The Down Range Forum
Member Section => Down Range Cafe => Topic started by: billt on June 02, 2011, 06:09:10 AM
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Does anyone have this? I was reading about it on another forum and it sounds pretty good. $19.95 a year and no phone bill. You get a doohickey that plugs into any USB Port on your computer. Then your phone plugs into it. That's it, your hooked up. The only requirement is you must have broadband. I was wondering if you can keep your same phone number?
The only downside I heard is if you have a lot of programs up and running and you get a call, it can break up, so it's best to close everything out when you get an incoming call. Right now I'm paying $24.00 a month for my land line with my cable provider. With Magic Jack that would go from $288.00 a year to $19.95 for the exact same service. I just wondered if anyone has it, and what you thought of it?? Bill T.
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I don't have it, or Vonage, and won't. Voice Over IP (VOIP) is used a lot and is pretty reliable UNTIL there is a power outage. Then its dead. We use it at work for a loot of stuff but we have back-up power and back-ups for the back-up. At home unless you have a battery back-up on the modem/router and can get a generator to recharge it in a long term power outage the phone won't work. Regular phones may cost more but it's built to withstand more damage before going out.
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Don't know about "Magic Jack", but Vonage blows. A friend had it for about three months and just finally got sick of the call "fadeing in and out". I could hear her fine, but she said she could only hear half we were saying, then it would do the oposite with other people. :-\
She'd call back two or three times and sometimes get a really good connection, sometimes not.
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Just use a web cam and Skype is free. It sux, frequently locks up the computer and downloading updates every day.
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Is Vonage the same as Magic Jack? Can your computer be off and will it, (Magic Jack), still work, or are you required to leave your computer on all the time? Bill T.
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It's all the same thing, just different marketing names for "Voice Over Internet Protocol".
Yes, you have to leave your computer on all the time. If you turn it off it doesn't get power to compute any more.
Kind of like the light bulb wont glow if you turn the switch off.
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Yes, you have to leave your computer on all the time.
That sucks. Why don't they have it so it plugs into the modem, not the computer?? Bill T.
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That sucks. Why don't they have it so it plugs into the modem, not the computer?? Bill T.
I'd guess because there is a software component....which, as Tom said, gets updated often.
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I had magic jack for awhile and only had one problem. My mom couldn't hear me very well but I could hear her just fine. I don't think the computer had to be on but mine is anyway. If my mom wasn't so hard of hearing I'd use magic jack. I'd rather pay less than $1.70 a month than $25 that I'm paying now. You get a new phone number with it BTW.
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Our oldest son and his wife tried Magic Jack and they didn't like it at all. They had a lot of missed incoming calls and static. FWIW.
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I have 3 friend who use it and are very satisfied.
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One family member has it and it works OK most of the time. Sometimes the call breaks up badly.
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I don't have it, or Vonage, and won't. Voice Over IP (VOIP) is used a lot and is pretty reliable UNTIL there is a power outage. Then its dead. We use it at work for a loot of stuff but we have back-up power and back-ups for the back-up. At home unless you have a battery back-up on the modem/router and can get a generator to recharge it in a long term power outage the phone won't work. Regular phones may cost more but it's built to withstand more damage before going out.
I had a friend that used that same argument. Only problem was he had a wireless phone. DUH! I have Vonage (got it when it was new and I was making a lot of long distant calls) and haven't had any problems - like getting an email with a vmail left at my home number. If I have a power outage I hope it's localized and rely on my cell.
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I have yet to see any VOIP - except internal within a single company on a private intranet - work well most of the type. We had a guy in England on my last project who used Skype, and he was always breaking up, maybe 1 call in 10 worked as desired. Maybe.
There is another alternative with only up-front costs, no monthly costs. Assuming you already have a cellphone, there are devices that will attach to your incoming wired phone lines and allow you to send and receive calls using your house phones so long as you cellphone is plugged into the base station. The cellphone is doing all of the heavy lifting, the local phones on the dresser, desk, kitchen, etc. are just convenience appliances. The real benefit is that you always have an answering machine working (cellphone's voice mail), your computer does not have to be on all of the time (even tho mine usually is), in fact your computer plays no role in the phone system at all.
For seriously die-hard VOIP fanatics, you can always install Asterisk on your computer and have your very own PBX! ::)
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I know some of you just abhor/hate/detest Google but I use Google voice and it works well, and it's free.
I wouldn't want to depend on it for all my calling but I like the features. I created a phone number that is local to my 92 yr old mother in Maine so she doesn't have to fool around with a calling card and just calls a local number to get me in CA or where ever I am as it goes to my office phone, my cell phone and my home phone.
When I make calls from my laptop using Google Voice people always remark how clear the call is and it's like I am next to them.
I also use it at work to mask calls. When I make a call on my office phone it actually looks like someone in Portland, ME called me. Also translates voice messages to text plus a sh*t load of other features.
http://www.google.com/googlevoice/about.html
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For VOIP (Voice Over Internet Protocol) to work well, all the routers involved in the connection must support COS (Class of Service).
Standard routers will degrade the throughput of "long" connections. This is older thinking that long connections, and we are talking long in computer time...so it might be measured in seconds, indicate a large data transfer and quick response is not an issue. Short transactions would be considered interactive type of traffic and would receive a greater portion of the available bandwidth.
With COS routers, voice connections are recognized and not degraded and thus receive the maximum available bandwidth for the duration of the connection. Other issues involve route switching and packet sequence which are also mitigated with COS routers.
COS capable routers are replacing all older standard type routers, by attrition in many cases, so your VOIP connection quality will vary depending on the hardware involved in the connection.
Worked for a company and we did VOIP over an MPLS (Multiprotocal Label Switching) WAN (Wide Area Network) network that had solid VOIP support as one of it's design parameters. We had branches in Europe and they worked well on our VOIP system.
However, even with all the right gear, there could be an occasional dropout or delay. We used standard phone connections for any customer calls, inbound or outbound....the thinking being we wanted 100% quality where the customer was involved rather than the 98% provided by our VOIP system.
BTW, for all of you who are grimacing at all the Acronyms in all this, the one I like the best is PCM-CIA. It is the name of the little card slot in the side of most laptops. I never could remember what the letters meant and had enough trouble remembering the letters themselves untill I found this mnemonic People Can't Memorize Computer Industry Acronyms.
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Skype is cool. Just seriously delayed.
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You can try magic jack free for 30 days to see if you like it or not. You have nothing to lose.
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We have a MajicJack and love it. And yes, the computer does have to be powered on to use it.
I bought our's about a year ago after some asshat dug a hole without calling Iowa OneCall, cutting a fiber optic cable and taking down 19 cell sites. As a result, we had no cell service (our only telephone service) for 4-1/2 hours. Taking into account my medical situation, I didn't feel we could afford to be without the ability to call for help for that long a period of time, and $1.70 a month seemed like pretty cheap insurance to me.
I've talked with m58 over that connection on numerous ocassions, and he has never mentioned any problems of any type.
Just my personal experience.
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I've talked with m58 over that connection on numerous ocassions, and he has never mentioned any problems of any type.
Just my personal experience.
I bet sometimes you were praying for some static, though!!!!!! ;)
;D Jab, jab, jab.....finally got to poke Mike for a little payback...... ;D
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I gave up the land line completely and for good about a year and a half ago. Don't miss it one bit! I only have basic cell service for two phones with no other gadgets with about 750 minutes a month and I've yet to use them all. If fact, I have about 5000 minutes in reserve. My cable is free because of some glitch when the house was part of a B&B. Saves me about 140 bucks a month. I tried to connect in my name and the cable company said I couldn't. I gave up trying to make it right cuz no one wanted to listen.
Land lines are a thing of the past for the most part. Society is just stuck on the old technology.
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I have had Vonage for over 4 years now and have had no issues with it. I have it plugged into my router so I can power down the computer when I am not using it. My father got it after I had recommended it to him and he has connectivity issurs with his brother-in-law at times (they both live in the boonies of PA), but it works fine other than that, so I don't see that as an issue.
I have cell phones for when the power is out, and car chargers for them if battery is low. Only problem with the cells, would be from large scale black out where the cell towers are down.
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Doo the things like Google, magic jack etc. come with voice mail? That's really all my land line is, an answering machine and call screener as anyone I want to talk to has my cell.
FQ13
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Yes, Vonage has voicemail included. They even notify you by email when you have one.
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Doo the things like Google, magic jack etc. come with voice mail? That's really all my land line is, an answering machine and call screener as anyone I want to talk to has my cell.
FQ13
Google has voice mail and even converts voice mail to text and sends you an email of the message.
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I just got something in the mail about magic jack PLUS. It says you can use it with or without a computer but you still need internet access to plug it in.
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I just got something in the mail about magic jack PLUS. It says you can use it with or without a computer but you still need internet access to plug it in.
Predictable, inasmuch as I have the original version. ;D
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I would go for it if I didn't have to have my computer plugged in all the time. Bill T.