There are so many VOIP providers, that making the right decision has become a blur! I wanted to use AT&T CallVantage, but they said they didn’t support Asterisk or its protocol. I am looking for a reliable source for my VOIP service provider, I already have DSL. I want to stay away though from the following Vonage, they have too many negative comments.
Can someone advise?
Thank you,
Neil
Assuming that you are looking for business service, we have been testing the following: Broadvoice broadvoice.com
Voice Eclipse admin.voiceeclipse.com/cgi-bin/ … d=a1x4w9u9
We have found both of them to be reliable, except that our toll free number through Broadvoice has been down for several periods.
The big problem, however, is in the terms and conditions. Broadvoice has the following restrictions on “business service”
“the BroadVoice Business Plan does not confer the right to use the Service for auto-dialing, call center activities, continuous or extensive call forwarding, call relaying, telemarketing, fax broadcasting or fax blasting, and that you may not use the Service for those purposes.”
VoiceEclipse has no such restrictions that I can find.
I can’t imagine that I wouldn’t run afoul of the BV restrictions in a very short period of time.
If you are just loooking for residential service, then I would probably go with BV, because of the cost factor.
Hope this helps.
We’re using Transbeam’s voip service for our entire company. So far it’s been a great experience - everything that supposed to work did, right off. A much better experience than we’d had with previous services. They’re constantly refining their service, too. Highly recommended. They’re also a provider of T1 and DSL service - we have a TB T1 so our ping times are around 15ms. Definitely makes VOIP a more solid option for business service.
I am sorry I was not clear, most people were right, my use is for a small business. I would like to use a provider that can support Asterisk protocol and that people are already using out there. Is too bad AT&T CallVantage does not support Asterisk protocol because, their customer support and sound quality is great.
My use is going to be simple or at least I believe is simple, I would like my customers to call in, then be greeted with my company’s name, then be routed to either sales or support and if busy, be able to leave a voice message, so that I can contact them at a later time.
For now, I am just looking for a good provider, that can offer good customer support, and sound quality.
Please help,
Thank you all…
I assume by Asterisk protocol you mean IAX. Just because a provider does not support IAX doesnt mean you cant use asterisk with them. Most of the time when one says they support asterisk it means they will help you configure it to connect to them. Not for sure if this company has numbers for you area but I use them for Longdistance and never had a problem with them
Sixtel looks very promising. They have local numbers for our region it seems. Do you have an ip for a sixtel sip/iax proxy that i can ping to see if our call quality would be anygood?
Thanks
I have been using Junction Networks. Their service and quality is very good. Select and port DIDs. Good service for business. I’ve also used Voipjet, no DID but no troubles.
We’ve been using Exgn for a while now and havent had any issues with them.
Their IAX/SIP server IP is 70.87.18.51, website is www.exgn.net
I found BroadVoice to be a good service provider. They have no contracts and their plans are clear to the customer. The other VOIP service providers recommended did not have clear plans. I was wondering if I can get input from others in the newsgroup who are currently subscribe to a VOIP service provider (with at least 1 year of trial) and have similar clear plans/w no contracts AND that support of course Asterisk. P.S. this is for a small home business.
Thank you all for your help. It is greatly appreciated!!!
[quote=“Neil”]I found BroadVoice to be a good service provider. They have no contracts and their plans are clear to the customer. The other VOIP service providers recommended did not have clear plans. I was wondering if I can get input from others in the newsgroup who are currently subscribe to a VOIP service provider (with at least 1 year of trial) and have similar clear plans/w no contracts AND that support of course Asterisk. P.S. this is for a small home business.
Thank you all for your help. It is greatly appreciated!!![/quote]
$7.95 per month for a US DID and 1.39 cents a min sounds pretty clear to me. No contracts or anything and that includes unlimited inbound for use with 2 channels
im referring to exgn
[quote=“wcombs”]Sixtel looks very promising. They have local numbers for our region it seems. Do you have an ip for a sixtel sip/iax proxy that i can ping to see if our call quality would be anygood?
Thanks[/quote]
Sorry it took too long:
is the proxy I use.
From my colo:
[root@innovation digits]# ping iax2.sixtel.net
PING iax2.sixtel.net (70.84.157.148) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from 148.70-84-157.reverse.theplanet.com (70.84.157.148): icmp_seq=0 ttl=53 time=41.3 ms
64 bytes from 148.70-84-157.reverse.theplanet.com (70.84.157.148): icmp_seq=1 ttl=53 time=35.7 ms
64 bytes from 148.70-84-157.reverse.theplanet.com (70.84.157.148): icmp_seq=2 ttl=54 time=48.2 ms
64 bytes from 148.70-84-157.reverse.theplanet.com (70.84.157.148): icmp_seq=3 ttl=54 time=46.6 ms
64 bytes from 148.70-84-157.reverse.theplanet.com (70.84.157.148): icmp_seq=4 ttl=53 time=36.1 ms
From my home asterisk box:
PING iax2.sixtel.net (70.84.157.148) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from 148.70-84-157.reverse.theplanet.com (70.84.157.148): icmp_seq=0 ttl=50 time=32.0 ms
64 bytes from 148.70-84-157.reverse.theplanet.com (70.84.157.148): icmp_seq=1 ttl=50 time=33.8 ms
64 bytes from 148.70-84-157.reverse.theplanet.com (70.84.157.148): icmp_seq=2 ttl=50 time=33.2 ms
64 bytes from 148.70-84-157.reverse.theplanet.com (70.84.157.148): icmp_seq=3 ttl=50 time=32.1 ms
64 bytes from 148.70-84-157.reverse.theplanet.com (70.84.157.148): icmp_seq=4 ttl=50 time=38.7 ms
–Andy
I have tested Broadvoice and found their reliability to be very spotty. I have tested Voicepulse and found their quality lately to be spotty. I have tested Teliax and they were great - but now their reliability has become spotty.
What does spotty mean?
Broadvoice:
Complete loss of inbound / outbound regularly
Voicepulse:
Inbound/Outbound speech was rendered unrecognizable
Teliax:
(503) errors making outbound calls
(603) errors making 800 calls
Here is my test:
When users are telling you that they haven’t noticed that you changed providers, because they are using their cell phones instead: you know it’s ugly.
My 2 cents. Of course, we have 30 people on the phones constantly - if that were to make a difference. For business, we can’t really afford a service to be down for 20 minutes (Broadvoice) or call quality to be bad for 20 minutes (Voicepulse).
And don’t tell me “Get a Land Line, VOIP doesn’t work all the time”. Just make it work. 