Any Good experience using Vonage with multiple phones?

[Princesa 0]

Hi,

Maybe someone can help me to understand if this will work OK. Here the situation:

We are trying a phone service through INTERNET in order to reduce our phone bills (still on the trial period). It works OK in the phone we have it now but in order to switch our phone number definetely to this company we would like to know if it will work fine if we connect it to our home wiring so we can use it in multiple phones. We have around 6 phones around the home and would like to keep them as they are (all the same phone number, since we already have the wiring).

They suggest different options but the only one that I think will work for us is the following (pls. read below). However, I would really like to hear comments from others doing this, if it works OK, etc. My husband is afraid it wont work and then we will have to pay the high re-connection bill with our former company and potentially loose our phone number if we switch and it doesn't work... so, better be safe than sorry! Please your comments, thanks in advance!

"Some of our customers have plugged the Phone Adapter directly into the existing telephone wiring in their homes. The manufacturer of the adapter does not recommend hooking anything to the adapter other than a telephone, but you can seek advice from an electrician or someone who is familiar with internal telephone wiring on how to best connect it to your current wiring to take advantage of multiple extensions. We would advise that you pre-check the wiring on the jacks to make sure you don't have live PSTN voltage on the jacks before connecting them to the Phone Adapter (this can be easily done by using a line tester)."

[meddykomp 0]

I would recommend that you contact your internet service provider to see if they have a phone service. The reason for this is because if you use vonage and begin having problems, vonage will often refer you to yout ISP ... and your ISP is going to refer you right back to vonage. A lot of times your ISP will also have a VOIP service that they offer AND support so you don't risk problems. Also, the ISP will most often do the wiring for you so that you can use all outlets in your home.

[kygeographer 0]

Disclaimer: This is how I've seen it done. Not guaranteed to work, necessarily. So, I'm not responsible if you somehow fry something or make your phone service hiccup.

Here's how I've seen it done.. There's a small green box on the outside of the house, for the telephone line. Try looking inside. There should be a phone cable going into a regular phone jack. Unplug that. You've now unplugged all the phone service running into your house. You now have two choices. Phone service from the outisde MUST be disconnected at that box I was speaking of, otherwise, you'll risk frying your Vonage box. Either may work, or just one. Try taking the phone cord (the one you'd normally run out of the Vonage box to a phone) and putting it into a phone wall outlet. Try a few phones in the house, and try to make a call. If that works, then, well, I guess that solution works. If that doesn't work, then you'll want to get a REALLY long phone cord, and run it from the Vonage adaptor to that little box outside, and plug it into the phone jack inside the box. That's also been known to work. Let me know how this works out, I'm quite curious.

Here's a few links I found on hooking up your house wiring to VoIP...

http://www.answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=321781

And if you're a picture person like me, this one might help you..

http://www.jakeludington.com/ask_jake/2005...one_wiring.html

I think the first steps I outlined may work fine, but take a look at the others if that didn't work. If that still doesn't work, Google "VoIP over home wiring"

Good luck!

I found these too, but it was too late to edit the post:

EDIT: Just found this on the Vonage forum..

http://www.vonage-forum.com/ftopic7168.html

And these too:

http://www.vonage-forum.com/ftopic755.html

http://www.vonage-forum.com/ftopic298.html

http://www.vonage-forum.com/ftopic278.html

http://www.vonage-forum.com/ftopic32.html

[radacos 0]

We have VOIP and multiple phones, not with Vonage but with Sunrocket, and it works fine. If I'm not mistaken, the way it works in our home is that the phone box is connected to the router. The phones are wireless, so they don't need to be plugged into anything.

[Peter Miami 0]

I have no problems.

[Princesa 0]

THank you very much for all your suggestions. Let's see what I can do and will keep you posted.

Kygeographer,

I have a good question for you: If I disconnect that line from the outside it seems like it should work... but if it safe for the Vonage device if we have other 2 phone lines connected in the box? (normal phone lines - I can't desconnect them since they are businness lines my husband uses). I am just switching our home line to Vonage to save some $$... and really hope it works.

Thanks again!

[bettenan 1]

THank you very much for all your suggestions. Let's see what I can do and will keep you posted.

Kygeographer,

I have a good question for you: If I disconnect that line from the outside it seems like it should work... but if it safe for the Vonage device if we have other 2 phone lines connected in the box? (normal phone lines - I can't desconnect them since they are businness lines my husband uses). I am just switching our home line to Vonage to save some $$... and really hope it works.

Thanks again!

If all else fails.......you could chicken out like we did and buy an expandable phone system. Went to Radio Shack and got a phone to plug into the modem and another in a wall outlet...works great without rewiring. They say it can expand to 10 phones.

Vonage rocks...not only am I saving lots of money BUT the extra features are awsome.

[Not Available 0]

IVonage rocks...not only am I saving lots of money BUT the extra features are awsome.

Amen to that

[flipside 0]

I have my vonage hooked up to the home wiring.. It works great.

ANother option is to just get one of those cordless phone systems that you can hook up to 10 handsets all over the place.

[rbhigday 0]

I could not get my phone lines to work in the house, but I have been with Vonage for over 1 year and my only regret is not switching sooner.

Free ld not to mention 6cents a minute to peru for Silvia, I have not found a cheaper rate yet