UTStarcom F1000 Wifi set & repeater

Posts: 4 · New Forum Member Joined: Jun 08, 2007 Posts: 4

Hi! I have a new F1000 set. My home has some dead spots so I purchased a matching D-Link DLW-G710 for my DI-524 AP/Router. It's been great for the wireless PC's but not the F1000. The PC's now have an incoming signal at MAX which they never had. However, the F1000 does not seem to see the repeated signal and from the same room where I have issues, the incoming signal has not changed.

The wireless repeater must repeat on the same channel AND it's SSID must be the same as the AP's.

I was on the phone for about 1h last week with a 2nd tier tech support analyst and they can find nothing in their database that gives assistance with using a repeater.

Has anyone else tried this? I'm about to send the F1000 back to Vonage as it has been of little use to me. I've had the service for a month and have not really been able to use it. I ported my phone number over and now nobody can get me except leave voicmail.

I LOVE the idea of the WiFi phone but it appears to me to be deaf on the front end (ie receiver). It very much appears to be a poor implementation of a great idea.

Posts: 63 · Full Forum Member Joined: Jun 07, 2007 Posts: 63

i think your pc is eating all up the bandwidth..since F1000 doesnt have a bandwidth saver you can't change the bandwidth setting..try calling without turning on your pc..or you can increase the range of your wireless connection..

Posts: 328 · Vonage Forum Evangelist Joined: Dec 13, 2005 Posts: 328

The Vonage F1000 will not attempt a hand over (during a call or on standby) so long at it is connected to an existing AP and can still see it. In that environment, the phone should still get incoming calls as it should be in contact with the AP.

Even though the SSID is the same, the MAC of the access point is different (it should be), so the phone can "tell the difference".

In the F1000G and F3000 (non-Vonage branded phones) there are settings for hand over that will have the phone work better in what seems to be your environment.

Posts: 4 · New Forum Member Joined: Jun 08, 2007 Posts: 4

howiewifi wrote:

The Vonage F1000 will not attempt a hand over (during a call or on standby) so long at it is connected to an existing AP and can still see it. In that environment, the phone should still get incoming calls as it should be in contact with the AP.

Even though the SSID is the same, the MAC of the access point is different (it should be), so the phone can "tell the difference".

In the F1000G and F3000 (non-Vonage branded phones) there are settings for hand over that will have the phone work better in what seems to be your environment.

IT will not receive calls if the signal is too weak. There are frequent dropouts, therefore the reason for obtaining a repeater. I did not know there were other WiFi phones. I suppose Vonage does not have to talk about non-branded products however I'm a little miffed now with the senior tech support in New Jersey for keeping me on the phone for over one hour claiming they were trying to find info in their database about this application when it appears they already or should have known about these other models and their ability to handoff.

I don't have access to these models as I'm in Canada and only the F1000 is available here.

Posts: 4 · New Forum Member Joined: Jun 08, 2007 Posts: 4

kumakuma wrote:

i think your pc is eating all up the bandwidth..since F1000 doesnt have a bandwidth saver you can't change the bandwidth setting..try calling without turning on your pc..or you can increase the range of your wireless connection..

You most certainly CAN change the bandwidth from DASHBOARD and I've don that. THis is not the issue.

Posts: 328 · Vonage Forum Evangelist Joined: Dec 13, 2005 Posts: 328

I agree - you can change bandwidth settings on the F1000, though only high (g.711) and low (g.729) work well. The middle setting often does not sound so good on a lot of calls.

As far as other WiFi phone models - there are many of these on the market, but none other than the original F1000 are Vonage branded. This means that while "any" WiFi phone will work with a Vonage soft phone account, only the original F1000 will work with a Vonage primary account - this is not a case of Canada versus anywhere else, this is simply how Vonage handles accounts and devices.

Posts: 43 · Full Forum Member Joined: Dec 27, 2006 Posts: 43

I would be interested in learning how you are able to use a non-Vonage wifi phone with the Vonage softphone; unless I misunderstood the thread, it sounds as if someone can buy the new linksys IP or the wifi3000 and use it if they have a Vonage softphone.

Posts: 328 · Vonage Forum Evangelist Joined: Dec 13, 2005 Posts: 328

When you get a soft phone account from Vonage, they give you your SIP password and SIP user name (you already have your user name, since it is your phone number).

You put the phone number into the SIP User Name and SIP Authentication String fields on the phone, then put your SIP Password in the SIP Password field.

You then put Vonage's soft phone server - sphone.vopr.vonage.net in any field that looks like it wants a server name (in the F3000 that means BOTH Register Domain and Outbound Proxy). Use a register interval of 60s and you're good to go.

This would work with the UTStarcom F3000, the Hitachi phones, or the Linksys phones, not to mention "any" unlocked SIP device that you have, soft phones included (I would recommend against the Linksys WIP300 and WIP330 as the batteries will not even last overnight). I never tried the Hitachi IP3000, but the 5000 is OK. I use the UTStarcom F3000 with a soft phone account and it works well.