Voice Over IP – VOIP
WHAT IS VOIP
Voice Over Internet Protocol allows you to make and receive regular phone calls over your Internet connection. This is not to be confused with WIFI calling – which is making mobile (eg Verizon, AT&T) calls over your Internet connection.
VOIP RELIABILITY
VOIP is inherently less reliable than the 150 year old Plain Old Telephone Service. If you have mission critical needs, we discourage you from canceling your landline.
Further, we recommend that you should not cancel your landline until you have tested VOIP for a month or so and confirmed that it is working well for your needs.
BEFORE YOU BUY
The great majority of customer connections are good enough to support VOIP. A small number have too much “Jitter” which is just fluctuations. Before you purchase a VOIP phone or software, please contact us so we can check to see if your connection is good enough to support VOIP.
VOIP typically has low bandwidth requirements – about 400 kbps for each concurrent call. Our least expensive plan is more than sufficient.
OPTIONS
While we cannot make formal recommendations, many subscribers report success with the following options.
MCN Digital Voice
MCN Digital Voice is a VOIP solution provided by Mendocino Community Network (a local organization) that provides installation and support.
https://www.mcn.org/services/digitalvoice
Ooma Telo
Ooma is a DIY option that is a few dollars cheaper and only provides limited support by phone. Ooma requires more technical capability than MCN Digital Voice (see setup instructions below).
https://www.ooma.com/home-phone/ooma-telo/
It is important to distinguish that this is not the “Air” version that we strongly discourage you from using.
How To Connect
To connect an OOMA you should plug in an ethernet cable to the OOMA port labeled “TO INTERNET” and ports 2, 3, or 4 of the your Further Reach Router. You can plug your phone into the “PHONE” port. Do not use the “HOME NETWORK” port.
