Vonage and Time Warner Cable-voice fades, cut-out of signal

Thanks, Patty

I recall one regular in the comp.dcom.telecom groups mentioned that he sent his Vonage unit back after a few years of service with them. I seems that they were maxing out some circuits on the path between him and them and dropping bits of conversations. They didn't really care to investigate or fix. Switching services cured that.

They also let you bring your own (at least on the pay-by-the-minute plan).

One of the service providers I'm thinking of auditioning next (and having one more fall-back provider) is Sipphone. They allow free direct inward SIP calling, believe in an open internet and also sell

2-cent minutes with no monthlies. They are also much closer to me delay-wise than any of the other voip/pstn gateway providers I'm now using. Google seems to like Sipphone too and is going to interconnect with them and Earthlink once Google gets some policy issues worked out. Anyone here use them yet? Hows the service?

-wolfgang

It is probably your VOIP provider. I would return the Vonage box and go with another provider who issues an unlocked device. I've been pretty happy with Teliax

and their price is competitive (or less expensive) than Vonage. They will sell you an unlocked adapter which you can configure for an additional provider if you want or you can use for another provider should you want to switch.

Personally, I would forget about TW's VOIP service because it is far too expensive. You may as well stick with a PSTN phone company if you want to pay the kind of money TW charges.

Coincidentally, I just configured Sipphone on the second line of my PAP2-NA. I have Teliax on line one. They sold me the unlocked box. I am happy with their service in general. The quality is good and it has been reliable for the most part. Communications have been bad in that they didn't adequately explain some of their fees, including the charge for incoming calls, the (now discontinued) connect charge, and the fee for porting your existing number. Also, their "voice mail sent to your email" system hasn't worked for months. They are now previewing caller ID with name and I hope they decide to keep the service at no additional charge.

Since most of my calls are incoming long distance calls from relatives with unlimited long distance service, I couldn't see paying for incoming calls. I set up the Sipphone account on line two. I had to get a phone number in another city, but that doesn't matter to the people who call me. The monthly fee works out to about $3 for the DID, no charge for incoming calls, and 2 cents/min for outgoing -- which seems very inexpensive. Teliax charges $5/mo for a DID and 2 cents/min for both incoming and outgoing. So far the quality of the Sipphone connection isn't quite as good as Teliax. There is a significant delay when placing a call. After dialing, there is some dead time and then the amount of money left on your account is announced. Finally, the call is connected. I also had some problems at first receiving calls. After reading their knowledge base, I discovered that I needed to delete my registration from their server (a tool is provided at their web portal) and then reboot my ATA. That seems to have solved the problem. If they had a local number, I would consider dropping Teliax. I guess paying for incoming calls bothers me - A LOT. For now, I will keep both services and use Sipphone for most incoming calls, and both Teliax and Sipphone for outgoing calls.