| leadbelly |
I have had VOIP with Primus for over a year now. I loved it at first, my phone bill went from $60/month for a hard line to $20/month by taking advantage of the "pick your area code" feature so that all my lengthy long distance phone calls to family became local calls. Voice quality was noticeably poorer, but I could live with that.
Recently though, things are different. Making a connection seems to be some kind of a random exercise where your 1st two attempts at dialing a number are considered "practice" and only your 3rd goes to the intended destination. I consider this too poor to accept, and need to do something.
Any recommendations to be made? Is Skype better? Or just forget about VOIP until it is ready for prime time? |
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| Geek |
Hiya Leadbelly,
How about a cellphone?
Lots of people I know have dropped the wires/VOIP all together for their cells.
Cheers! |
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| I_Forgot |
A cell phone is NOT what you want if you want cheap phone service. I am amazed at how much people spend on those things.
I have used Packet8 VOIP for a few years and it is usually pretty reliable.
Recently, while I was in Japan, I installed skype on my computer and was talking to my wife in the US. It was unbelievably good! The voice quality was better than local phone call, and had less delay. The connection was perfect every time.
I recently retrned to the US and bought a camera for making voice calls via skype. It works great, even to friends in Japan. It is almost too good to be true.
I have not yet tried calling a land-line phone via skype, but their rates are very low. I may replace my VOIP service with skype.
I_F |
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| DigitalJunkie |
All of the Voip stuff I've experienced has sucked,HARD.
Echo,delay,horrible sound quality,drop-outs,etc.
The only setup that didn't suck was the Verizon FiOS service,it actually sounded BETTER than copper twisted pair.
And the FiOS internet connection was smoking fast too!
Fiber optics baby! :D |
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| analog_sa |
| quote: | Originally posted by I_Forgot
A cell phone is NOT what you want if you want cheap phone service. I am amazed at how much people spend on those things.
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Not necessarily. While Skype does not work well on my 3G cell (Symbian), Voipcheap works extremely well through SIP. Obviously voice quality is not that hot but it's 3-8 times cheaper even for local calls. Not to mention that it makes me feel better paying someone in Germany rather than the local bunch of extortionists. |
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| leadbelly |
| quote: | Originally posted by Geek
Hiya Leadbelly,
How about a cellphone?
Lots of people I know have dropped the wires/VOIP all together for their cells.
Cheers! |
Actually, I sort of have already done that. I have a cell with a Calgary area code as my main phone that's $10/month, and a VOIP with a Montreal area code wired to my house outlets for $20/month. This arrangement is both cheap and comfortable, as the long calls are all made on the big handset.
I'm wary of Skype though. Recently I was travelling with a buddy who had Skype on his laptop and I made a call home via Skype over a hotel room internet connection. The sound quality was absolutely horrible, worse than what I get now with VOIP on my throttled cable modem (256kbps). |
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| I_Forgot |
Wow ! $10 /mo for cell service?
In the US minimum is $30 or $40/mo. and that doesn't include the various taxes, corporate welfare charges and miscellaneous overcharges. A $40/mo plan ends up costing $60/mo. after all that junk is added. $30-40 /mo. is voice only. Start sending text messages and you pay more. Send pictures or video and pay much more. Try web surfing and the cost goes through the ceiling. I really can't understand why people would spend so much money every month for that, but an awful lot of people do. I've seen people with family plans that give multiple handsets and asked about their bill and they pay $300 per month by the time they add on all the extra stuff. You can buy a car for $300 a month. In a lot of places you can rent an apartment for $300 per month. $300 to talk/text/picture/websurf on a (alright, 4 phones) phone? You gotta be nutz!
If I could get cell service for $10/mo, even just voice only, I'd abandon land lines entirely, and use skype for international long distance.
I_F |
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| jleaman |
| What about Vonage ? |
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| Geek |
Hi,
| quote: | Originally posted by I_Forgot
Wow ! $10 /mo for cell service? |
Yes and it's well known that Canadian's pay up to 60% more than equivalent packages in the US (other than PayGo, which we pay around 30% less).
I'd say you have really crummy providers in AZ, or state laws allow them to really hoop you guys good :( |
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