Their website sucks. I keep clicking to check on portability and what not and it just submits to itself without saying anything. There is a link about local number portability, which doesn't say anything meaningful. Is it possible to port my landline number to the vonage system?

 

[Nitemare]

Originally posted by: Skoorb
OK How much crap do they throw on their rates in terms of taxes and other ass-happy crap?

Their website sucks. I keep clicking to check on portability and what not and it just submits to itself without saying anything. There is a link about local number portability, which doesn't say anything meaningful. Is it possible to port my landline number to the vonage system?

My number is portable I just checked

Billing info
Initial cost depends on which plan you get

 

[Freeze]

Originally posted by: Nitemare

Originally posted by: Freeze
I'm intrigued. How does this work exactly? I'm use Comcast to get online and I have a router. Does their device plug into the router and work or is there something else involved? I'm checking out the Vonage website as I reply... Thanks!

They give you a cisco device that you plug your phone in

Click me, Skoorb

So is it a "pass through" kind of device that you sit between the router (or PC without a router) or do you plug it into a router. I'm just trying to figure out where this device fits into the picture...

 

[StageLeft]

Is 205 available? Since their website doesn't work, I can't tell, but I think that maybe the entire city of birmingham isn't.

 

[freegeeks]

Originally posted by: Freeze

Originally posted by: Nitemare

Originally posted by: Freeze
I'm intrigued. How does this work exactly? I'm use Comcast to get online and I have a router. Does their device plug into the router and work or is there something else involved? I'm checking out the Vonage website as I reply... Thanks!

They give you a cisco device that you plug your phone in

Click me, Skoorb

So is it a "pass through" kind of device that you sit between the router (or PC without a router) or do you plug it into a router. I'm just trying to figure out where this device fits into the picture...

maybe this can help you out

 

[trmiv]

I'd love to do this, but the savings just aren't there for me when I have to have a landline to have DSL in the first place.

 

[Nitemare]

Originally posted by: Freeze

Originally posted by: Nitemare

Originally posted by: Freeze
I'm intrigued. How does this work exactly? I'm use Comcast to get online and I have a router. Does their device plug into the router and work or is there something else involved? I'm checking out the Vonage website as I reply... Thanks!

They give you a cisco device that you plug your phone in

Click me, Skoorb

So is it a "pass through" kind of device that you sit between the router (or PC without a router) or do you plug it into a router. I'm just trying to figure out where this device fits into the picture...

You can plug it in to a router or you can use it as a pass thru

 

[Voip]

Interesting.

 

[StageLeft]

Originally posted by: trmiv
I'd love to do this, but the savings just aren't there for me when I have to have a landline to have DSL in the first place.

Yeah that's true. For long distance you should be using Bigzoo.com. Since I now have cable internet, I will actually look into this. I'm sick of having a sore cornhole from BS (bellsouth).

 

[Nitemare]

Originally posted by: Skoorb
Is 205 available? Since their website doesn't work, I can't tell, but I think that maybe the entire city of birmingham isn't.

Has an email notification for area codes

I was basically paying $10 for a cheap dial up, $35 for basic phone service, and $20-40 a month for long distance phone cards.

Switched to Road Runner and will soon be getting Vonage, for roughly the same cost.

 

[Thraxen]

I'd love to do this, but the savings just aren't there for me when I have to have a landline to have DSL in the first place.

Ditto. We have cable here too, but the speeds don't match SBC's current offerings. I refuse to drop to a slower connection. I wish SBC would sell the DSL seperate from basic phone service.

 

[Nitemare]

Originally posted by: Thraxen

I'd love to do this, but the savings just aren't there for me when I have to have a landline to have DSL in the first place.

Ditto. We have cable here too, but the speeds don't match SBC's current offerings. I refuse to drop to a slower connection. I wish SBC would sell the DSL seperate from basic phone service.

How fast is your DSL?

Checked my cable the first day I had it was +1.6 MB down and 400kb up

 

[Fiveohhh]

My Telco let me drop my landline and keep dsl. And I love having vonage. I get all the features for free, gt mu voicemail sent to my email I can carry to any place I want and get my phone to ring there, and best of all one step closer to ditching the phone company

 

[Freejack2]

Originally posted by: Nitemare

Originally posted by: Freejack2
Cool, been a Vonage subscriber for quite some time now. It's nice to be getting all the services and paying less than half what I paid for Verizon's crappy service.

How's your service so far?

With Vonage themselves it's been pretty decent. I signed up somewhat early in their life and there were some initial problems like faxes not working properly and no names on the caller id. They've since fixed all that and the service has been good.

However something to keep in mind. The service is only as good as your internet connection. If your internet connection goes down so does your Vonage. Mind you, you have the option of forwarding your calls to another phone when this happens or just letting it go to voicemail.

Speaking of voicemail, one thing I love is I can retrieve voicemails over the web and I can even have the voicemails e-mailed to me as a .wav attachment.

I'm paying $27 and change a month including all taxes and fees, for unlimited local and 500 minutes of ld.

 

[NogginBoink]

Vonage has been good for me too, but Comcast hasn't been as reliable with the cable modem service as I'd like.

I pay $33 or so a month total, and that includes $5 for a second phone number in a different area code.

As a service, Vonage is great. As a solution, the dependency on a reliable internet connection is a major drawback. When my internet connection goes down, I can't call comcast support!

But I'm keeping it. It almost halved my local telco bill. And voicemail is there when the internet connection goes down.

Skoorb, here's my last month's bill:

Unlimited Local/Regional Plus Plan for xxx-xxx-xxxx(02/11-03/10) $24.99
Virtual Phone Number for xxx-xxx-xxxx (02/11-03/10) $4.99
Sales Tax: $0.00
FET Tax: $0.90
Regulatory Recovery Fee: Details $3.00
Total Amount: $33.88

 

[NesuD]

Originally posted by: Skoorb
Ah, I'm so full of it.

$14.99/month Vonage Basic 500 Plan

What is the catch or catches? After signup, how much will I ACTUALLY be paying each month for this? I don't care about long distance, but I currently pay _$35 dollars_ month for BASIC phone service with only caller ID. I need C.ID. I'd love to tell bellsouth where to stick it. How much will using the phone compromise my upload speed, for when I'm gaming? I only have 128kbps up 🙁

Friend of mine has had this for 4 months now the upload can be a problem. What he has experienced is that if he is talking to someone on the phone and has a sudden demand on the uploads the person on the other end can no longer hear him. Looks like uploads basically cut out the phone. Need a way to reserve a set amount of upload bandwidth for the VoIP's exclusive use. Other than that He has been very happy with it. I woud use it myself if there was a way to reserve an adequate portion of my upstream bandwidth to the VoIP so I wouldn't have to worry about losing someone in the middle of a call when the 11 yr old started a starcraft server from up in his room or the 14 yr old decided to send an mp3 to his buddy through an instant messenger when i was in the phone.

 

[WinkOsmosis]

Hmm I get free long distance on my cell.