What Makes SoftPhone A Good Idea?

Posts: 233 · Posted: Tue Aug 30, 2005 4:57 pm Post subject: What Makes SoftPhone A Good Idea?

I have my VoIP and love it. I have both a personal and work laptop. I just haven't seen a reason for SoftPhone although I don't doubt many people love it. If you don't mind, could some of you give me some info on how it helps you so I can understand the advantage over having VoIP at home and my company assigned cell phone hanging on my side?

Posts: 1424

galion wrote:

...and my company assigned cell phone hanging on my side?

If you work for yourself and pay all your phone bills then the answer becomes more clear.

The two main advantages to SoftPhone are portability and ease of connection.

Since the user is already travelling with a laptop it eliminates the need to also carry an adapter and phone. Some users run SoftPhone on PDAs.

It can be used more easily in more places. It is easier to get a SoftPhone connection at a HotSpot or hotel than using an adapter for several reasons. First is wireless capability. Second is the need to go through an authorization screen.

There are other advantages. For example some people have SoftPhone software that is tightly integrated into custom software to aid them talking with customers, providing technical support or tracking calls for billing.

Posts: 233 · Posted: Tue Aug 30, 2005 9:37 pm Post subject:

Wow. Thanks. That makes sense. I just haven't kept up with the VoIP thing so I did not realize that you could run it on a PDA. I am stuck programming robotics all day and I guess just hide from the real world. A couple of years ago I managed an engineering firm in Atlanta and if I could have gotten VoIP on my PDA it would have been great. Or course, look at what has happened in the past two years. My old PDA was an old Palm OS system and probably wouldn't even think about running the software. It'll be interesting to hear any twists from others on advantages.

I would have to say I am getting a lot for the money just on my system in my house! Sadly every penny I am saving is now going to pay for gas, but hey if I had kept my POTS system I would have to walk to work.

Posts: 18 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Nov 30, 2003 Posts: 18

For the past two years I've been flying around the world for a charter airline. International cells are EXPENSIVE! Found that either cheap or free internet can be had most anywhere. Used either my vonage softphone or skype to call home regularly.

If I had to pay for all of those calls I'd be broke!

Posts: 18 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Sep 22, 2005 Posts: 18

boeingpilot wrote:

For the past two years I've been flying around the world for a charter airline. International cells are EXPENSIVE! Found that either cheap or free internet can be had most anywhere. Used either my vonage softphone or skype to call home regularly.

If I had to pay for all of those calls I'd be broke!

When do you choose to use Skype vs Vonage softphone? Do you ever use the Vonage adapter scenario?

Do you have any recommendations for integrating the two services (Skype and Vonage)? One stop shopping for voicemail, forwarding, email alerts, whatever...? It could get convoluted quickly.

I noticed that Skype offers a dedicated phone number for a nominal fee, as well as the Skype out feature (in Beta I believe). I've not done it because I'd need to update my Mac OSX, which i've held off on for a vairety of reasons. It seems a lot cheaper than Vonage, but services are more limited than Vonage, and I've read some noises that the connection quality is less reliable than Vonage.

My internet access scenario abroad most likely witll be internet cafes as I can't afford hotels with internet access.

Do you find yourself installing the software for Skype or Vonage's softphone on internet cafe computers, or is it typically already there? Is one's phone book contents stored on a database online when one logs in (Vonage), or is that something that one must somehow bring?

Posts: 2135 · Posted: Sat Oct 01, 2005 12:14 am Post subject:

The last time I checked, this was the Vonage forum. VoIP comparisons are not allowed here.

Please adhere to the forum rules.

Thank you,

Posts: 18 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Sep 22, 2005 Posts: 18

dconnor wrote:

The last time I checked, this was the Vonage forum. VoIP comparisons are not allowed here.

Please adhere to the forum rules.

Thank you,

Hmmmm.... you are probably addressing at least me... so I'll respond...

I'm terribly sorry if I broke some rules, but I thought I was on topic with this thread, and the spirit of my post doesn't seem against the rules to me.

I think if you reread my post, and that of the one before me, you will see that our focus is not on excluding or creating competition for Vonage, but on the integration of Vonage softphone as an effective communication tool in the context of the real world... specifically abroad.

I said...
"Do you have any recommendations for integrating the two services (Skype and Vonage)?"

The real world includes many communication options, and rarely is one option always effective... especially abroad. It's virtually impossible not to mention other communication options and compare their features in "if / then" type scenarios. I've seen it done extensively in this forum... and I think it's a good thing.

The clearer people are about how to effectively and conveniently integrate Vonage's services with their basket of communication tricks (cell phone, instant messaging, email voice attachments, another Voip, etc), the better for Vonage and it's customers.... and potential customers. The reality is that many people use more than one voip... so there must be a reason for it.

I thought the Vonage forums, with real world vonage users, would be the best place for mutual education about how to best utilze Vonage abroad, and integrate it into our arsenal of communication tools. I'd think Vonage would welcome the free R&D and insite for their vision thang.

However, I'd be happy to post somewhere else, if someone can point me to a more appropriate, educational, and less limiting forum.