 Review by dsl_boy 
UPDATED: 1.9 years ago
member for 8.6 years, 1430 visits, last login: 302 days ago
 undisclosed location
 $17 per month (12 month contract)
 about 7 days
 "I'm too bitter to remember good points"
 "Shutting down the network without prior notice"
 "Thanks for the memories --- painful though they are"
| Web-site:
Ease of Installation:
Call Quality:
Reliability:
Tech Support:
Value for money:
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Well, I liked it -- until they dumped me without notice. Anyway, for posterity, here was my former review.
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Sunrocket is a remarkable VOIP service. I'd like to compare it to my previous service, Packet 8 (the comparison below is valid as of December 2005, when I discontinued my Packet 8 service (after using it for more than one year.) I've used Sunrocket intensively for about one month.
COST
Sunrocket is a mere $200 for unlimited calling in the US, Canada, and Puerto Rico. This price include free cordless phones currently on sale for $40 at target.com. In contrast, Packet 8 included extra fees bringing its price up to about $25/month for "unlimited calling" (which does not include Puerto Rico -- calls to PR are rather expensive). In December 2005, Packet 8 reported that they were going to add another $2/month fee to all programs to support E-911 service.
EQUIPMENT
Sunrocket includes free converter equipment (called a Gizmo) with the order price. Packet 8 sells equipment through third party vendors and afterwards one can apply for a rebate (with all the extra paperwork) for a refund of most of the price (but not shipping). Packet 8 requires manual updating of converters, Sunrocket updates software on their devices automatically.
CALL QUALITY
Both Sunrocket and Packet 8 have good call quality in the US, although I would give a slight nod to Sunrocket which seems to have slightly better quality.
INTERNATIONAL CALLS
Sunrocket and Packet 8 both have low prices for international calls. Sunrocket costs $0.03/minute to most common places. Sunrocket also provides a free allowance of $3/month of international calls. Packet 8 has low prices (but not quite as low in many instances) and no allowance. However, Sunrocket international call quality is far better than Packet 8. Packet 8 calls to Asia Pacific include over a second of latency which causes major problems when talking on the phone. Sunrocket has superior quality and low latency.
TECHNICAL SUPPORT
Technical support for Sunrocket is simply horrible ... they use an inferior call center in India. Just cross your fingers that you don't have any problems.
RELIABILITY
Both Sunrocket and Packet 8 have good reliability, although Packet 8's has suffered recently as they have been "upgrading their network".
EXTRA PHONE LINES & PHONE NUMBERS
Sunrocket includes a free extra phone line; one must pay at Packet 8 for an extra phone line. The Sunrocket extra phone line has a distinct ring, if Packet 8 has a similar feature, I am unaware of it. Sunrocket allows one to choose his or her own phone number; Packet 8 just assigns a phone number in the assigned area.
E-911
After two weeks of struggling, I never got E-911 working properly with Packet 8. It worked properly with Sunrocket.
VOICEMAIL
Packet 8 requires one to dial 012-0555 to access voicemail. No web access to voice mail is allowed, although if one (a) first stores it in the archive; and then (b) requests to have it sent by e-mail; the voicemail is forwarded to e-mail.
Sunrocket allows access to voicemail by dialing 00, through the web, and has an elaborate system for processing voicemail including an option to have phone calls automatically forwarded to an e-mail address.
FEATURES
Packet 8 has limited features. It doesn't even have seven digit dialing and international dialing is tricky
Sunrocket has a huge set of features including full support for Caller ID (including names, not offered by Packet 8) and processing of different numbers differently (including automatic forwarding of certain numbers to voicemail, etc.)
CONCLUSION
Except for customer service (Sunrocket's greatest weakness) Sunrocket is superior to Packet 8. Both companies face uncertain futures; Sunrocket just received $34 million in second round financing but only has 50,000 customers. Packet 8 on the other hand has 93,000 and is selling $15 million in additional stock. Packet 8 had a net loss of $5.6 million last quarter. Both services face uncertain futures.
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