 Review by CajunWon 
UPDATED: 193 days ago
member for 3.8 years, 1035 visits, last login: 3 days ago
 Cary,Wake,NC
 $15 per month (month by month)
 about 3 days
 "BYOD available & Well attended external support forum"
 "Self inflicted issues related to my equipment"
 "Works and passes WAF test"
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Ease of Installation:
Call Quality:
Reliability:
Tech Support:
Value for money:
(ratings above consensus)
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VOIP is still not for the masses. You must be willing to either learn of user work-arounds or call for occasional technical support otherwise stay away from VOIP (imo).
My first VOIP experience was very positive with SunRocket (SR) for 18 months (total/net cost of $199). However, returned from a mid July vacation to find the phone service was dead, found that SR had closed its' doors stranding nearly 200,000 without phone service. I quickly restored service on a forgotten proxy server which worked well for 1.5 weeks, then only outbound service until mid August.
Signed-up with ViaTalk (VT) on the day I discovered SR was out of business. I had 2 ATA (internet phone adapters), so signed-up with VT BYOD (bring your own device) monthly service. I then locked-down both ATAs with custom password. I was live with a new VT # 3 business days later with the same good phone quality as with SR. Setup call-forwarding so I (hopefully) wouldn't have to give out a temporary number.
3 minor issues:
1. LNP/Port: I wanted to keep my same phone# & knew the VT number would be temporary so I grabbed a GrandCentral number. This was in-case my old number stopped forwarding before the Port occurred. The Port took 3.5 weeks (my fault but in line with the 20 day expectation), 4 days after the old number stopped forwarding, therefore I did have to give out the GrandCentral number (which I plan to keep as a second number).
2. DTMF: I performed a factory reset on the adapter I used for VT which disabled touch-tone passing to automated phone systems. I hadn't read the manual, but quickly found the solution on this forum.
3. I masked this whole event from 'the boss' for 3 weeks. During the 4th week I instructed her to give out the GrandCentral number to important contacts. This would not have been necessary had the Port taken just 4 less days.
This whole event has been a worse case VOIP scenario. If the above are not minor issues to you, then stay away from VOIP and stop slamming your chosen provider on the forums (imo).
btw:
5(best) rating to Tech Support -I've seen the +/- threads/posts but I've not had to contact them. Apparently their support is top notch yet contacting them is difficult.
4 to phone quality -I had 1 issue when it took an hour to restore service after selecting an alternate proxy server (prior to 8am on a Saturday).
& I'm not an SE -I've only received 1hr of a 3hr DOS class in 1987, so if I can do this anyone can.
6 Month Update: All is well with ViaTalk service. I haven't looked into my ATA for months. VT did just increase the monthly net price to $17.45. WAF still under repair from SR incident, prior to which she had noticed only positive change from POTS. Still use GrandCentral for half incoming calls to remain prepared for quick change of service if required.
Over 1.5 years now: All remains well with Viatalk. Less and less new threads on the support forums indicates they are having less issues. Seems they have returned to service levels reported prior to the Sunrocket melt-down. VT500 is now ~$20/month after fees.
With the help of DSLR virtual friends (mazillo, dcurry, dogface05, to name a few) I now have a fully functional 2nd line. Rings with and has same features as line 1. I do this through Gizmo5, so line 2 does have a separate number, but transparent in this setup. I can receive a call directly to line 2, but it is a number from another state so not likely.
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