I am thinking of setting up Asterisk for my home for VoIP service. I did some searching and Googling but couldn’t really find the answers I am looking for.
Aside from a regular computer which additional hardware would I need, such as VoIP card, etc?
Do I need a VoIP provider or would all I need be regular Time Warner cable and thats it
You haven’t specified your needs yet. What do you want to do, exactly? But voip-info.org/wiki/view/Asterisk+hardware can give you some idea.
Just the basics, I just want some kinda land line service (because we only have cell phones now) it will be for my home with 2 other people so nothing fancy is needed.
I guess bottom line is I don’t want to pay a monthly charge for a land line from SBC. So if I can pay some money up front for hardware and then just use my existing ISP to facilitate the calls then I will be happy.
You can avoid SBC, but you’ve got to pay somebody to have “some kinda land line service” that technically includes DID and gateway. Depending on usage, you can subscribe to a VoIP provider that charges a small monthly fee (~$5) and a per minute fee for each minute of each outgoing call (Skype like) - I assume you are in the U.S. or Canada. Most people should be fine with this. If you just can’t live without an “unlimited” plan, you don’t need Asterisk for the total cost would be much more than going with Vonage or Lingo or iTalkBB. The extra flexibility of running your own Asterisk may not justify the extra cost. (In fact, iTalkBB allows you to pay $5/month and pay each incoming and outgoing minute, with free hardware.)
Now that you know a “subscription” is unavoidable, hardwarewise you’ll need either one or more ATA (and your old phone(s)), or VoIP hard phone(s). Either just below $100 each. That’s about all.
Thats a bummer, I was hoping I would be able to eat the cost of hardware and phones up front and have no per month fee from a carrier. But ya, it probably isn’t worth the cost from what you said. I’m surprised you have to pay per minute also.
It would be nice if I could just build an Asterisk box, buy the phones, and use my ISP to carry the calls 
"I’m surprised you have to pay per minute also. "
What you are surprised that you must PAY for a call…
think about if You could do it for FREE WHY WOULD ANYONE PAY???
"It would be nice if I could just build an Asterisk box, buy the phones, and use my ISP to carry the calls "
Oh you can… but you can not call the PSTN network…you can call other exten;s on your box you can call other SIP / IAX devices.
Really come on YOU REALLY WHERE THINKING IT WOULD BE FREE???..
Yes, VoIP to VoIP is FREE, but you don’t get a normal PSTN phone number.
At the moment sipgate.co.uk are giving away free UK DIDs to UK customers only (didn’t notice any credit checks, so maybe you could lie about where you live).
This way anyone in England can call you for the price of a local call, but you still have to pay if you want to call out to someone on a PSTN phone number.
Speaking of free DID, AOL is (reportedly) giving away free DID’s in the U.S. Of course I don’t see any integration with Asterisk.