VOIP SunRocket Internet Phone Service $199 for 15months = $13.27/month

[mm60]

Originally posted by: jayfischer
I had the gizmo hooked into the router on my first attempt. Then I went to before the router - which works. I have the crossover cable from the router to the gizmo WAN port.

That was one question I had though - do I use the crossover cable going into the router? You answered that, mm60.

I shouldn't need to reset the cable modem and/or router with the gizmo after the router, right? As long as the router assigns a IP to the gizmo everything in theory should be cool, right?


Thanks
Jay

What you mentioned is "the theory". In practice I found it better to reboot the devices after changing the configuration. As far as the gizmo goes, I read other posts that you HAVE to wait for 45 minutes after disconnecting the power. Apparently it takes that long for the capacitors to discharge. It is only then that it loses its old ip address. Until then, you may get strange results

 

[dabuddha]

I have the linksys wrt54g router and i have the gizmo hooked up to it via a regular patch cable. I'm not using the cross over. And the patch cable is plugged into the wan port in the gizmo.
Plus I had to enable DHCP on my router even though I use static IP addresses on my network. Once I enabled DHCP, it connected almost instantly.

 

[ImSeeker]

Day 25

Incoming calls on my former POTS number are now incoming to the Sunrocket phones.

Strangely enough, my POTS line still has a dial tone. What's THAT all about?

I'll wait till tomorrow to see if the POTS line dies and then rehook everything.

 

[doan]

I had to call SR to request a refund today...they confirmed that e911 would not work in my area and could not give me an ETA. They were very nice about the whole thing and even offered to send me a pre-paid return shipping lable in addition to a full refund. If the e911 stuff ever gets fixed I'll gladly go back to SR for VOIP but for now, with a family of 6, I can't take the risk of no real 911 service.

 

[RideFree]

Originally posted by: ImSeeker
Day 25

Incoming calls on my former POTS number are now incoming to the Sunrocket phones.

Strangely enough, my POTS line still has a dial tone. What's THAT all about?

I'll wait till tomorrow to see if the POTS line dies and then rehook everything.

Maybe you'll slip through the Qwest Qracks...Hark!!!

 

[ImSeeker]

Hmmm - so what's a good way to test e911 without bringing the cops and firetrucks to your door?

 

[doan]

Originally posted by: ImSeeker
Hmmm - so what's a good way to test e911 without bringing the cops and firetrucks to your door?

Just call 911 and tell them you're confirming 911 effectivity for your new phone service. Its prob a good idea to call the local police station first. They may have a prefered time or day for test calls.

 

[Ctown]

FYI..apparently voice mail notification is now working. I have not been able to verify it myself yet, but various threads over at FW and dslreports are confirming it....excellent news.

Now if they couldd just get caller id with name to work, I'd be all set.

 

[ttown]

Now includes unlimited calls to Canada!

(sorry if this is old news... I just noticed it on their "new" home-page for March)

 

[GTFan]

It's working, they've overhauled the web site and you can now see detailed call logs as well. Both VM stutter dialtone and the message waiting indicator on the Uniden phones are good for me. Dial '00' to hear your VM, then after you clear unread messages the tone and light go back to normal.

Does distinctive ring work yet? I'm forwarding my signature number to the free k7.net fax service.

 

[ttown]

Originally posted by: GTFan
It's working, they've overhauled the web site and you can now see detailed call logs as well. Both VM stutter dialtone and the message waiting indicator on the Uniden phones are good for me. Dial '00' to hear your VM, then after you clear unread messages the tone and light go back to normal.

Does distinctive ring work yet? I'm forwarding my signature number to the free k7.net fax service.

Sweet! Call duration is there now.

But I did notice "strange activity" which appears on the "full call log", but not on any of the individual ("tabbed") listings... and that is, 2 missed incoming calls from "unknown" at about 2:45am Eastern this morning. I'm 100% sure my phone didn't ring. I'll assume it's related to the site/system changes, but I'll be worried if I see that kind of thing in the future.

edit: double sweet! They added time-zones in the account settings. Now I don't have to "subtract 3" from Eastern time to get Pacific time.

BTW: I had a <somewhat> phone-service related problem yesterday. I tried calling a regional-800 number via my SR phone and got a message (from the 800#) saying I was calling from out of the region. It's a problem with the company that set up the 800 number -- not SR -- but just a heads up if anyone depends on such a thing.

 

[ImSeeker]

Day 26 - A big day!

Yesterday evening, my land line phone calls started ringing the Sunrocket line. Strangely enough, the land line was not dead, but it did die at midnight last night.

This morning, I disconnected the outside phone box. This site helped immensely to make me feel comfortable I was doing the right thing (although I pretty much knew what to do.)

http://michigantelephone.mi.org/distribute.html

After doing this, I connected in the Gizmo into my inside wiring. Wow. It worked!

One glitch, when I called into the new system, the phone would ring twice, then seem to answer, then disconnect. (I could call out fine.) Was it number of phones? Some line?

All my phones rang (and I have 11 phones in the house). I disconnected them all and reconnected them one by one. Turns out that TWO of the phone jacks were the problem. If they were not connected to phones, everything worked, if one or both were connected, two rings, then die. I tried this with multiple phones - it seems to be the jacks.

I opened the jacks to see if they were reversed, or something strange like that. Although I understand the red/green/yellow/black system for my house, I couldn't find a configuration that worked at the jack.

So, for now, I simply don't have phones connected to those two jacks and everything works fantastic.

NOW - I have to figure out what the tarnation is going on with those two jacks. But not tonight! - Any suggestions or thoughts welcome. Again - the issue seems to be on call in - two rings and they SEEM TO ANSWER ON THEIR OWN, but the line dies.

But, hey, that's a wiring problem - Sunrocket seems to be handling all this fine!

 

[jayfischer]

Ok. I got it working. How'd I do it. I installed a brand new spanking WRT54GS (I was using a BEFSR81). So whatever the GS brings to the table worked for me.

I still can't call out but I can receive calls. Strange.

 

[MrNutz]

Originally posted by: GTFan
It's working, they've overhauled the web site and you can now see detailed call logs as well. Both VM stutter dialtone and the message waiting indicator on the Uniden phones are good for me. Dial '00' to hear your VM, then after you clear unread messages the tone and light go back to normal.

Nice site changes. Real nice to see call duration now. Even for past outgoing/incoming calls.

How long does it take before the msg waiting light on the Uniden base comes on after leaving a msg? I just left a test msg, but I don't have a notification. Did you have to set it up in the phone?

 

[jono8]

anyone have a problem with clicking on "view messages" under the voicemail page? It works when I click it on my signature number, but when I clicke on it for my household number, the page just refreshes.

 

[jono8]

just noticed too that my Feb call logs only go up to 2/16...

 

[imported_troyconrad]

Hello--

I have been using SunRocket for a little over a month now with very few problems. I choose to keep my current landline since it's being used for a very sweet grandfathered SBC DSL plan that gives me 6000/768 for $50 a month, but stripped the line down to bare minimum to cut costs. This also gives me a backup line for emergencies or service outages.

I love the free, small, feature-filled Uniden phones, but wish there were 5.8 instead of 2.4, as my microwave interferes with them, and they are probably interfering with my lightly used 802.11G WiFi network as well.

I have the Access211 in front of my router, as suggested by SR, and have it set to forward all available port ranges to my existing NetGear router, essentially DMZing to that device. This lets me use the polished interface on my NetGear to manage port forwarding, LAN DHCP, etc, while still allowing the Access211 to perform traffic prioritization so my calls are clear even when I'm making heavy use of the connection for BitTorents, etc.

I have been doing research trying to find out more about the Access211 router/adaptor, and have found nothing but press releases and a spec sheet on the Telco.com web site. On a hunch, I check to see if they have a FTP site and bingo!

For those that want to find out more about their new "Gadget", what's changed in the latest firmware, etc, you might want to check out the files at the following URL:

<a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="ftp://ftp.telco.com/outgoing/Access/211/"><a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="ftp://ftp.telco.com/outgoing/Access/211/">ftp://ftp.telco.com/outgoing/Access/211/</a></a>

-Troy-

 

[ttown]

thanks troyconrad... I've been very curious about the workings of the gizmo as well.
I've determined that upon powering up the gizmo, 2 configuration files are downloaded to it.
One file has "general" SR settings and the other file-name is comprised partially of the gizmo's mac address -- making it specific to each user (with user-specific info). Within the individualized config file is a reference to the "sip_211_4_50_xx.rom" file -- which I'm assuming it auto-downloads if the version changes. My gizmo's version#'s matched, so I haven't actually seen a firmware download occur. But, I downloaded the rom file and ran a "strings" (unix) command on it. It's a 2MB (exactly) file which apparently has a TON! of configuration settings to mess with (stuff regarding bridging, vlans, and more!)
Unfortunately, it appears that the interface is disabled per some settings in the config files that it downloaded at the beginning.
I've downloaded the config files for my gizmo -- and if I modified it to turn the interface ON (vs OFF) and somehow tricked the gizmo to read my config files instead of the ones off SR... I should be able to turn it on. That's way outside my intentions, though.... I'm mostly interested from an "App Developer" point of view, versus a hardware tweaker. I can't think of a scenario that I'd have in my house that the gizmo doesn't accommodate as-is.
Somewhat off-topic: I do find it a little disturbing that if you told me what your mac address is -- I can tell you what your phone# and caller-id display is. I haven't thought much if that idea could be (mis)used by haxors. (Yes, I'm paranoid)
Anyway... Thanks for the links to the manuals... I'll definately check them out.

 

[MrNutz]

Thanx troyconrad

 

[ttown]

Hmm... I just thought of somethng that may be a problem...

On rare occasions, I've lost internet connectivy because my ISP changes some settings (or potentially other issues).
I've had to configure my router with a static configuration which I just duplicate from dynamically assigned settings. However, occasionally when my ISP makes changes, I've lost connection until I reset my router.
If this occurs during a time when I'm not surfing, I wouldn't know about it -- thus causing a potential problem. I may lose my phone for hours and not know about it until I try making a call (or try surfing).

Is there a good solution to being notified that my phone is "out of order"? (other than setting up the "find me" stuff on SR.com)
I have a cell-phone with text-message capability.

One not-so-convenient solution might be to have a script run on an external site that pings/talks-to my gimzo -- and have it email (text-msg) me if connection is broken.
That's doable, but is there a better solution? Ultimate solution would be for SR to either text-message me upon a perceived outage, or maybe trigger a "forward all calls" to my cell/(or other) number. Configuring the "find me" to always be on isn't good for me because there'd be WAY too much ringing/forwarding before a call would go to voicemail.

any ideas out there?

 

[MrNutz]

Isn't that what the Fwd calls option on SR was intended for? (i.e. power outage)

 

[loup garou]

Originally posted by: werk

Originally posted by: dabuddha

Originally posted by: werk
How long did it take you guys to receive your shipment from SR? I ordered 12 days ago with express shipping (boy was that a waste of money) and it's still not here. I called after a week and the SR support guy said he couldn't track it. I'm calling again on Monday, this is pissing me off...:|

Real waste of money. I ordered mine on a Friday with standard shipping and received it on the following Monday.

Well, I haven't even been charged yet. SO I'm going to call again tomorrow and tell them I'm not paying for Express shipping if it's going to take weeks for it to get here. :|

SR still has no idea what's going on with my order. Last CSR I spoke to "elevated my case" and said to call back "in a few days for an update." I emailed their Cheif Marketing Officer whose name/email was attached to my welcome email, who responded a couple days later personally (nice) to state their director of CS would call me that day (no call 24 hours later). This is getting ridiculous, but I'm not giving up!

 

[ttown]

Originally posted by: MrNutz
Isn't that what the Fwd calls option on SR was intended for? (i.e. power outage)

That's a bit of a catch-22.... I'd normally want my calls to come through to the gizmo->phone. Say a power outage occurs. My gizmo is dead, phone is dead, computer is dead. I can't log-on to SR to turn on Forward-all-calls without my computer.

I have the modem,router and gizmo on a UPS -- so the power-outage scenario isn't quite what worries me -- but probably should be the worry of lots of people. My worry is if my ISP goes down (or when I get disconnected from it, till I reset my router).

Maybe what SR needs is another option for "Forward all calls when Gizmo doesn't respond." That seems like it should be a relatively easy solution -- since I know for a fact that my gizmo registers itself every 15 seconds. If an incoming call is attempted, but I haven't "registered" w/in the last minute, then forward the call to my cell/user-defined-number.
I think I'll put that in their suggestion-box.

 

[MrNutz]

I thought of that too. B/c you really don't want the calls to be fwded if you're just not home. Good idea to pass it along to them.

 

[mm60]

Originally posted by: ttown

Originally posted by: MrNutz
Isn't that what the Fwd calls option on SR was intended for? (i.e. power outage)

That's a bit of a catch-22.... I'd normally want my calls to come through to the gizmo->phone. Say a power outage occurs. My gizmo is dead, phone is dead, computer is dead. I can't log-on to SR to turn on Forward-all-calls without my computer.

I have the modem,router and gizmo on a UPS -- so the power-outage scenario isn't quite what worries me -- but probably should be the worry of lots of people. My worry is if my ISP goes down (or when I get disconnected from it, till I reset my router).

Maybe what SR needs is another option for "Forward all calls when Gizmo doesn't respond." That seems like it should be a relatively easy solution -- since I know for a fact that my gizmo registers itself every 15 seconds. If an incoming call is attempted, but I haven't "registered" w/in the last minute, then forward the call to my cell/user-defined-number.
I think I'll put that in their suggestion-box.

Another great feature would be if you could specify a time between which you wanted calls forwarded e.g. 8:00 am to 5:00 pm forward all calls to my cell or office number (when I am at work)...