Death knell for landlines - RANT

[Larry Caldwell]

If you just want telephone over data, take a look at Skype. You can make and receive calls from cell phones, computers or tablets. Free calling anywhere in the world is about $13/month. Domestic North America calls are cheaper.

 

[OKnewguy]

Give Obihai and Google voice a try! it is totally free for the U.S. Uses your old phones, just needs an Ethernet feed.
Dave

 

[rekees4300]

I tried ooma, doesnt work on satellite internet. If you have high speed internet it is great.

I had Hughesnet in the past and glad to be rid of it. Have Verizon 4G LTE now with 5-12 mbps so Ooma should work okay. Ooma has many positive reviews and has been PC magazine editor's choice the past 4 years. Hopefully it will be good enough to ditch our landline.

 

[dmccarty]

... Copper has a lot of limitations.. Not the least is sensitivity to lightning, and EMI, both into the copper and out of the copper, as well as length and bandwidth restrictions

If I am working from home, and there are thunderstorms between me and the office, the VPN will drop. My local Internet connection is working but the VPN drops. Kinda odd, because I would have thought the communication links from the central office to where my work is located would have been fiber. But apparently not. I can hear the thunder and then the VPN goes away. :shocked: Kinda interesting and frustrating at the same time. :laughing::laughing::laughing: It does not happen all of the time so I wonder if it is ground strikes that are causing the problem. :confused3:

Later,
Dan

 

[Gem99ultra]

You can get those to work from a cell phone. The cell phone ones work better anyway. No phone line to cut.

Not so long ago ADT required a land line. That requirement has probably changed in the last few years. I suspect if troutsqueezer checks, he'll find out that he probably can now use a cell phone.

That, however, wouldn't be a satisfactory alternative for us here in the outskirts of Warm Springs, GA... we don't get cell phone service here.

 

[ultrarunner]

The Hospital Fire System required two separate landlines to be UL certified in 1995... and that is what we have.

The second line has never been used except for testing.

About 10 years ago we got a new business manager and she got rid of the line because it was not being used... that lasted for about 24 hours!!!

 

[hawkeye08]

We dropped our CenturyLink landline this last year and went with ATT wireless home phone with internet. It is an additional device on our mobile share plan, we kept our phone number, and the internet portion is simple wifi access point so when our primary internet is down, we can connect to that. We can also take it with us on vacation if we want. I use my phone as hotspot but wanted something more automatic. With taxes, it is $37 per month which is much less than the 85 per month our landline was costing. We also switched from microwave based internet (Motorola Canapy radio) to wifi based internet (uses dish with Ubiquiti radio. We have 5-10 times the speed at a lower cost. We had been on the microwave for over 10 years and the company just didn't keep up and their reliability has been terrible the last few years, especially in late fall and early spring when weather was right around freezing..

 

[RedNeckGeek]

Give Obihai and Google voice a try! it is totally free for the U.S. Uses your old phones, just needs an Ethernet feed.
Dave

Google voice is totally free until you try to join a conference call. Then Google charges a penny/minute. Not a big deal, until you find out that your Google wallet is flat before or during the call...:duh:

 

[rekees4300]

Ooma has many positive reviews and has been PC magazine editor's choice the past 4 years. Hopefully it will be good enough to ditch our landline.

Update: Unfortunately Ooma was a total FAIL. Couldn't even activate it. Spent 30 minutes entering my info online, clicked the Activate button, got a mumbo jumbo error message. Contacted Ooma support and they were clueless, said to use a different browser then enter all the info again. I declined, sent the device back to Amazon for refund.

 

[buckeyefarmer]

Update: Unfortunately Ooma was a total FAIL. Couldn't even activate it. Spent 30 minutes entering my info online, clicked the Activate button, got a mumbo jumbo error message. Contacted Ooma support and they were clueless, said to use a different browser then enter all the info again. I declined, sent the device back to Amazon for refund.

I had a similar experience, sent mine back also. Guy at work uses one and loves it.