Tired of paying for a landline

T

Techmasta

Gawd
Joined
Jul 28, 2003
Messages
851
The ~$30/mo AT&T local calling bill isn't worth it when I hardly use my landline, but I've had the number forever and want to keep it. Are there any reliable VOIP providers that I could port the number to? Ideally it would have a mostly pay-per-minute plan to keep the cost low. I have a couple Polycom IP phones so BYOD would be good too.

I'm looking at Vitelity. Anyone have any alternatives?
 
Vonage is reliable. But you still will pay around $20 a month. I pretty much left any land line and went all Cell phone now. I did get MagicJack for that one time I might need a phone in the house so I do have a home phone on that for now.
 
I've been on Vitelity's Pay as you go plan for a while with an old Nortel SIP phone on my office desk for a while now. I spend probably $35-$40/yr. Sometimes life is just easier with a good speakerphone :D Mine's backended with an Asterisk box so it's a little overkil for your scenario, but you can run just a single phone off of their service w/o issue. Before the current setup, I had an old Cisco 7960 connected direct to Vitelity.
 
You can always call and check with your phone company. Ive got mine to where I pay like $5 a month to maintain the line then like $.10 a minute per calls or something like that. That way its there in an emergency.

I live in one of the towns that got clobbered by several tornado's back in April and was glad Id kept my land line. We werent allowed out of our town (we could leave but wouldnt be let back in), cell phones were pretty much dead and we had no power so my land line phone was all I had.
 
You could also pay the 20 bucks and port the number to google voice and just forward it to your cell phone. That way you have the number. PBX in a flash has support for google voice or you can setup an asterisk by yourself.

You mention voip but do you want it as another line or just want to keep the number?
 
I don't think there is a gaurantee that a voip service will retain the same number yet? I duno maybe they are better now haven't looked at it in awhile once I went landline free I never went back.
 
Correct me if I am wrong but you can port your number anywhere.
 
Nate7311 said:
I've been on Vitelity's Pay as you go plan for a while with an old Nortel SIP phone on my office desk for a while now. I spend probably $35-$40/yr. Sometimes life is just easier with a good speakerphone :D Mine's backended with an Asterisk box so it's a little overkil for your scenario, but you can run just a single phone off of their service w/o issue. Before the current setup, I had an old Cisco 7960 connected direct to Vitelity.
Click to expand...

More information please. How would one go about using an old cisco phone connected directly to their service?
 
Check out voipo.com for 6.21 a month for unlimited calling by the way I am a reseller for voipo.
 
I would have to say a good alternative would be Google Voice and an Obi110 ATA adapter, which natively supports Google Voice.

21K5RPffbmL.jpg


My buddy uses it and reports it has very good quality, but unfortunately no 911 service but that can be solved by signing up for a 2nd VOIP provider that has e911 service such as CallCentric. It's $5.95 a month and the Obi110 supports multiple VOIP lines and you switch between them by selecting *1 or *2. OR if you have T-Mobile Cellular Service, you can log in to their website and update you 911 address so it's passed to your local PSAP when you dial 911 from your cell.

Here's an Amazon link: http://www.amazon.com/OBi110-Service-Bridge-Telephone-Adapter/dp/B0045RMEPI/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1320401884&sr=8-1

I think the reviews alone speak volumes about this product.
 
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schnell said:
More information please. How would one go about using an old cisco phone connected directly to their service?
Click to expand...

It's all about massaging the config file. I'll admit it was a little tricky to setup, because the phone has to pull the config file from a TFTP server. If your phone is already loaded with SIP firmware it shouldn't be that bad. Go to VOIP.org and look at info on the 7940/7960 phones first. It all boils down to a Proxy/registration ip address, username and password.
 
http://www.callcentric.com/support/device/

They list only one "supported" Polycom phone, but I have a feeling other models would work fine. I currently have Callcentric (been a customer for a couple of years now). I have two SIP lines with them. I ported my phone numbers from Vonage to them. Ports are a little on the pricey side ($25.00 each) when compared to other VoIP providers. Support has been good (they only offer e-mail support). Only a couple of outages and most were fixed within an hour or two. E911 is included.
 
I use NetTalk. Exactly like magic jack but requires no computer running. Costs 69.99 to buy and includes the first year of service. Additional years are 29.99 / yr. Small device that plugs directly in your network. Emulates a standard analog phone. Unlimited call to all NetTalk numbers, USA, Canada
 
wow...some interesting posts here....whoever said magicjack is on crack.
If 90% reliability and so-so to above avg phone call quality is acceptable...then magicjack is an option. I also believe Magicjack finally has a product that does not require a PC.

My contribution is Ooma Voip. They've had (2) outages within the past 5 years. One was huge but it mostly effected the Western US. The features/pricing and quality are one of the best values on the market and for $10 more a month you can have HD Voice and much more.

My Ooma costs me $3.25 per month for 5000 minutes anywhere in the US along with a pile of other features. http://www.ooma.com/

Comparason: http://www.pcmag.com/image_popup/0,1871,iid=299564,00.asp

Recent Review: http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/ar...omise-of-free-calls-nationwide-133103453.html

Evidently Ooma is listed as #1 VoIP service at Consumer Reports.

I purchased my Oooma Telo on sale for $180.00 without the (2) phones....I use my own phones.

Finally the one review above is incorrect. Calling Canada from the US with Oooma is $ 0.014 per minute.
 
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It might be overkill for you, but if you've got some scrap parts lying around or VMWare on a box, set up an asterisk server (I'm using PBX In a Flash) and your Polycom's should play nice with it. Then pick the provider of your choice. I'm using flowroute, pay by the minute. DID's run about $1 and change a month.

For the time being, cancel every service you have on your AT&T number and call forward everything to the DID you get from flowroute or anywhere else. Once you are happy, port the number over.

I have a "pro" looking system that cost me next to nothing to slap together (except for the Aastra phones) and only pay for usage and 2 DID#'s, which last month was about $8. The only downside to flowroute is that you also pay for incoming calls. You can use skype connect, free incoming, ~1-2 cents per minute outgoing, but I don't think you will be able to port over your existing number in the future (unless they have changed that).

Another nice benefit, you can add an IVR to the system and have calls routed based on pretty much anything. Known numbers go straight through to my phone, everyone else gets IVR. Just a mere "Press 1 to speak to me or 2 for..." will get rid of everyone calling you with a predictive dialer (telemarketers, etc...).
 
cryptok1d said:
I would have to say a good alternative would be Google Voice and an Obi110 ATA adapter, which natively supports Google Voice.

21K5RPffbmL.jpg


My buddy uses it and reports it has very good quality, but unfortunately no 911 service but that can be solved by signing up for a 2nd VOIP provider that has e911 service such as CallCentric. It's $5.95 a month and the Obi110 supports multiple VOIP lines and you switch between them by selecting *1 or *2. OR if you have T-Mobile Cellular Service, you can log in to their website and update you 911 address so it's passed to your local PSAP when you dial 911 from your cell.

Here's an Amazon link: http://www.amazon.com/OBi110-Service-Bridge-Telephone-Adapter/dp/B0045RMEPI/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1320401884&sr=8-1

I think the reviews alone speak volumes about this product.
Click to expand...
I have one of these and it works well. Got a local phone number from Google too.. for free :D
 
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I've used PBX In a Flash with the Polycom phones before and I might go that way in the future. Right now I'm really just looking to hold the number.

I didn't know you could port numbers to Google Voice. The VoIP providers I'm looking at now are:

Vitelity
Callcentric
Ooma

I might call AT&T too and see if I can get on a cheaper <$10 plan.

Thanks for all the replies.

mikecLA said:
It might be overkill for you, but if you've got some scrap parts lying around or VMWare on a box, set up an asterisk server (I'm using PBX In a Flash) and your Polycom's should play nice with it. Then pick the provider of your choice. I'm using flowroute, pay by the minute. DID's run about $1 and change a month.

For the time being, cancel every service you have on your AT&T number and call forward everything to the DID you get from flowroute or anywhere else. Once you are happy, port the number over.

I have a "pro" looking system that cost me next to nothing to slap together (except for the Aastra phones) and only pay for usage and 2 DID#'s, which last month was about $8. The only downside to flowroute is that you also pay for incoming calls. You can use skype connect, free incoming, ~1-2 cents per minute outgoing, but I don't think you will be able to port over your existing number in the future (unless they have changed that).

Another nice benefit, you can add an IVR to the system and have calls routed based on pretty much anything. Known numbers go straight through to my phone, everyone else gets IVR. Just a mere "Press 1 to speak to me or 2 for..." will get rid of everyone calling you with a predictive dialer (telemarketers, etc...).
Click to expand...
 
I consider myself "poor white trash" .. so in an effort to save a bunch of money over the course of the next 12 months .. and after reading a bunch of stuff on the net .. it was either Ooma or Nettalk Duo .. went with the Nettalk Duo for $49.99 (shipping included) from newegg of which includes the first 12 months of service and I can port my existing number over for free.

Ooma's inital cost setup was a bit on the high side for me .. as well as the monthly cost was higher then the nettalk device..

We'll see how it goes ..some say you get what you pay for :p .. but the wife and I aren't really picky. We don't own cell phones, we don't spend much time on the phone .. and as long as we can understand whoever is on the other end .. we're happy.

..are standards are probably lower than some in this regards. :)
 
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