I've been a Vonage customer for well over a year now. I like the
service and am generally satisfied with one exception. Often when I
take an incoming call there is a two - five second lag between when I
pick up and when the call path is established. I've tried letting it
ring a few extra times but that doesn't seem to make any difference.
The phone adapter I got from Vonage is the Cisco ATA which they no
longer seem to ship.
Two questions. Does anyone know if the newer phone adapters offer any
better performance in this area or any other benefits that I should
consider? How much hassle is it to replace a phone adapter on an
existing Vonage account?
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: The Motorola TA (which Vonage was
shipping after they discontinued shipping the Cisco) has never had
that problem that I am aware of; that's the telephone adapter I have
now. Lately they have been shipping Linksys on orders, but they may
have stopped that and gone back to Motorola; I do not know.
Regards any 'hassles' with swapping out one TA for another, my
experience was this: Several months ago when chatting with a customer
service person one day (while I still had the Cisco TA) they told me
they had 'started using Motorola'; they suggested the QoS or quality
of service, fromn a technical standpoint, was better on the Motorola
so I requested one. Here is where my experience may differ from yours.
I have mounds of credit on their books, due to 'next month free'
e-coupons I have redeemed for new users, so the rep said what they
would do was put a charge against my credits on hand for the amount
of a Motorola TA (in effect, I paid for a new adapter; they will
probably take your credit card number for payment.) Two or three days
later I had the new Motorola TA, which I installed on my line, taking
out and returning the old Cisco adapter, using the RMA number they
gave me, marked plainly on the Fed Ex box. When the old Cisco TA
got back to them and recorded on my account, they then gave me the
full credit for same back on my account (in your case they would
probably issue credit back to your credit card [or release the hold on
it, however they do it].)But be sure to save the receipt from the
Fed Ex driver or whoever.
The Motorola TA they sent me to replace the Cisco has certain things
burned in the e-PROM of it when they send it to you; an ESN (or
electronic serial number) and your telephone number; you cannot change
those values as apparently you could with the Cisco. Also, with the
Cisco, I could do (on the phone keypad)_ #80# and get an audio playout
of many of the values recorded in the TA. Or, I could do #123# and the
Cisco would recite to me its 'name' and version number, etc. With the
Motorola TA I can't find anything to do on the phone keypad to produce
such results, however if you know to do it you can get a *visual
display* on your screen. I think on my network here 192.168.100.102
displays the Motorola TA values that are burned into it, including my
particular rom version number, ESN and phone number. And where I view
my NetGear router on 192.168.0.1 (and change values as desired) the
Motorola TA which sits beyond it, and more on the 'net side' of things,
looks at the NetGear as 192.168.102.something.
If you have the money to spare (while waiting for the new Motorola TA
to reach you and the Cisco to get returned to the company) you may
want to ask them if they still have any Motorola TA units around you
could try. I have not seen the Linksys (and the latest rep I talked
to at Vonage told me 'do not even bother; it is a disappointment').
The Motorola TA has one advantage; instead of plugging it into one of
the holes on your router -- depending on how many computers/periphe-
rals you work with, that hole might be very valuable real-estate -- it
bypasses all that and plugs into the line ahead of everything
else. With three holes of its own, the modem plugs into one, the
telephone into another, 'bypassing' your internal network, then your
router and computers and peripherals go out the third hole. Vonage
says the Motorola TA 'chokes' data coming and going, providing better
phone conversations. I dunno how true that is, or if it is just
bulljive from the Vonage people. PAT]
Mike Sutter (mjs2032@rochester.rr.com)