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

[EvilYoda]

Well I'm not saying it's the gizmo precisely, but the problem only presents itself when the gizmo is in line with the router. When it's just the cable modem to the router, I have no problems, everything works as normal. But when the gizmo is in line (as it is now), I'm resolving a page maybe a third of the time. frustrating, to say the least.

 

[mfbf]

Originally posted by: ttown

Originally posted by: mfbf
I wonder if anybody can help. When I use the phone, I hear the other person crystal clear but they say I am breaking up constantly (ie. worse then a cell phone). I have to contact SR tech again but was wondering if anybody has any ideas.

I have modem->gizmo->router and it still doesn't help.

Any other network activity? Like file-sharing or other up/down loading?
If so, turn it off while your diagnosing issues.
Also, you might try a speed test -- go HERE and run the "speed test" near the bottom of the page.
Hopefully, you have 150+Kbps UP. I think ~100Kbps is "required minimum" -- but the higher the better.
If that looks good, try re-seating all your cables. If there's a dirty connection, it may be introducing noise. Also, maybe try a different wired phone... just to rule out wireless interference.
Do a "ping www.sunrocket.com" from the command prompt. I get ~88ms average with little variation. If yours is significantly higher, you may have a lame ISP, or are just unlucky.
If all those tests seem OK, then calling SR is pobably a good idea. It may be that they'll upgrade your firmware. (can be done on-line... you don't have to mail it back)
PM me if you want to chat more.... or post here.

hth

To dabuddha, yes I had the gizmo after the router but thought I would get better sound quality in front of the router.

To ttown, I have tried the speed test and it says I can have 4 VOIP so I don't think upload/download is a problem. No other internet activity was occuring during these times. I pinged sunrocket and got 44 ms. Will chat with sunrocket again and try and get things straightened out.

Thanks for the info guys.

 

[ttown]

Originally posted by: EvilYoda
Well I'm not saying it's the gizmo precisely, but the problem only presents itself when the gizmo is in line with the router. When it's just the cable modem to the router, I have no problems, everything works as normal. But when the gizmo is in line (as it is now), I'm resolving a page maybe a third of the time. frustrating, to say the least.

My guess is that you're resolving against your dns cache -- and that your "real" dns is not being used. At the comand prompt, do a "nslookup www.stinky.com" -- the dns resolver-IP is near the top, and is hopefully the lan address of your router (note: no idea what stinky.com is... I just picked a word that you'd be unlikely to have cached)
My hunch is your ISP is likely the cause. Take the gizmo out of the picture for a moment... Plug the router into the modem and reset it. Log into your router and find the DNS settings. Write them down. Now, set those as "hard-coded" DNS settings in your router. Then, put the gizmo back in the line-up and plug the power in. Pick up the handset attached to the gizmo and dial "##333285" (you should hear a voice say 'dot'). Then reset your router. At this point, your router has your ISP's dns addresses, your PC should have your routers IP for dns resolution -- and so the gizmo is out of the "dns loop".
If a problem comes up again, take out the gizmo and change your router to get your DNS settings dynamically, then do a release/renew in your router.... Did different IP addresses come up? Yes?-- then your ISP is messing with your dns servers. I don't have my gizmo set up like that, but I can imagine a scenario where it doesn't like to have it's dns settings changed on-the-fly (I could very well be wrong) -- whereas your router handles it fine. If that's the case, it certainly would be usefull info to call and mention to SR. (This scenario doesn't apply to those who have the gizmo behind their router) Or maybe someone else here can post that the gizmo handles that situation fine.

The reason I put some focus on your ISP is because my ISP had frequent dns issues in the past which would result in a situation similar to yours, except I would have dns resolution issues with or without the gizmo.

 

[GTFan]

Originally posted by: georgepa
GTfan-

Nobody expected otherwise. I stand by mine, and 89% Call Reliability from many reviewers backs it up. No matter what some hateboys have to say. Just a little poor that you would cut and paste a CONS list from some other hateboy on another forum rather than bringing your own.

Actually, some of it *was* mine, but you can't handle the truth anyway. My pros and cons are really no different than your own, except that you just blanket copied my pros, then ignored half the cons and poo-poo'd the rest.

If they last, they have a chance to be a nice VOIP option, and I'm going to stick with them for the year (unless this month's fiascos continue). What I'm doing here is presenting a realistic view of SR, but you can see no wrong with them no matter what. Possibly due, of course, to the fact that your rep now depends on it from all of your (currently) happy referral clients. That's why you're a fanboy.

More than anything, I strongly disagree with the prevailing 'oh well, VOIP services have outages, just live with it' attitude. You can say what you want, but until the VOIP providers (and their contracted providers) get serious about it, it's going to be hard to take them seriously. I shouldn't have to put up with 4+ hours of daytime outages in the last 3 weeks, nor should you. This is especially true if you're depending on inbound calls to a published number (business, urgent calls, etc.). Or, you have a guest over, and you have an emergency, but the only phone they find is dead because your VOIP service took a dump.

That's why I say, when it works, it's great, but when it doesn't, well, now you know why it's cheap.

 

[EvilYoda]

huh, I guess I'll try that later tonight...but first, how do I go about setting up the Gizmo behind the router? Do I just go from port 2 of the router -> WAN on the Gizmo?

 

[ttown]

Originally posted by: EvilYoda
huh, I guess I'll try that later tonight...but first, how do I go about setting up the Gizmo behind the router? Do I just go from port 2 of the router -> WAN on the Gizmo?

Yup!
After the change, reset the devices in the order they are attached to your modem.
(when it comes to the gizmo, power-off, switch stuff around, power-on gizmo, dial ##3332858" -- which is a special# to reset things to the 'defaults')
edit: If your router has "denial of service" settings (probably under "firewall")... you may need to UP the thresholds for what your router considers "an attack". I didn't do that at first, and my router would shut-down inbound calls. I made the change, and everything has worked since.

This configuration may cause quality issues for people that run file-sharing with lame routers. I have a nice (but non-QoS) SMC Barricade router and have 0 problems with voice quality while simultaneously doing heavy downloads. I'd expect voice-quality to be more of a concern with heavy UPLOADS... so ymmv, especially if you're an active file-sharer. I haven't tested quality during uploads, so I can't say for sure.

 

[EvilYoda]

Only consistent uploads are torrents which are capped at a total of 15KB/s, out of a 300kb/s line, so I should be okay. I'm running the 2804 SMC 802.11g router, so hopefully I have luck like you...I couldn't get it to work behind the router yet, but I'll try resetting everything and then calling that number. Thanks again

 

[laketrout]

Originally posted by: GTFan
I stand by what I posted, regardless of what 'georgepa' (or pan, or whatever) says. It's not all milk and honey, no matter how bad the fanboys want it to be so. But it is cheap.

Caveat emptor.

It may not be milk and honey, but for the price I think it is more than sufficient. I think for the non-tech person that alone should win them over especially if they are a cell phone user (saving sometimes $50 a month, you kidding?).

For the techy, it is cheap and a load of fun to play with and go through some of these hiccups to learn more about something that isn't going away and will probably be mainstream in 5-10 years.

Ridefree - you aren't the only one in the FAQ box..

Firmware Discussion - Checked my firmware to as suggested and it is 4.50 anyone work out how to get that up to 4.54 or is it only through SR customer service?

 

[GTFan]

Originally posted by: laketrout
It may not be milk and honey, but for the price I think it is more than sufficient. I think for the non-tech person that alone should win them over especially if they are a cell phone user (saving sometimes $50 a month, you kidding?).

For the techy, it is cheap and a load of fun to play with and go through some of these hiccups to learn more about something that isn't going away and will probably be mainstream in 5-10 years.

All true, and I agree. The way some of them market it, however, you'd think it was a perfect replacement for your old POTS line. There are still a lot of folks without cellphones, but I guess they'll be happy paying Ma Bell forever anyway.

 

[georgepa]

GTFan-

The CONS list was copied verbatim from another hateboy on FW.

However, come on now: Call forwarding doesn't work? Ticket opened? Call forwarding works, as you well know. I use that feature all the time. But in addition to the simple type of forwarding others offer SR gives you advanced forwarding. After 4 rings your first choice is called, then your second, then your third. That feature also works. Call forwarding is a PRO, not a con. It is ridiculous to copy another hateboy's list, because it shows when you copy the guy's personal stuff ('talked with Joyce, said that my area code is not included, etc.')

I pointed out 2 areas that SR could improve upon (Busy Redial and Softphone support,) you just reposted some hateboy's list without listing your own thoughts. That is cheesy.


The bigger question is why you have such a chip on your shoulder? When I talk with someone else I never invoke your username ("unlike hateboy or VOIP shill GTFan over there",) yet you find it necessary to resort to childish remarks like that? Why not constructively making your service-hate-case and let that be it? Don't worry so much what I tell someone else. It is not like I am trying to get Promocodes onto my account or anybody loses big money even if they hate the service.

BTW, NOBODY is marketing any VOIP as a full single-phone option. Everybody always points out that it is imperative to have a cell phone available, just in case. That is particularly the case with Sunrocket, which as you know is the ONLY company to have E-911 service installed as part of the basic package, and even with that they note that "You should always have an alternative means of accessing emergency service."

Since about 80% of households in the US do have some kind of cell phone capability it is mainstream technology for most that can be used in conjunction with a cell phone.

 

[RideFree]

For the Naysayers!

All I know is that there seem to be an extraordinarily large bunch of folks saving a lot of money this year by getting rid of their POTS. :beer:

If your phone service is so 24x7 critical, what the hell are you doing trying to save a few bucks/month?

 

[ttown]

Originally posted by: RideFree
For the Naysayers!

All I know is that there seem to be an extraordinarily large bunch of folks saving a lot of money this year by getting rid of their POTS. :beer:

If your phone service is so 24x7 critical, what the hell are you doing trying to save a few bucks/month?

You got that right, RideFree... and I thank you that I'm one of them!

 

[GTFan]

Originally posted by: georgepa
The CONS list was copied verbatim from another hateboy on FW.

Not true, I added a couple of points to the list, which is in any case accurate. Find me forwarding was what he was talking about (it doesn't always work).

It is ridiculous to copy another hateboy's list, because it shows when you copy the guy's personal stuff ('talked with Joyce, said that my area code is not included, etc.')

WTF are you smoking? I don't know who you're talking about, but I did no such thing.

I pointed out 2 areas that SR could improve upon (Busy Redial and Softphone support,) you just reposted some hateboy's list without listing your own thoughts. That is cheesy.

Your ignorance of this matter, and avoidance in actually addressing most of the cons, shows that there's no further point here.

The bigger question is why you have such a chip on your shoulder? When I talk with someone else I never invoke your username ("unlike hateboy or VOIP shill GTFan over there",) yet you find it necessary to resort to childish remarks like that? Why not constructively making your service-hate-case and let that be it? Don't worry so much what I tell someone else. It is not like I am trying to get Promocodes onto my account or anybody loses big money even if they hate the service.

For Chrissake, I don't hate the service, and I don't have a chip. How many times do I have to say that I'm a VOIP fan and I want it to work as it should? I'm just trying to present a reasonable argument as a flip side to all of your gushing praise, but you can't deal with it. I'll stop calling you a VOIP shill and SR fanboy if it makes you feel better.

 

[GTFan]

Originally posted by: RideFree
If your phone service is so 24x7 critical, what the hell are you doing trying to save a few bucks/month?

I never said it was, just pointing out common man cases where users are going to get burned because of poor planning (on both sides, provider and consumer).

And for crying out loud, I KNOW IT'S CHEAP.

But even so, we should be able to take it for granted by now. Perhaps my expectations are unrealistic, but if you don't ask the hard questions then all you get are easy answers.

 

[lotust]

Originally posted by: GTFan

Originally posted by: RideFree
If your phone service is so 24x7 critical, what the hell are you doing trying to save a few bucks/month?

I never said it was, just pointing out common man cases where users are going to get burned because of poor planning (on both sides, provider and consumer).

And for crying out loud, I KNOW IT'S CHEAP.

But even so, we should be able to take it for granted by now. Perhaps my expectations are unrealistic, but if you don't ask the hard questions then all you get are easy answers.

Ditch this crappy phone service and get a real land line. Im Done with this crapola

 

[schipperke]

If your phone service is so 24x7 critical, what the hell are you doing trying to save a few bucks/month?

Actually this is not a good argument. A provider should not get a pass because they are less expensive, when they promise you the service in the first place. If they advertise, "We are cheaper because are service is happenstance" , then OK I'd give them a bye.

 

[lotust]

Originally posted by: schipperke

If your phone service is so 24x7 critical, what the hell are you doing trying to save a few bucks/month?

Actually this is not a good argument. A provider should not get a pass because they are less expensive, when they promise you the service in the first place. If they advertise, "We are cheaper because are service is happenstance" , then OK I'd give them a bye.

Ditto...

 

[markrb38]

Originally posted by: georgepa
GTFan-

BTW, NOBODY is marketing any VOIP as a full single-phone option. Everybody always points out that it is imperative to have a cell phone available, just in case. That is particularly the case with Sunrocket, which as you know is the ONLY company to have E-911 service installed as part of the basic package, and even with that they note that "You should always have an alternative means of accessing emergency service."

Just as a note the FCC just passed a rule that ALL VOIP services in the U.S. have to have local 911 service for any area they sell their service too. I am not sure of the date they need it by, but it is soon.
This came after hearings where a child died after the mother could not get local emergency services.

IMO the family should have known this, but then again since we, as a society, have become so accustomed to having 911 it's not that far of a reach to think the less tech savy wouldn't know or even think this was a possibility to not have local 911.

This just shows that SunRocket was thinking when they made this rule from the start. Now the others need to scramble or cancel exhisting customers.

Mark

 

[georgepa]

Mark-

Actually, Packet 8 was smart as well. They got the service going, but charged extra for it. Now all they have to do is include it into the base package and they are done. Everybody outside of P8 and SR is scrambling.

GTFan-

Look, nobody forces you to stay with SR. In fact, they probably have the most liberal cancellation policy of them all. Cancel and you get a prorated refund. Everybody else penalizes for cancelling. You still get to keep the phones. On top some providers reward you for switching (i.e. Voicepulse gives you a $50 credit.) Yet, you don't switch to another service. Are you saying that while you dislike this or that SR is still the best of the VOIP bunch (talking value for money?) I mean, we KNOW that cable VOIPs are more reliable because they rely on less "partners" and have a larger infrastructure net than the indipendent VOIPs can have. How could they not be more reliable, given that key difference? They are also more than double, sometimes triple the cost.

I guess you are asking a small, growing, indipendent VOIP provider to spend Billions on building their own backbone and lay their own fiber, while providing unlimited phone service to the US and Canada for $16.58 per month and give away $3 in int'l calls to boot. Yes, I would say you are being unrealistic.

Oh, and what was I talking about when I mentioned that taking someone elses gripes into your own post is just, well, cheesy? You copied some illogical haters gripes from some other site, and it simply looks kind of childish when you repost: "Some features like forwarding don't work. They are working on this. Tkt is still open." As in "his" ticket, not yours. And he cleary wrote that FORWARDING does not work. That is a bold faced lie. Why did you just copy that over? Anybody considering the service HAS to walk away with the impression that simple call forwarding does not work. It does, and reliably so. Nowhere did it state "Well, one of the more advanced forwarding options." It is disingenious to make the claim you made, whether it was just lazily copied from some other hater or not. It shows the type of measures some of you go to to try to paint the blackest picture possible. So, since you made the claim you made in your CONS list (the one you "stand by") are you going to maintain that "Some features like forwarding don't work?"

Maybe you see me "gushing with praise," but if you look through this thread hatemongers have been all over this thread way before I arrived with outright lies (like the above mentioned) and misinformation, so some here actually post the good stuff to present a flip side to all the bashing and posturing.

 

[ttown]

Originally posted by: schipperke

If your phone service is so 24x7 critical, what the hell are you doing trying to save a few bucks/month?

Actually this is not a good argument. A provider should not get a pass because they are less expensive, when they promise you the service in the first place. If they advertise, "We are cheaper because are service is happenstance" , then OK I'd give them a bye.

I agree, but I think it was said a little lightly. I expect uptime from SR... and I expect them to do everything in their power to maintain connectivity to their systems regardless of price.

I also understand that there's more pieces to the puzzle -- and that my ISP, and their ISP, and lots of stuff in-between, plays an important role. So far, there have been 2 issues that I can recall. One, a major failure with their provider involving a cut network feed. That sort of thing is pretty rare, and definately not in SR's control. Sh!t happens. The other one was "some" people were affected last friday. I don't know the details... but it didn't affect me. Let's assume that some tech pee'd on a server. It wasn't down long, and didn't affect everyone. If it happens frequently, I'll worry, and question my choice to go with SR. I don't know your experience with POTS, but occasionally trees fall on the lines and take out hundreds/thousands of customers. They roll out a truck and fix it. Sometimes it takes hours. I don't consider ditching my phone because it's windy outside. Just like I don't ditch SR because some construction company dug too deep and hit a very crucial line. (I don't really know the details)
I know almost nothing about POTS, but I'll assume there's at least 2-times the number of possible points of failure with VoIP service. With that assumption, I'll expect 2X the outages. So far, my experience with VoIP/SR is much less than that, so I'm happy.
1 (or 2) periods of a couple hours downtime over the last 3 months (for me) isn't enough for me to get all huffy about. I also don't think the time period and #of events is enough to draw any conclusions about service going forward.

lotust... i usually try not to diss on people. But all you've done is rant about how your gizmo doesn't work, and blame it on how crappy a company SR is. Your last mention of a problem was regarding not being able to access your network. Following that was a few suggestions made my a couple different people. Following that was a post by you saying "hell with this". I and others have helped many people through set-up issues, either via posts out here or in PM. Rather than rant about how much easier your POTS is, state your problem, give the details of your setup, and say "thanks" when someone here tells you how to fix it. Done! So far, I can only fault SR with one thing. That is, not insisting that the makers of the gizmo include a freaking RESET button. Had they done that, this entire thread would be 3 pages long of people saying "thanks OP!", with a sporadic "I hear an echo!", followed with the response "Oh, you need to call customer service and they'll fix that. Takes a day. Just call."

If you want to work through your issues, post details details details. How is everthing wired, what CAN you do, what CAN'T you do, what specific things have you tried? It sounds like your frustration level is beyond repair... but if you'd like help, I'll do what I can.

 

[georgepa]

ttown-

I had Roadrunner for a while, now am a FIOS customer. It was fairly common for my Roadrunner to be down once in a while. I would call Bright House to be greeted by a recording "We are experiencing temporary outages in parts of the country..." so I would hang up and wait, sometimes for hours, until service was restored. That's just the way it is. I had similar once-in-a-while outages with Verizon Fiber, but haven't had them long enough to see a clear "averaging" pattern. These are gigantic companies we are talking about here. They've invested countless Billions in infrastructure, failsafes, redundancy networks. It happens to these companies and their services despite all the money they spent on their networks. Yet, when it happens to a piggyback service like VOIP that actually leases bandwidth and services from these very same companies it is inexcusable?

Strange how with ISPs it is accepted and "just part of the online experience," as I am sure GTFan has had some ISP outages as well, but I guarantee he didn't hop onto some website to bash Verizon, SBC, Quest or whoever provides his internet as worthless.

 

[GTFan]

Originally posted by: georgepa
Strange how with ISPs it is accepted and "just part of the online experience," as I am sure GTFan has had some ISP outages as well, but I guarantee he didn't hop onto some website to bash Verizon, SBC, Quest or whoever provides his internet as worthless.

Since when did I say that SR is worthless? You need to lay off of the caffeine, george, the wild exaggerations are not helping your case.

Phone service should be held to a higher standard. Period. Whether it's POTS or VOIP, that's what people expect, that your phone just works. VOIP has been around long enough for providers to make it reliable. My company runs its entire voice network (many thousands of employees) on VOIP, and it doesn't go down.

In other words, it's not the tech, it's the implementation and management of it. Could be cost, could be that they don't have a clue. We just don't know, but we'll keep paying to find out because it saves us money.
Over time, the good companies will rise to the top and 5 years from now we'll be laughing about the losers that we funded.
And no, I'm not saying SR is one, I actually do think that right now they are one of the best. Of the Wild West of VOIP, that is.

 

[cordite]

If you are experiencing problems with outbound voice quality (i.e. the person you're talking to says you're breaking up or something along those lines but you hear them fine) then you should put your gizmo in front of your router -- assuming your router doesn't have suitable QoS for VOIP. Also, check into dynamic rate limiting in the broadbandreports.com VOIP forum. Read carefully as rate limiting probably doesn't work quite like you would expect from looking at the gizmo's internal config pages.

 

[laketrout]

This convo is sure getting out of hand.

This is a great thread, I would hate to see it get locked up over an argument getting out of control....crosses fingers.

Its pretty simple. VoIP is still an emerging technology that will have some problems, that is why people like georgepa say it is what 89% reliable. I would even give it a 90%+ reliable for me. This is going to vary from place to place I am sure and the way to counteract that is to have threads like this to help those out who are experiencing more problems. It appears that a lot of the problems have been solved here and by SR (just look through the thread).

As far as marketing/advertising. SunRocket is very clear and upfront about the limitations of their service potentially being down during Internet outages and the concern for 911 that they are working to solve (and are ahead of the pack) but that people still need an alternative form of communication such as a cell phone. It says it explicitly on their site during the sign up process. I was never confused or mislead by anything they offered.

In addition, SR does have one of the best cancellation policies, one of the reasons I went with them. No activation, cancellation, or hardware return penalties. With the annual deal you get pro-rated returns. Not bad IMO.

So overall, SunRocket as a company with their stance, business model, and honesty to customers is an excellent company IMO. I believe they are trying first to deliver the best product they can. Problems arise, and they know and have adjusted so that the customer isn't penalized if they do not feel comfortable with the service. If that occurs, it is the customers choice, and is unfortunate but SR is doing a great job working with the customers as much as I have seen.

So sorry it doesn't seem to be working out for GTFan and lotusts, but as you see by the thread, it is for a lot of us. So if you want help it appears people are here to do that so just ask and leave it at that. In the end it saves money and probably didn't put you two far back, just seems a bit frustarting which is understandable.

So back to Firmware talk... what is the address to login to the LAN port on the gizmo...192.???.?? something?

 

[georgepa]

GTFan-

I should have probably put "worthless" in quotation marks, so you would have understood that I used the term somewhat sarcastic.

I am with ttown on this one. For THAT type of savings I expected a service that is far inferior (but still acceptable) when compared to Verizon. Instead I feel like I actually got more. Sure, full name Caller ID has to be either programmed into the Contact Logs (otherwise it'll come up with the number but the name as "Anonymous") and I have to 10-digit dial instead of 7-digit, but that is a small price to pay for savings that are not just minor but gigantic. I used to pay $100 between local service, extended local service (intrastate), long distance and int'l calling cards. Now I am paying $16.58 for same usage. That is a savings of over $1000 a year. Forget any "referrals," but the standard savings alone (enough to enjoy an unplanned week-long vacation with my family sometime this summer somewhere out of town) are NOT worth "some" minor inconveniences? I got two phones which my family loves - my daugher enjoys the walkie-talkie features, the "distinctive ring" feature on these phones is a hit - my family knows when it is me calling, either set of grandparents, etc. via music, the speakerphone built right in is used quite often as well. Voice quality is excellent, the codec used by SR is the best, IMO. Outages? I personally have not experienced a single one, wasn't around for it. My wife noticed it one time (she called me on the cell to let me know) and it was back up after 20 minutes. So, from a personal level I can't complain much.

Sure, I would like some more advanced features, such as Softphone (which I would be willing to pay extra for,) 1-800 incoming option, Busy Redial, Simulring, but I feel we are getting quite a complete package (and then some) with this. I had Verizon before and while there were fewer outages I had one that took 4 days to resolve (was without any phone service for the entire 4 days because a line was cut.) They had terrible India tech support and I fought with them over billing problems and messed up voicemail on a constant basis. I had an advanced features package which was forced on me as my wife calls her mother in a town 30 miles away, which required "extended local" at a premium price, which with Caller ID add-on and touch-tone (!) came out cheaper when ordering the "Deluxe Feature" package. Even at that, did it include half the features SR includes? Not on your life.