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Review by raderator 
UPDATED: 40 days ago
member for 6.3 years, 1130 visits, last login: 13 days ago
 Conklin,Broome,NY
 $11 per month (24 month contract)
 about 3 days
 "Price, features, free cloned line"
 "No Contact catagories, hidden fees"
 "Great deal with all the features we need"
| Web-site:
Ease of Installation:
Call Quality:
Reliability:
Tech Support:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
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We were switched over from Broadvox a few days ago (they gave up residential service) and things have gone smoothly. Everything works great, so far (Earthlink cable, 6 down, 1 up).
They did not charge us the $15 for shipping the ATA, unlike brand new customers. We got the $200/2 yr deal and they let us keep our free 2nd number from Broadvox. There is a $2/month fee and a 7.3% tax so our monthly cost comes to $11.53. We were paying $20 with Broadvox which had fewer features but was rock solid. No commitment tho. When the 2 yrs ends, we'll be back to paying something near $20/month, unless we go elsewhere.
Support has been good and is American based. I tested the QoS of the ATA and it actually works, yea! Does not seem to slow down overall speed either. We have one line in the computer room and the rest of the house is on the other. The ATA uses half the wattage of our old 24v Mediatrix and is a third the size. The sound is louder, which is good.
We have a month to try it out. Sometimes I think about Ooma and their cool new equipment but I don't think we need it. We don't screen our VM and if we wanted to have two lines on our phones, I could add the 2nd line to our home wiring and use a 2-line phone. The PhonePower website is ugly but functional. You can login without re-entering your user name and password. They put a big ugly sticker on the ATA but you can slowly peel it off once the unit is warm.
PhonePower also sells to businesses, which is a good sign for reliability and longevity. I doubt anyone makes money in the residential VOIP market.
Update: We just got a set of AT&T DECT cordless phones. They worked but there was a loud clacking sound during the dial-tone. I put back our old Mediatrix and there no problem. So I went to the live web CS and finally convinced them to lower the volume a bit and that cured it. I think that's what he did. I lost the chat window cuz of the ATA reboot. Vtech now owns AT&T and they look to be functionally the same.
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Review by analytic168
UPDATED: 43 days ago
member for 44 days, 0 visits, last login: 44 days ago
San Francisco,San Francisco,CA
$12 per month (24 month contract)
about 21 days
"Excellent customer service, excellent phone service, low cost"
"DIY setup works for me because I'm technically savvy but I imagine most VOIP users are"
"This is the VOIP provider to get. btw i'm in San Francisco"
| Web-site:
Ease of Installation:
Call Quality:
Reliability:
Tech Support:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
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I set this up for my girlfriend. She is from Canada and needed cheap phone service because she calls home a lot. We live in San Francisco. I set her up with Skype initially (being the cheapest) but the phone service was extremely iffy and my gf wanted to use a real phone. After reading some reviews here of various VoIP providers, I decided to go with Phone Power. Other providers seemed to have higher ratings, but Phone Power seemed to have the most active users and the most established reputation based on the forum activity here and elsewhere. I had doubts because there weren't very many reviews in San Francisco, but I figured they're in California so it should be OK.
In the end, Phone Power has worked out so well that I am taking the time to write a review. I relied heavily on the other reviews here, for which I'm grateful. So here is my lengthy story:
I ordered the 2-year $199/year package. With taxes it came to $253. I read and believe there are some obligatory charges (maybe $40?) the second year (I think it's taxes or something). The first time I tried ordering their web site wasn't working. I had to do it again the next day. Before ordering, I chatted with a sales person on their web site, who was able to confirm for me that my first order didn't go through, and some specifics about the 30-day guarantee. My order went through the next day I received an email indicating they couldn't port my gf's old phone number (it was already disconnected, oh well) and that I needed to choose a phone number from the web site. I chose one and told them over e-mail which one I wanted. Then my order went through and within another day I received an email confirming shipment of my Grandstream.
They shipped my Grandstream via USPS. There was a little bit of delay on my part because I had this shipped to my work and they put my gf's name on it, which confused the people at my work. Plus I didn't check my packages for a couple weeks. That's all my fault. Their customer service however was EXTREMELY good about this and when I called them and briefly explained what happened they shipped me another Grandstream no questions asked. This time I followed the tracking number, hounded my company's mail room, and picked it up promptly.
Set up: I decided to set up the Grandstream behind my router. I am pretty technically savvy, but I still found this a little tricky. I made extensive use of the documents on their support web site / knowledge base, which I found helpful though a little tricky to navigate. I had a number of technical difficulties during set-up, I think these would have happened with any VoIP service and mostly aren't unique to Phone Power: For one thing, all their instructions say when putting the Grandstream behind the router, to plug the router into the WAN port of the Grandstream, but in the end I didn't end up doing that and I don't believe that's the right thing to do based on what little I understand about networking. I had to dig around their support web site before finding the default Grandstream password is 123. I went back and forth between putting it in front of and behind my router but couldn't get everything working. I finally thought I had everything connected properly (I could access the grandstream and my router and the internet from the computer), but the Grandstream still wasn't registering with Phone Power. After eliminating all possible problems from my side, I finally figured that they must have the wrong adapter registered at phone power due to the shipping mix-up.
I called them the next morning as soon as they opened at 8 am - I had to wait in the phone queue for maybe 10 minutes. The first support person just took my phone number so another support person could call me - I thought this was a nice way to do it. The next person called me back within 5 or 10 minutes. I told him I thought the problem was due to the fact that I had a second adapter shipped to me. He looked into it, verified that that was indeed the problem, and had it fixed in a minute. I re-booted the Grandstream and it was working within a few minutes. I made a test call and it was all working!
I was generally happy with the service I received from Phone Power - their support staff were super-friendly and local to California (one had a nice valley girl twang).
Since then, my girlfriend has made many multi-hour calls (she's a talker  over the past couple weeks to Canada and within San Francisco. They are all perfectly clear and as good as her old landline phone service. A call has never gotten dropped. Maybe once every 3 hours of talking there's a brief fade, but that's the worst it ever gets. My gf has a crappy old router that I gave her and I was initially concerned because the ATA is behind the router, but the phone still works great. There's not much to say here, I'm no audio expert, but I think the calls sound great.
As a techie, I also appreciate their functional and full-featured Web site. I build Web sites for a living, and their web site is cleanly laid out, works well, and is easy to use. They have a ton of neat features (voicemail to email, ring down to other numbers, etc.) that I am chomping at the bit to enable for my girlfriend (although she's not as interested in the features). I do kind of wish they offered some kind of soft-phone (maybe they do? i can't seem to find out anything about it.)
All in all, we're super-happy with Phone Power, and it's going to cost us less than $15/mo! (Btw, they advertise their $199 2-year special as being a time-limited offer, but the timer seems to reset every time it runs down!) I heartily recommend them to everyone looking for VoIP service!!
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Review by gworkman7
UPDATED: 50 days ago
member for 4.1 years, 804 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Tucson,Pima,AZ
$23 per month
about 14 days
"Good Feature Set / Reliable"
"None"
"Could be a good thing."
| Web-site:
Ease of Installation:
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Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
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I had my account hijacked by PhonePower due to Broadvox Direct dropping its customers on them. When I first recieved the e-mail notice, I contacted Phone Power to ensure the equipment would be sent to the correct address. This was on 9/10. On 9/14, I checked the tracking log and it showed that the equipment was sent to my old address. I contacted them again because my original box would no longer work after 9/15. They corrected the information (for the second time) and said it would be shipped out on 9/14. A few phone calls and two missed promises of the box being shipped and we are now up to 9/17 with no equipment and now, no service. I now have a tracking number for an overnight shipment of the equipment.
*** UPDATED 10/5/09
The equipment finally arrived on 9/21. So far, the service has been performing well. The only problem I had is that the volume is too loud. Called tech support and they had to log in to advanced settings (not available to end users) and make the adjustments. Everything is fine now.
Tech support was reached in less than 5 minutes, which was also a plus.
Followup comments:  | | 
ptrowski
Got Helix?
Premium
join:2005-03-14
Putnam, CT
clubs:
 ·VOIPo
 ·Metrocast Communic..
 ·AT&T DSL Service
·ViaTalk
| Re: Account HiJacked? said by TransitMan :Don't think so. Your old provider Broadvox simply sold/transfered you and everyone else to Phone Power, along with whatever records they had at the time, correct or not. Giving Phone Power a knock for something that may not be in their full control is not right. I think you missed this part-
"When I first recieved the e-mail notice, I contacted Phone Power to ensure the equipment would be sent to the correct address. This was on 9/10. "
--
"So, Lone Starr, now you see that evil will always triumph because good is dumb."
Have you been touched by his noodly appendage? »www.venganza.org | |
| | | 
TransitMan
Premium,MVM
join:2000-09-05
Dayton, OH
clubs:
·RoadRunner Cable
·Time Warner VOIP
·Earthlink TrueVoice
| Re: Account HiJacked? said by ptrowski :I think you missed this part- "When I first recieved the e-mail notice, I contacted Phone Power to ensure the equipment would be sent to the correct address. This was on 9/10. " And no, I didn't miss that part.
Even though you contacted Phone Power does not mean that they screwed up.
Transference of records, even though one may call in to make sure they are correct can and do become messed up.
Giving Phone Power low marks for this, in my opinion is a cheap shot at someone when they are trying to make something right from someone else dropping the ball, namely Broadvox, your old provider.
--
Perhaps TODAY IS a good day to die!
Worf on the Defiant - ST First Contact
Proud Host of Crunchie #2. | |
| | | |
ptrowski
Got Helix?
Premium
join:2005-03-14
Putnam, CT
clubs: | Re: Account HiJacked? When the email specifically states to call PP and give them your new address, etc and then they go with the old records, then yes that is a PP issue. | |
| | | |
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Review by dplantz
UPDATED: 57 days ago
member for 9.3 years, 3607 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Roslindale,Suffolk,MA
$23 per month (month by month)
about 5 days
"Great Voice Quality, Features that Comcast does not have, great tech support"
"Goes down every so often"
"Great value for the money, us based tech support"
| Web-site:
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(ratings match consensus)
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I ordered Phone Power after reading the reviews at DSL Reports. I wanted a cheaper phone service than Comcast after my promo ran out.
I have had voip since 2003 when I got Vonage. I have saved a ton of money using voip and love the features that pots does not have.
I have tried many voip companies over the last few years and wish that you could have ported numbers sooner than we could have.
Phone Power is one of those set and forget voip providers. I had issues when I got my ata, but tech support got me up in running in less than an hour of re-configureing the hardware. I love the feature set and the fact that I have outgoing caller id with name.
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 Review by Kinzoo
UPDATED: 59 days ago
member for 5.8 years, 347 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Buffalo,Erie,NY
$18 per month (12 month contract)
about 7 days
"Good price, Good quality."
"Still none after over one year!!!"
"Great service, support & price"
| Web-site:
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(ratings match consensus)
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Good price, Talk to real support people.
Plug and play.
Phone Power has been terrific, was with VOIP.com before and there service & support was pitiful!!!
Well,
Its been a year and a half now.
PhonePower has not missed a beat.
I have not experienced any outages, that I am aware of!!
The few times I had to call customer support, they were 100%.
I would highly recommend this service to anyone.
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Review by darren3179
UPDATED: 79 days ago
member for 7.9 years, 18 visits, last login: 79 days ago
Plano,Collin,TX
$23 per month
about 3 days
"Cheap International calls, Amazing call quality, free second line"
"none so far"
"A far better choice than Vonage all around"
| Web-site:
Ease of Installation:
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Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
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I decided to go with Phone Power recently since I call the Philippines often and Vonage was charging me .24 per min for calls to philippine mobile. Two other deciding factors were that the call quality to international calls was subpar at best and many times i would have to dial upwards of 7 to 8 times to get the call to connect. This was with calls to Australia and the Philippines, domestic calls were never an issue.
Hookup was easy with the grandstream VoIP modem, hooked into my Westell router ( I have FiOS) and i was up and running. With Vonage the calls always sounded very faint and distant, it was obvious i was talking to someone 10,000 miles away. With Phone Power I was absolutely amazed when i call the philippines now it sounds like the person is in the next room, the clarity is phenomenal. Also its only .14 per minute to a mobile as opposed to .24 with Vonage.
Bottom line, for Domestic and International calls you cannot beat Phone Power.
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Review by billburnett
UPDATED: 98 days ago
member for 3.9 years, 28 visits, last login: 25 days ago
Oak Harbor,Island,WA
$12 per month (24 month contract)
about 21 days
"Cost, Ease of Installation, Decent Feature Set"
"A Few Features ATT CallVantage had I'd Like to See Added"
"So far, as good as ATT CallVantage at about one-third the cost"
| Web-site:
Ease of Installation:
Call Quality:
Reliability:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
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I have been reading DSL Reports daily for a number of years, but have only occasionally bothered to log-in. Last log-in was when I adopted ATT CallVantage as my VOIP provider. I was pleased with that installation, have been a happy camper with CallVantage, and am another displaced CallVantage user moving only because they are closing shop.
My ISP is Comcast. I have the basic Tier Speed, at whatever speed Comcast advertises that to be these days. Modem is a Linksys (BEFCMU10). Router is also a Linksys ((WRT150N). In both the CallVanatge and Phone Power setup, I have the TA placed between my modem and the router.
Before selecting Phone Power I scoured the DSL reports website for reviews, other website reviews, and various VOIP providers' websites. Based on that information, I was intrigued mostly by Phone Power, CallCentric, and Future 9. I considered, initially, most all I could find/review. I could have gone with any of these three, and I changed my mind a few times back and forth reading their websites.
VOIP technology seems to me like it's advanced the last few years, and there are more providers in the marketplace, so I was optimistic I might be able top save a few $$ over my previous VOIP service. ATT CallVanatge had been costing me about $33 monthly. I liked Phone Power's new customer deal that gave me their Unlimited Residential service for $199 the first year, plus an additional year "free". Their service also recommended and provided a custom setup Grandstream HT502 TA for $14.95. All told, with taxes, etc, my initial two-year subscription is about $10.50 a month.
I placed my order for Phone Power over their website. No glitches. I asked for a changeover of my home phone number from ATT CallVanatge to PhonePower three weeks ahead in time, as I was going on a two-week vacation. Their website had offered me options to switch over in as little as about 7 days out, but I didn't want that occurring with me not at home to swap out the hardware. The HT502 TA from Phone Power arrived by mail the following week after I placed the order, and I had it in hand almost a week before I swapped it out. I waited until the day of turnover. Phone Power provide instructions with the TA, and their website had even more information about setup. Essentially, I just powered things down, placed the Grandstream HT502 where I had previously used the Callvanatge-provided Centillium, and turned things back on as instructed. As per the instructions, I waited 15-20 minutes, then dialed Voicemail to set my PIN. After that that, I made a few calls, and things seemed to be working OK. The cutover to receive calls happened overnight later that night (when Phone Power tells you "midnight", they mean midnight at the END of the day of the service date, not at the start of that day). Once PhonePower was up 100%, I called ATT CallVantage to ensure they were planning to stop billing me. Seems they already had all the information, and I got a confirmation email from them the following day indicated they had closed my account. Basically, this was a straightforward, as-advertised turnover, with no Admin or technical glitches.
I have Phone Power setup to ring a couple of phone numbers simultaneously, using the default greeting (no custom greeting from me). Apparently, callers initially get a recording that tells them the system will attempt to locate the party being called and then are provided music to listen to. They never hear ringing. They get a second recording them asking to leave a message if neither phone answers. I mention these details because a number of callers have mentioned this to me. In general, they like it, even though it is a bit different for a residential phone call. Call Quality is quite good. No complaints.
I have had no need for direct customer support. A few features (like calling multiple lines simultaneously) required me to adjust a few settings on the website twice. I initially misinterpreted a few directions. I'd have to say ATT CallVanatge did have a much "slicker" website. Phone Power's website does seem to be adding features to their service on an ongoing basis.
For about a third the cost of ATT CallVantage, and service that seems pretty much its equivalent, I am satisfied with Phone Power. My only concern, and I hope its unfounded, is that they manage to stay in business, versus outfits like SunRocket.
UPDATE 18 August, 2009:
So far, the service has worked fine with no major glitches. I have updated my monthly cost from $10 to $12 as I have since learned from reading other bloggers' entries that Phone Power will be charging me about another $40 or so at the one-year mark. I am a little disappointed that this was not clearly spelled out on their website. On the other hand, I am still saving quite a bit over my previous CallVantage service.
I have experienced only two imperfect calls. Once, I experienced the "echo" on line that others have mentioned. This, however, was via a forwarded call from Phone Power that I was actually receiving via my cell phone - not my VOIP line. Also, once, I have had a call drop on me, but in that instance I was on line for 30 minutes with a call TO a mobile cell phone user. In both cases, I cannot say for sure if the "glitch" was with Phone Power or with the cell phone systems in use.
Followup comments: 
44402812
Hack The Planet
Premium
join:2006-08-28
Plattsburgh, NY
|  Hope this eases your mind?
We collocate in the best of carrier neutral telco grade facilities, over a dozen bandwidth peers, use telco grade commercial equipment (not homegrown), etc...
Pretty impressive if I can say so myself :
2009 Year to Date Availability (Updated Monthly)
Scheduled Maintenance: 60 Minutes
Unscheduled Maintenance: 0 Minutes
Service Availability for 2009: 99.96%
2008 Total Availability
Scheduled Maintenance: 30 Minutes
Unscheduled Maintenance: 27 Minutes
Service Availability for 2008 99.99%
»www.phonepower.com/info/networkstatus.aspx | |
| |
ptrowski
Got Helix?
Premium
join:2005-03-14
Putnam, CT
clubs: | Re: Hope this eases your mind? Our? Are you working for PP now? | |
| | |
44402812
Hack The Planet
Premium
join:2006-08-28
Plattsburgh, NY | Re: Hope this eases your mind? Nope just a copy and paste from the PP forum. Thanks for the compliment though  | |
| | | |
ptrowski
Got Helix?
Premium
join:2005-03-14
Putnam, CT
clubs: | Re: Hope this eases your mind? You might want to clarify that as it comes across as your own text. | |
| billburnett
Premium
join:2005-12-06
Oak Harbor, WA
·PHONE POWER
·Comcast
| thanks.. Thanks..my concern with respect to my comparison of Phone Power to Sunrocket was based on my perception that, like Phone Power, SunRocket was one of the smaller VOIP outfits (versus Vonage or ATT Callvantage), and, for some reason, I believe SunRocket went out of business rather abruptly. Having paid up front a two-year deal with Phone Power, I was simply expressing that I hope nothing similar comes of Phone Power. I've no information personally to make a technical comparison between the two companies. | |
| |
44402812
Hack The Planet
Premium
join:2006-08-28
Plattsburgh, NY
1 edit | Re: thanks.. Well, look at it this way. Even if "were to go under" take 250.00 and divided it, that works out to about 20.00 a month. Within the first month PP payed for itself for me both time and money! People are forgetting the features such as call waiting, call forward, and 3 way save time. Time which you can't ever get back. Most people instead can't get over the 250.00 price and think O'no's what if they go under.  I may loose a little money?
Hell when I got rid of ViaCrap I lost 50.00 did a cry? Nope! Just got upset over the fact that they are still in business. Hope you continue to have great service
| |
| 
DM123
@verizon.net
| PhonePower I've had similar good experiences with PhonePower. I recently switched from ATT CallVantage (2 days before I realized that they were killing it) because of issues with ATT. ATT had some software annoyances, call forwarding issues and poor customer support.
Prior to switching, I called PhonePower tech support and was very impressed with their quick answer and eagerness to help. I then bought it and it installed and worked as advertised. I had a couple of questions as I have a complex call forwarding scheme and they were very helpful.
At this time, I have switched my work number over and am debating about switching my Verizon home line (FIOS). I just need to let it simmer for a month to make sure things continue and understand Verizon's contract. | |
| | | |
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Review by Bertrand_Q
UPDATED: 108 days ago
member for 112 days, 6 visits, last login: 8 days ago
San Jose,Santa Clara,CA
$12 per month (24 month contract)
about 7 days
"Price, reviews, tech chat, sales chat, service delivery"
"Account management could be improved"
"Like it so far"
| Web-site:
Ease of Installation:
Call Quality:
Reliability:
Tech Support:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
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This is my very first review (not only VOIP, just anything). I will use a timeline presentation to present my experience with Phone Power.
May-June-July 2009: Shopping
-----------------------------
I friend of mine switched his traditional phone company to VOIP (VIATALK). Since then he has been very happy with the service and I was getting ready to subscribe to their prepaid, one year - get one year free. I changed my mind after reading the reviews on voipreview.org, dslreport.com, checking their F rating on Best Business Bureau (www.bbb.org) and finally, I don't like the Viatlak hidden $49 cancellation fee (at anytime even after contract expires). I then start spending long hours reading reviews for all other VOIP. I almost went for Intalk but the final cost was higher and Nextiva (hosting Intalk) seemed surprised by me asking for a residential service when they offer Small business service.
I finally found Phone Power which:
- Has decent reviews
- Has the same offer (1 year free) as Viatalk
- Almost clearly announced the real cost of the service including fees and taxes.
July 2009: Chatting with Phone Power
------------------------------------
I got a sales rep to chat with me quickly. Conversation was fine. I mostly had one question after reading the Terms of Service:(»www.phonepower.com/services/term···tos.aspx, section 7.2) "If the Service Term is longer than twelve (12) months, additional taxes and fees will be charged after the initial twelve (12) months have passed". At this point, if you are still reading, you can guess I am a little neurotic about figuring out the real cost of a service before signing (which is a real hassle in the US ... don't get me started on this subject). The sales rep confirmed that taxes and fee would be around $40 for the second year but she could not give me an exact price.
This is why my monthly cost is around $12 = (253.26 + 40) / 24
July 29 2009: Signed up with Phone Power
----------------------------------------
I finally took my courage and signed up with Phone Power online, with my the option of porting my current phone number. They indeed charged me exactly $253.26 on Aug 3rd.
I received the Grandstream HT502 on Aug 3rd although USPS had it available for me on Aug 1st but I was not there.
August 3rd 2009: Installing the HT502
------------------------------------
I like it; small device, small power supply. I connected everything as instructed: HT502 (WAN port) directly on the cable modem, my router on the LAN port of the HT502. All leds seemed OK ... I waited an hour but got a busy signal on every attempt to dial a number. I checked again the Phone Power web site and confirmed that I should be able to dial out. I finally managed to get in web administration page of the HT502 and immediately noticed that the FXS1 port of the phone was marked as not registered. Not that I know exactly what to expect to read here but usually, "Not registered" does not sound good.
I tried 4 times an online chat (8-9pm) but it failed (too late I guess).
I looked in the support pages of PhonePower.com with every kind of keyword search and did not find anything about registration. Since I don't fully read instructions, I guess I qualify for being a geek. Being aware of this deviant behavior, I then tried again to read the small instructions notice but did not find anything.
I can't remember exactly how I end up on this page: »www.phonepower.com/Support/Knowl···263.aspx
but it solved my problem and the HT502 was now registered and outgoing call worked (with the right caller ID).
As expected, the incoming calls are not working since the porting date is on August 5th.
So basically, the installation was fine except that glitch with having to enable the WAN web access which really is not a straight forward move when you receive the device. I really can't imagine my grand mother saying "Of course, I have to enable wan web access of allow PhonePower servers to remotely activate and register the ATA". That makes me think I should call my grand mother.
So far so good, I will continue this review after the real service activation. It's pretty good so far!
06-Aug-2009: Service activated
-----------------------------
Exactly as announced, Phone Power activated my service (ATT is now gone) and I can now be called at home. 9 days to get a complete service including porting my existing number: Impressive!
08-Aug-2009: Comments on the Account management pages
------------------------------------------------
I'm a little disappointed by the "My account" pages:
1. The call blocking feature is a little obscure. The "Blocked contact" page is simple but it's only if you go to Power Forwarding page that you discover that you have to apparently activate the "Complex call routing" to enable call blocking. Blocking by exact phone number is ok but in the end what I would like (I don't think it's unreasonable) is to block phone number by pattern, for example block or forward directly to my voicemail all incoming toll free number (800, 866, ...). It's a very neat feature available on Viatalk.
2. There is a rendering problem (minor) with Safari browser.
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 Review by veloslave
Posted: 121 days ago
member for 6.3 years, 1761 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Pleasant Hill,Contra Costa,CA
$16 per month (24 month contract)
about 365 days
"Price"
"SERVICE!!!"
"Haven't had them for long... already thinking maybe I need to pay more for someone better"
| Web-site:
Ease of Installation:
Call Quality:
Reliability:
Tech Support:
Value for money:
(ratings well below consensus)
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Got some really bad service so far... no one could get it running... they wanted to end the hour and a half "trying to get it working" phone call because it is closing time. Had a guy in Chat hang up on me on purpose (Thanks DAVE you jerk) and it is still not working right not to mention it being almost unusable with FAX.
I have talked with some very nice people... but knowing what you are doing should go along with the title. Took two calls, both over an hour long to get it working/dial tone... which is intermittent/sometimes it stops working, so it is still not working right and then you get hung up on.
This is another not ready for prime time (everyday dependable residential) VOIP service that the industry is littered with. Maybe I need to move up in price range to get a dependable service WITH customer support that shines... but who are they?
Why can't more companies be run like Honda, Sonic.net and Verizon?
Product AND service... is it too much to ask?
Unfortunately in the day and age it seems the answer is "yes"
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Review by mth712
UPDATED: 125 days ago
member for 3.1 years, 50 visits, last login: 54 days ago
Raymore,Cass,MO
$23 per month
about 13 days
"Easy signup - Lots of features - Good call blocking"
"See review for update"
"I had Comcast Voip and the log time and date are always wrong"
| Web-site:
Ease of Installation:
Call Quality:
Reliability:
Tech Support:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
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Signing up was easy. The Grandstream box came fast. Porting took a long time. I requested 7-7-08 and they put start date at 7-15-08 and it was ready that day. May have been an issue with getting the number from Comcrap.
Plugged in box and it just works. Plug and play. Light on Grandstream flashes when a message is waiting.
Call log is too short and no history.
UPDATE 7-21-2009
I still love all of the call blocking and numerous other features. The call log is now as long as a person could want. The issues I have are that I could fax with Comcast Voice and the voice quality was as good as or better than land-line. With PhonePower I can't fax and the quality is not too good. A lot of echo and static and we have to unplug and plug back in the Grandstream often to get our line to work right. I hate the stutter tones. The quality is such that when I use the touchtone for banking or other,the tone isn't received half the time.
I tried every fix for every issue and even called support. The thing is that I am now with UVERSE and I do not know if it is UVERSE internet quality or PhonePower so you should give it a try. I have signed up for UVOICE so I will be giving UVOICE a try after this Friday.
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