Possible Alternative to VOIP and Skype International Calling.

I was surfing the web and came across a company called Rebtel claiming cheap to free international calling.

Well this sounds good to me so I had to ask around.

What Did Ya Find?

In one of the forums I go to I asked if anyone has used them, and how was the experience.

I was told they seem to work well and sound quality is good.
So I decided to make an account.

Sign Up Process.

Very easy and straight froward.
The way it works is you sign up for the service (you are given a free ten minutes at sign up). When you enter your information in the form you enter your phone number and create a pin.

The next form/screen will ask you for your friends information:

Name
Country
Phone Number
Email address
Language (only choices are English, Spanish, Polish, and French) This will be for the prompt when your friend is calling you.

Hows the service work?

Once your account is set up Rebtel will give you a local number in your friends country. So in Rebtels own words:

"You give us the phone number of a friend in another
country, and we give you a local number for them."
"Save this number on your mobile so you can call
your friend whenever you want, for a fraction of your
normal international rate."


So How Much $$$?

Rates seem very good. For my situation its the best so far.


So What About Free International Calling?

Rebtel offers free international calling..Yes it true....But not for everyone.

The way it works is if your in one of the Rebtel-Countrys and your friend is in a Rebtel-Country, then you have free international calling.

Ok.... So How Do I Do It?

Once again, in Rebtels own Words.

Call your friend on their Rebtel number.
Ask your friend to call you back. Tell them to use the number shown on their phone screen.
Stay on the line. Don't hang up! In a few seconds your friend will join you back on the call. (this part sounds strange, but do as it says)

Or you can just watch the Video.

Thats it.


So What Do You Think Of It?

To be honest I haven't tried it yet..... but I'm going to!!
I love the Idea and think it should add more value to my Skype/VOIP phone system.

So When Are You Going To Tell Us How Well It Works?

I'm going to need my wifes assistance on that. I dont think it will take all that long....maybe a week or two.

I'll let you know the wifes verdict as soon as we give it a go!

Skyp, Gizmo, Grandcentral, VOIP Phone Project

Into the Crazyness:

I hate bills, and I hate giving money to Big corporations. I guess you can say for the most part I'm anti everything.

I've been tossing money out the window for many years now in the form of whats called a phone bill. So I decided instead of whining about it I should try to do something about it......and this is what I came up with.

Reasoning:

Before I started this project, I was paying about $130 a month for my phone bill. (In State, Local Long Distance, Nation Wide Long Distance, International, Caller ID, blah, blah, blah.)

After tossing money out the window for a few years, I said to my self “There must be a cheaper way.” So I did a little reading and this is what I came up with.

Before I jump into how I have everything hooked up and configured lets take a look at what I wanted to accomplish.

1. No longer use the PSTN Line. (kinda true)

2. Have very cheap local,long, and international calling.

3. Keep my Land Line phone number.

4. Keep all the perks. (Caller ID, Hold, voice mail, etc.)

5. Have a backup service just in case one goes down. (2 Lines)

6. Have everything transparent to the wife. (Very important)

7. Have all my phones ring when someone calls me no matter what number is being called.

Now that we know what I want to accomplish, lets move on to the Pros and Cons of the system.

Pros:

1. Cheap

2. You have control....well for the most part.

3. Better then paying the phone companies

4. Save Lots, and Lots of $$$$

Cons:

1. If you loose power you loose your phone.

2. You are the Admin, so if the phone goes down the Wife gets mad at you!

3. You must press 1 to answer all in coming calls from GrandCentral.

What I did to over come the power problem was buy a UPS and place the, Router, Switch, ATA, and two of my phone bases on it. All units are very low power therefor I will get a few hours of service if my power goes out.

Note: I have FIOS so I also had to put the Fiber modem/converter, or whatever the thing is also on a UPS.

Things I had research to accomplish all the above:

REN:

One very important thing to know is the REN value of your phones and ATA. If you plan on hooking up phones to your ATA you will need to know this information. The REN is usually found on the phone labels specs. Explanation to all this is below.

In order to connect all your home phones to your ATA it must have a FXO port (PSTN landline) and you will need to know the Maximum Ringer Load of the ATA. For example the Linksys SPA3102 has a Maximum Ringer Load of 3 REN

The REN value on the ATA tells us how may phones it is capable of supporting/Ringing by determining the REN values of the phones you plan on connecting to your ATA.

Example:

If you have an ATA with a Maximum Ringer Load of 3 REN, then it could support 2 phones with a REN vale of 0.5.

So if you have 2 phones with a REN of 0.5 that would be equal to 1 REN. Therefor the ATA could still support another 2 REN.

Lets move on....

Equipment used.

ATA: Linksys SPA3102

The SPA3102 data sheet says the SPA3102 has a Maximum Ringer Load of 3 REN.

Phones:

Philips VOIP841 (REN:0.1B) Skype/PSTN

Panasonic KX-TG5439 (Very good sound quality) (REN:0.1B)

Uniden DECT2080-3 (Lots's of $$ and sounds like crap) (REN:0.0B)

Services Needed:

Get a number

Note: You will need to reserve a number from one of these providers and getting one may take some time.

GrandCentral Or Ribbit

Configure GrandCentral Per these directions.

Get A Skype and Gizmo Account.

I bought a 1 year subscription to skype, and a $10 credit on Gizmo.

Skype

Gizmo5

Parts:

I already had some house phones, so I just hit ebay for the Philips VOIP841 and Linksys SPA3102.

I used CAT 5 to make all the connections to the phone lines. (Because I had it)

If you decide to make your own cables you will need some crimp's and RJ-11 plugs.

I went to HomeDepot and picked up:

GE 5-Jack Adaptor, White Model 26131004

GE Surface Mount Jack, White Model 26136004

Note: Before starting this be aware... Some people have not had a very pleasant experience with gizmo, However others have. I for one have enjoyed the service for as long as I have been using it.

So...Shall we start....?

First I cut the main phone line coming in the house. For some very good info on cutting and connecting your line see here under "Safely Cutting Your Phone Line".

Once the main line was cut and separated from the rest of the house, I ran a CAT5 cable with a RJ-11 plug on one end, and just the Blue and Blue/White wires of the CAT5 on the other end. I connect the Blue and Blue/white wires onto the main phone line and plugged the RJ-11 end into the "Line" port (PSTN landline) into the ATA.

(Click to open color chart below)

I then ran a new CAT5 cable with both ends cut only exposing the blue and blue/white wires on each side. I tied one side of the Blue Blue/White wires to the remaining phone lines and the other to the Surface Mount Jack (Model 26136004). Once that was done I plugged the 5-Jack Adaptor (Model 26131004) into the Surface Mount Jack. All thats left for the moment is to connect the Skype Phones base, (Philips VOIP841), the ATA (into the “Phone”), and whatever else you want to plug into the 5-Jack Adaptor.

Now for configuration.

On my main router I am using the Tomato firmware.

I enabled UPNP on the router for the skype phone and the ATA. (You could just open ports if you wanted.)

Once UPNP was enabled I plugged the skype phone into the router and set the Skype account up.

You can set up your Skype account multiple ways from:

• Skype PC Software
• VOIP841 Handset
• Web Interface on the phone base

To set the account up from the web interface you will need to know your phones IP Address.

Default User namd and password:

User: philips

Password: voip841

Once that is complete make a test call out with the Skype phone.

Now comes the fun....

Note: Before configuring the ATA you may want to check for a firmware update. If one is available update per the manufacturing instructions.

Router Configuration:

Plug a RJ-45 cable into an open port from the router to the internet port on the ATA

Set the ATA up with a static IP on the Wan side.

ATA Configuration:

Wan Setup Tab:

Connection Type: DHCP

DNS Server Order:DHCP,Manual

Primary NTP Server: Put what you would use

Click the above Screen Shot to open.

Lan Setup Tab:

Disable DHCP

Click the above Screen Shot to open.

VOIP System Tab:

Enable Web Admin Access: Yes

Click the above Screen Shot to open.

I also added password.

Note: Even though Web Access is enabled it will only give access to my local Lan and not the internet. (This is how I wanted it!)

The ATA's VOIP settings were done per this post

Note: If the setting dont automatically load you will have to go to each link in the post above and enter the info manually.

Conclusion:

Once I had the system up and working I called my phone company and and took the most basic phone service that is offered.

What that gave me was the call in number, and a little credit for local...all for $5.

Over all I spent about $250 for this project. So every thing should pay for its self in about 2-3 months. If my math is correct I should be saving about $900-$1000 a year!

So the end result is if anyone calls my land line all the phones ring (including the Skype phone). If anyone calls my Gizmo or Grand Central account, all phones ring. I can pick up any phone in the house and call out using Gizmo (Even the Skype phone. It has an option to select default (Skype, or land line)) If someone calls my Skype account only the Skype phone will ring. No big deal to me. Think of it as a second line, so if someone is talking on your main line you can call out on Skype.....Kinda nice!

Other Cool Links:

http://thatsmith.com/2008/06/grandcentral-addon-for-firefox/

http://www.internettablettalk.com/forums/showthread.php?t=21394

http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/8592

Helpful Forums:

Voxilla

Gizmo5