Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Vonage

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Posted by Jason Burroughs (Member # 68) on 10-13-2003, 05:34 PM:

Just wondering if anyone has used Vonage web page or anything like it.

Vonage is a Voice over IP (VoIP) service that works over a broadband connection.
For ~$24/month you get extended local coverage and 500 minutes of free long distance a month, free voicemail and other features too. They send you a pre-configured Cisco ATA (Analog Telephone Adapter) so that you can use your regular phones with their service.

This seems like a really good idea, supposedly the audio quality is not distinguishable and uses minimal bandwith. I will say that VoIP in my corporate network sounds just fine and the bandwith usage isn't bad at all, but I'm not sure about going across the internet.

If you have any expriences with Vonage or somethign similar, I'd like to hear.

Posted by Jack Ondracek (Member # 1466) on 10-13-2003, 06:13 PM:

We chatted somewhat about Vonage in a thread about payphones.

I have two Vonage accounts, and my daughter has one. With a good cable modem, it works great. It would even work well with a DSL... I guess if you needed additional lines or the like. It isn't very good at ISDN speeds & below... mainly because it needs 90kb per line.

Reliability and voice quality have been very good. Their customer service is a bit long, but my reasons for calling have had nothing to do with technical issues.

So far, so good!

Posted by Mike Williams (Member # 1140) on 10-13-2003, 06:15 PM:

A friend of mine is using this down in Florida. He said it is pretty good with his cable modem. For me, I could not tell the difference on my regular phone talking to him on it.
I am waiting for them to start with the 865 area code before I start using it. I think it is a good deal also.

Posted by Floyd Justin Newton (Member # 1316) on 10-13-2003, 06:16 PM:

Jason--
Yes. I have had Vonage for abot six months now and I am very
happy with it. Audibility is very clear and clean. You can only
use it on high-speed cable. The only gitch I've come upon with
it is this: the ATA 186 MUST be at least 2-feet away from the router too avoid echo. It sure beats the local phone company
both in service AND monthly cost.
FJN

Posted by Manny Knowles (Member # 1171) on 10-13-2003, 10:53 PM:

I use it all the time with my cable modem. If the internet service is having issues you will get occasional dropouts lasting anywhere from less than a second to a few seconds. Sometimes when that happens I just end the call and try later. Most calls are just fine, though.

My home network doesn't use a router. I use a hub and the Vonage adapter sits right on top of it with no echo problems observed.

Something I just learned -- Vonage doesn't work with TiVo yet [Frown]

but they are working on it [Smile]

Oh well I guess I'll have to hold off on my TiVo purchase.

Posted by Jason Burroughs (Member # 68) on 10-13-2003, 11:45 PM:

I've done some looking around, but have yet to see anyone that really had anything bad to say about the service. I'm not worried about Tivo since I don't use it anyways, I suppose the problem comes in how the Tivo box dials or something. The only other issue I've heard of is names not showing up on Caller ID, just the number. Again this isn't a big deal for me.

Looks like I too may be telling Ma bell to shove it.

Posted by Sean M. Grimes (Member # 445) on 10-14-2003, 12:57 AM:

Everything looks great about vonage, but I have one question, do you have to 11 digit dial all numbers? Or when you are calling locally (within area code) can you dial 7?

Posted by Manny Knowles (Member # 1171) on 10-14-2003, 01:51 AM:

Even if you are calling to another number within your "area code" you must dial 11 digits:

1 + area code + 7-digit number

It's true about no names with Caller ID -- Just the number comes through. Not a big deal for me, either.

Vonage sends you advisories by email when you get voicemail. You can check voicemail from any telephone (including your Vonage phone) or via your account on the Vonage website.

I'm very happy with Vonage.

Does anybody know what the 2nd phone jack on the ATA could be used for? I accidentally plugged into that one and wondered why I got nothing. I remember reading somewhere (the manual maybe?) that Vonage doesn't use the 2nd jack at this time. Just curious.

Posted by Mike Williams (Member # 1140) on 10-14-2003, 05:08 AM:

It says on their website it can be used for a seperate fax/modem line for an additional charge.

Posted by Jason Burroughs (Member # 68) on 11-19-2003, 06:06 PM:

Well I've had Vonage for a little over a month. I have to say that I have no complaints about their service as of yet. Calls are crystal clear, my wife says it acutally sounds better than the "land" line. I haven't noticed any difference in bandwidth usage. I did have to set up port forwarding on my Linksys router, but that was a very simple task.

My ATA sits right beside my router with no echo problems at all. Unlimited Long Distance, Virtual numbers and CHEAP international rates are fantastic.

I highly recommend this service [thumbsup]

Posted by Ron Yost (Member # 1850) on 11-19-2003, 07:37 PM:

Can you dial emergency numbers? 911, etc.? I'm guessing probably not.

Ron Yost

Posted by Floyd Justin Newton (Member # 1316) on 11-19-2003, 08:21 PM:

Ron--

Re: Vonage 911 yes, after initial setup;

FJN

Posted by Jason Burroughs (Member # 68) on 11-20-2003, 09:21 AM:

I haven't had occasion to try the 911 service yet <knock on wood> But you do have to configure it, by entering your address etc. Interrestingly 911 calls aren't handled as they normally are by the local 911 call center, but some other type of emergency routing service. Supposedly not an impact on service though.

Posted by Ron Yost (Member # 1850) on 11-20-2003, 10:48 AM:

It does impact emergency response time and that's what I was worried about. The delay caused by the 'forwarding' is dangerous and potentially life threatening. It's the one reason I wouldn't go totally landline-less yet, much as I'd like to.

Ron Yost

Posted by Jack Ondracek (Member # 1466) on 11-20-2003, 02:51 PM:

Their service is not connected to the network that auto-reports E-911 information to the call centers.
Several reasons for that:
* The E-911 network is not national, mainly because it does not need to be. It's split up into many regional areas and there's no single method to hook them all up.

* Probably a larger issue, but maybe not why the idea of 911 reporting for IP-based phones doesn't work: You can pull the ATA from your router in Seattle, go to Bogalusa and plug it back in. It will work as if you never left. Unfortunately, nobody on the end of a 911 connection would know you moved the phone.

The Vonage system takes your 911 call and routes is to a regular land-line at the call center you specify. You will have to inform the call taker of your address, number, etc... which they usually ask for anyway. This WOULD be a problem if you couldn't communicate and were counting on 911 to dispatch based on their screen information.

We've kept a couple of hardwired lines here because of that... but we've made use of Vonage for everything above that... especially for lines that wouldn't likely be used for 911.

[ 11-20-2003, 06:20 PM: Message edited by: Jack Ondracek ]

Posted by Ron Yost (Member # 1850) on 11-20-2003, 04:12 PM:

Thank you for the info, Jack. [Smile]

Ron Yost

Posted by Joe Beres (Member # 678) on 11-21-2003, 08:32 AM:

I must have missed this topic the first time around. This sounds great. I have had so many problems with my phone line at home, and I am looking forward to getting rid of that landline. I have a Linksys Wireless Access Point with a 4 port router (BEFW11S4) at home. It is connected to my cable modem, a desktop pc, and wirelessly to my laptop. Has anyone ever used Vonage with this sort of equipment? Vonage says it should work, but I thought I'd ask some of you to see if there have been any hardware conflicts.

Posted by Daryl C. W. O'Shea (Member # 1303) on 11-21-2003, 11:47 AM:

It'll work. You'll have to open a (few) port(s) on your router's firewall or put the ATA in the DMZ.

Posted by Jack Ondracek (Member # 1466) on 11-21-2003, 03:35 PM:

Hmmmm what ports would those be? I didn't have to do anything... just plug it in. Maybe I've got something more opened up than I should?? Nope... just checked. No port forwarding or DMZ configurations here.

I'm using the 4-port Netgear RP614 cable/dsl router on this side of my cable modem. I didn't have to open any ports to make the Vonage ATA work.

Joe: You may not want to tie yourself down quite this much, but Vonage does have a real cheap package that you can use, if you're willing to use your PC (headset/soundcard) instead of "real phones". Regardless, it's a pretty good deal & we're happy with it so-far. The price is certainly right!

Posted by Jason Burroughs (Member # 68) on 11-21-2003, 04:41 PM:

Some models of the Linksys routers, such as the BEFSX41, are pretty locked down. For Vonage to work properly there's a few ports that need to be forwarded to the adapter's IP address.
5060 to 5061 ----- UDP
123 --------- UDP
69 ------------UDP
53 ------------ UDP
10000 to 20000 ---UDP

Alternately you can put the adapater in the DMZ.

Other routers that aren't quite as restrictive (Such as the NetGear) do not need to have port forwarding configured.

Supposedly Vonage is now sending out some Motorola adapter units that acutally sit outside of your local network, between your modem and router.

Posted by Jack Ondracek (Member # 1466) on 11-21-2003, 07:06 PM:

Interesting.
Thanks for the info, Jason.

Posted by Mike Williams (Member # 1140) on 11-22-2003, 06:26 AM:

Can you assign a static IP to the ATA? If not, wouldn't port forwarding become pretty dicey if it is on DHCP behind a linksys?
The reason I ask is I know anytime the router is reset (like for a power outage), it assigns new IP addresses to everything on DHCP. How do you determine the address of the ATA short of pinging every possible address on your home network?

Posted by Jeff Joseph (Member # 511) on 11-22-2003, 04:32 PM:

Has anyone tried Vonage with a satellite modem (Dishnet/DirecTV)?

Jeff

Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 11-22-2003, 05:09 PM:

Mike--most DHCP servers allow you to specify that anything with a given MAC (hardware) address should be given a specific IP address at all times. This is easy with ISC dhcpd (the standard software-based DHCP server implementation), and many home router/NAT boxes support something like this as well. You just specify the MAC address of the ATA and whatever IP address it should get.

DHCP does create an additional point of failure that wouldn't exist if fixed IP addresses were assigned, so it's probably a good idea to set a very long DHCP lease time if you can't assign a fixed IP address on the ATA itself.

Jeff--I'd be interested in the answer to your question as well. I doubt it would work, as the latency (response time) is quite terrible with satellite connections, even though the actual transfer rates can be fairly respectable.

Posted by Jack Ondracek (Member # 1466) on 11-22-2003, 05:11 PM:

quote:
static IP to the ATA? If not, wouldn't port forwarding become pretty dicey if it is on DHCP behind a linksys?

Yah... this gets a little out of my area, but I don't think everything on a DHCP net necessarily gets rearranged if the power goes out... at least, mine didn't before I started locking down the addresses at each computer.

I've had my ATA operating 2 routers away from the cable modem, and it hasn't had any trouble booting up.

quote:
Has anyone tried Vonage with a satellite modem (Dishnet/DirecTV)?

I haven't, but offhand, I wonder how reliable it would be. If it did work, you need 90k of bandwidth for each line. They have a 'bandwidth compression' mode you can use, but the quality is pretty bad, and you get tired of it fast. I'd bet the conversation would lag worse than a cell phone, too... pretty distracting.

Posted by Jeff Joseph (Member # 511) on 11-22-2003, 06:34 PM:

I just bought a Vonage unit for the office (where we have DSL); I'll take it home at some point and try the satellite set up...

Jeff

Posted by Jason Burroughs (Member # 68) on 11-24-2003, 12:19 PM:

The DHCP sever on the Linksys routes is pretty loose. As long as the ATA remains on, then it will always keep the same IP Address.

The satellite idea sounds interresting, but I don't know that it would work. Like Scott said latency could be a HUGE issue. Vonage's website specificaly says that it doesn't work on Satellite, but who knows [Smile]