[VoIP] Cable questions

[Mark Rudholm]

I would second the suggestion that you consider this.

There are a number of VoIP service providers that will work
nicely with Asterisk.  I use Teliax for outbound call completion.
They charge 2c/minute for the US and most countries I call.
There are cheaper providers, but Teliax seems very solid.
They do provide phone numbers for 4.99$/month + 2c minute
for inbound, or you can pay about 24$/month for something
resembling regular phone service (free inbound and some
number of outbound mins included).  One nice thing about
the pay-per-minute deal is you can open up as many simultaneous
channels as you want, so every phone in your house could
be on a separate phone call if you need.  The more traditional
plans limit you to two channels iirc.

I also have a Measured Rate POTS line from AT&T going into
my Asterisk.  It's cheap (5$/month + taxes) and provides a
good, reliable way to get free inbound calls.

I have forward on busy on my POTS line that sends calls to
a BroadVoice account that also goes into Asterisk.  BV is
also pretty cheap, but read their Terms of Service, they're
somewhat draconian.  But they're cheap, and additional DIDs
only cost 2$/month.

As has been mentioned earlier, DSL does tend to provide a
more consistent service level than cable modems do.  And
with VoIP, what matters more than maximum throughput is
jitter and latency since a phone call is only about 64kbps
but suffers from lost, late, or slow packet delivery.
If you were generally happy with your DSL service, it's
probably worth the trouble to try to get it fixed.

At the moment, I have both cable and DSL so I can send
the real-time stuff like telnet/ssh/voip over DSL, and
the bulk stuff like usenet, ftp, or http over cable.

-Mark

Martin Harriss wrote:
> Jayson,
> 
> I've heard very bad reports of phone service provided by cable 
> companies.  This is not surprising, considering that they probably know 
> very little about providing telephone service.
> 
> How about the following idea:  since you already have an asterisk box up 
> and running, why don't you become your own telephone provider?  Find a 
> wholesale provider from whom you can buy a local telephone number; 
> outbound service wholesale costs a couple of cents a minute, and I think 
> there are even providers that will allow free local calls within a 
> portion of your own area code.  You may even be able to port your 
> current phone number.
> 
> The only thing you would need is an Internet connection, either "naked" 
> DSL or from your cable company.  You might want to invest in a UPS for 
> selected parts of your setup.
> 
> Of course the whole 911 issue needs to be dealt with, but may be easily 
> solvable by careful choice of provider...