Comcast vs. Vonage

Posts: 60 · Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2006 4:23 pm Post subject: Comcast vs. Vonage

I am no believer in conspiracies, but having seen two episodes of Vonage issues tied directly to "work" being done at Comcast, I cannot help but wonder what Comcast is up to. Have absolutely no faith in baby bells or cable companies, and would not be surprised if they weren't tinkering with some things to piss off Vonage users.

Posts: 1715 · Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2006 4:26 pm Post subject:

Well, Comcast is doing their own VoIP service in some areas now.... considering they have a competing product at a higher price.... well, you can be the judge on it.

Posts: 2257 · Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2006 4:27 pm Post subject:

(As I shudder contemplating the impending buy out of my most excellent ISP by Comcast)...

I certainly hope that your conspiracy theory belongs on a bad episode of the "X-Files", but sadly it's not outside the realm of possibility.

VoIP from "independents" like Vonage is a threat to the ISP industry because they are "yet another bandwidth hog" making flat rate Internet access harder to provide due to increasing bandwidth demands. They are also a threat to the local telcos as they are direct competitors.

Unfortunately, VoIP depends on ISP's for bandwidth so our lines work, and on local telcos for access to their local bridges to hop onto the POTS network so we can talk to mere morals. (grin).

And a little intentional "oopsie" goes a long way toward discrediting VoIP...

Posts: 60 · Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2006 4:48 pm Post subject:

I know ISPs like to provide that "bandwidth hog" argument, but in reality, does VOIP really take up that much bandwidth? Seems to me that's a pretty low user of pipe relative to streaming video or buying songs off of iTunes.

Posts: 2257 · Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2006 4:53 pm Post subject:

rdstoll wrote:

I know ISPs like to provide that "bandwidth hog" argument, but in reality, does VOIP really take up that much bandwidth? Seems to me that's a pretty low user of pipe relative to streaming video or buying songs off of iTunes.

Well, you're right of course, it's a low use compared to those... except that it is a symmetric use.

Upload (Upstream) is generally more expensive than download (downstream) data. iTunes is amost pure downstream. Vonage is 90k each way. The same is true of P2P services like BitTorrent, etc. That's why ISP's hate services like that so much. That's also why they've been blocking things like web servers on your connection for years.

This is why providers tend to cap upstream at a much lower rate than downstream. My current provider caps my upstream at 256k, real-life about 200k, but they also haven't complained about my using every bit of that 200k for months now, and they've been pretty reliable in providing it.

So, my ISP has solved the problem by just instituting a low cap. Some open up the cap, then find themselves swamped in huge amounts of upstream bandwidth that they cannot provide within their budget.

Posts: 409 · Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2006 4:56 pm Post subject:

I will call my local comcast now and ask if they offer voip.. as they did not in my aera a week ago...

see whats up..

Posts: 409 · Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2006 5:03 pm Post subject:

somethings is going on...

Before when I called comcast I always got the same options for television press 1 for internet press 2 NOW it also says for digital phone service press 3. ( didn't have that #3 option before) ...... so i pressed 3....... asked about digital phone service in my aera she said its not available yet but there working on it and it will be available in a month or two...

Either there working on the lines to get voip up and going or mmmmmmm who knows....

Posts: 13 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Feb 02, 2006 Posts: 13

hmmm. Mediacom, here in central Iowa, has recently started offering their flavor of VoIP services (again at a slightly higher price). I haven't had any issues...yet, however they have called and asked about signing me up and I told them that I have Vonage instead. Hopefully the technology is similar enough that they can't merely start "fiddling" with ports and configurations that are specifically "Vonage". If they were the same, then they would be fiddling with their own customers....yada yada. I also have 256Kb cap (upstream), and "they" say that they will be offering a 10Mb/1Mb...not sure what the price tag will be for that or if Mediacom can really support 10/1 for the extra $$. Heck half the time I see 3.7 Mb down and 240 (ish) up with the current 5Mb/1Mb plan.

Posts: 114 · Posted: Tue Feb 14, 2006 10:56 am Post subject:

Be careful with the Comcast "digital phone service". I had that for about 3.5 years (starting 5 years ago). In our case it wasn't VoIP. It's POTS service over the coax cables. We switched to Vonage about 1.5 years ago.

The "digital phone service" was fine, but expensive (same as Verizon in pricing).

I'm not sure how Comcast is distinguishing "digital phone service" with VoIP these days.

-Craig

maryjane wrote:

somethings is going on...

Before when I called comcast I always got the same options for television press 1 for internet press 2 NOW it also says for digital phone service press 3. ( didn't have that #3 option before) ...... so i pressed 3....... asked about digital phone service in my aera she said its not available yet but there working on it and it will be available in a month or two...

Either there working on the lines to get voip up and going or mmmmmmm who knows....

Posts: 423 · Vonage Forum Evangelist Joined: Oct 03, 2005 Posts: 423

We are trying to get more info on this Comcast thing. If you are in the midwest, having problems with your Vonage service, and want to help us gather info, reply with the following:

TEST:

- Perform bandwidth speed test on connection (provide results)
- Have the customer access www.vonage.com and also http://216.115.22.200/ (provide results)
- perform nslookup on www.vonage.com and return the results (provide results)
- perform a traceroute to www.vonage.com (provide results)
- perform a traceroute to www.yahoo.com (provide results)
- perform a traceroute to www.zoom-phone.com (provide results)
- Test to see if you are able to access www.zoom-phone.com (provide results)
- For call quality, provide examples (to/from – from/to numbers and times of the calls)