Vonage

[talldude123]

Who has Vonage Internet Phone? How does it work? Can your entire house use the Vonage network, even the phones in the basement where the computer isn't located, or do you have to have the phones next to the computer.


That's what makes Vonage seem stupid; having a phone modem with two ports; the phones can't be anywhere in the house, only by the computer.

 

[Him]

That's why cordless phones were invented. And, just like cable, when you get it installed you have a jack put where you want the phone. It's just like when phones were first introduced, you had to have a jack put in where you want it to be, and it's still like that. What do you do if you have your internet connection in the basement, and you want to put a computer two floors up and have it connected to the internet? Well, you would do the same for Vonage.

 

[Sevoma]

Vonage is like any other voip service. You plug in your ethernet cord into it's box and it gives you phone jacks. It is basically like any cp,puter phone service, but that little box is the computer. It uses your internet bandwidth to transmit and recieve the voice data. You can use any phone with it, as it just plugs into a phone jack.

 

[talldude123]

Is it better to have Vonage VOIP, or have the cable company install Digital Phone service with a cable modem instead?

 

[Elbatrop1]

Vonage
Pros
Cheap
Long distance, calling features, blah blah blah

Cons
Doesnt work if power goes out
No service calls if a problem occurs
Uses your internet bandwidth
Self done install (non-professional) which usually means that all phones in the house wont get connected

Cable Co phone
Pros
Works if power goes out
Service calls
Long distance, calling features, blah blah blah
Professional install (I know you have Shaw, and here they do the install for free) which you can have all existing phones hooked up
Dedicated network for phone, so it wont be degraded if you or your neighbors are downloading/uploading
You can keep your current landline phone number

Cons
Usually more pricey than Vonage and regular landlines. However, worth it if you do long distance calling.

 

[Crysalis]

a friend of mine tried vonage. They were without a phone for 2 months. They cancelled.

I have heard nothing but bad about them... i would stay away.

 

[talldude123]

Honestly, i wouldn't get Vonage.

Vonage = $39.95 per month.
Shaw = $45 per month.

I really thing it's worth it for that extra $5.05 per month, especially when it works with all phones.

 

[Him]

How is the VoIP offered from the local cable company any different than Vonage? It's not. They both use the same protocol (VoIP: Voice over Internet Protocol), they are both used through the cable lines. The cable company started offering it to compete with Vonage, make more money. It does not differ, Vonage does not use more bandwidth than the one the cable company gives you. If the power goes out, the one from the cable company wont work either. How are you going to power the box that you plug the phones into? Both the phones from the cable company and from Vonage need those boxes to function, and without power, they canot function.


There are several different codecs that Vonage and the like use. They are 30kbps, 60kbps, and 90kbps. Most people use the 30 one, so lets use that as an example. Remember that there are 8 bits in a byte. Most calls over VoIP send packets at about 78bytes and the standard call will send about 50 bytes per second, so that comes out to some 3900bytes per second, and 234 kilobytes per minute. 1,024kb in 1MB, 1024/234=4.376MB per minute. If you have standard Comcast or other cable, you are getting at least 3Megabytes per second. This isnt very much bandwidth to be concerned with. My office uses VoIP which works the same as Vonage and the rest, and this is not a cause for concern on the bandwidth.

They ALL do this, not JUST Vonage. Vonage was just the first company to do this, so people are hatin on them. You can also keep your current landline number with Vonage, as with everyone else.

EDIT; Vonage for small business, where you can call outside of the US (to Puerto Rico and other places) it is $39.95. For unlimited home calling within the US, it's $24.95. If Shaw is $45.99, I dont think the $20 a month is worth it. And what does Shaw have over Vonage? Not much, except that it's more expensive. And if something goes wrong, it's not Vonages fault, they just send you the box to plug in, it's the cable companys fault, because it's their internet line. They send out service calls with their phone service, because the men they send out to fix it are just cable repair men. You should all do some more reading on Vonage and VoIP and anything else before you start making gross assumptions.

 

[Elbatrop1]

How is the VoIP offered from the local cable company any different than Vonage? It's not. They both use the same protocol (VoIP: Voice over Internet Protocol), they are both used through the cable lines. The cable company started offering it to compete with Vonage, make more money. It does not differ, Vonage does not use more bandwidth than the one the cable company gives you. If the power goes out, the one from the cable company wont work either. How are you going to power the box that you plug the phones into? Both the phones from the cable company and from Vonage need those boxes to function, and without power, they canot function.

You must not have really read too much about how cable companies supply phone service. It's actually a complete modem, with battery backup, that usually gets installed in a basement, to connect to all the phone jacks. Not only are the modems backed up with batteries, mainline equipment is as well.

You are right in saying that the cable co phone doesn't use more or less bandwidth compared to vonage. However, cable co's use a seperate channel for modulation and a seperate network for phone service as to not compete with internet traffic.

 

[talldude123]

You must not have really read too much about how cable companies supply phone service. It's actually a complete modem, with battery backup, that usually gets installed in a basement, to connect to all the phone jacks. Not only are the modems backed up with batteries, mainline equipment is as well.

You are right in saying that the cable co phone doesn't use more or less bandwidth compared to vonage. However, cable co's use a seperate channel for modulation and a seperate network for phone service as to not compete with internet traffic.

I guess you work for a cable company Elbatrop1?

I do like the cable company's digital phone over Vonage. Much clearer, and you don't need to have junk around your PC area. And why do they offer different styles of modems for Vonage? They should be free, cable companies modems are free!