Techie Talk

So let's say I'm sick of my landline, and I want a skype phone.
Does there exist any hardware that allows you to hook a real phone up to the PC to use as a skype phone?

Yes there are. D-Link makes one.

Someone gave me an APC PDU.. which is basically just a really heavy duty rack mount power strip with a lot of outlets and a 30 amp plug on it. Which I can totally make use of. The only problem is, it doesn't have the little L brackets to mount it into the rac... Anyone have some spare APC PDU brackets lying around???

Thanks :)

Yes I could make some. Kind of overextended at the moment, also have no idea where my hacksaw is...

So let's say I'm sick of my landline, and I want a skype phone.
Does there exist any hardware that allows you to hook a real phone up

to the PC to use as a skype phone?

Mixed media not getting the job done for you anymore? I think the real trick for you is going to be getting your phone number ported out from under the FiOS without cancelling your service. And didn't you agree to a two year contract a few months ago?

Anyway, as Pulse mentioned there are several brands of Skype-to-POTS adapters available. Most of them seem to be USB attached, though, so it's likely you'll need a dedicated computer (or a VM with a USB connection passed through to it) for this purpose.

Does it have to be Skype? If you're just looking for any phone service, most other VoIP services will give you an Ethernet-attached adapter that you can plug directly into your local network.
Vonage is the best known one, but if you'd rather go with someone trustworthy and local, our friends at Ace Innovative offer an *excellent* SIP service.
I used it for years before I got FiOS.

And if you're looking to go super cheap, you should also check out Magic Jack.

It's not worth all the taxes and fees (which I may yet pay if I go with somebody else) for the little bit that I use my landline, but I do occasionally need to be on the phone for 4 hours, and the pay as you go cell phone bill would be outragoues so I'd need some way to make long cheap calls, just really rarely.
I think I only signed a 1 year agreement, and according to what is working on vzons website, it expires 6/2010 so it's about time to start rethinking my strategy. can I port a landline number to a voip service? I didn't think you could do that. That would be neat to keep the phone number, esp since I'll be moving soon and if I can keep my phone number that'd be nice.
Good point, no it doesn't have to be skype, I'll look into vonage, and I'll check out ace. Thanks.
Any chance this stuff runs on linux? I'd rather not have to run it in a vm if I didn't have to.

oh I see, the whole thing is in one box you just plug it in to your router.
I like.

Most VoIP providers will let you port your landline number to them. Ace definitely will; I've done that with them before. You'll have to ask them if they have a way to port your number out from under a FiOS service without cancelling the service. I know they had a way to do that with DSL.

If you're moving, it might be easier to wait until then. Port your number to a new service, cancelling FiOS in the process, and then at your new location you can order service (either FiOS or Cable or whatever) and then bring your ATA along with you and plug it in -- poof, your old number is now at your new home.

Or move to my neighborhood and I'll share my bandwidth with you :)

I know Vonage can port a land-line number as well. My parents have been using Vonage for at least two years now and they've been happy. They had a local land-line beforehand and their number didn't change.

Frankly, I didn't even know they'd switched to Vonage until they told me about four or five months after the fact.

I thought ace was expensive until I looked at vonage. I think vonage actually costs more than verizon, but it's hard to tell with all the fees.
magic jack has a 30 day free trial so I ordered it, although it sounds like you have to run their softwar so e so you can see their ads, but that's what a vm is for I guess.

Anybody know of any other cheap options? The thing is I almost never use the phone but when I do it can be for a long time, so I really want an all I can eat plan for really really cheap. :-)

http://www.iconnecthere.com has a $25 unlimited plan, and they also have $0.02/minute without a plan.

If you are going to really just use it for the occasional long call, I suggest seeing how many minutes you would get on your cellphones if you were to add whatever extra amount to your cell plan instead of getting another line. Because right now I am only paying $80/month (plus $13/month in tax and fees of course) for unlimited everything. And you can get a good number of minutes for less than that. It might be more worth it than another line, since you would then be able to make that long call anywhere. BTW, t-mobile lets you change your favorite 5 as often as you want.. which does not matter to me since I have unlimited minutes. But if you don't have unlimited minutes, you still can get unlimited minutes to any number you want. It's not a bad deal at all.

Though I am finding out.. that t-mobiles coverage, though they are supposedly better than they used to be, is still not all that amazing. Sprint coverage was better. With t-mobile, I actually do hit dead spots pretty often, especially wit

h data. But it is ok.

PS: About the PDU (power distribution unit).. it is not a UPS, it is just a heavy duty rack mount power strip with 12 outlets on it. So it's a bit heavy for a power strip but nowhere near as heavy as the actual UPS. Anyway, it turns out that they were getting rid of 5 more of them and I took them all.. and these all have the brackets. So I am good to go :)

I've got one like that. It's in the back of my rack to support the back of a pile of servers that are mounted in the front by their ears because I don't have the rails for them :)

pp you have a point, but the last 12 years of my life live on my landline phone number, and if I can keep it for cheap, I'd like to.
So here's my next scheme which won't pan out.
Skype apparently won't port numbers, you have to use from their list. But skype appears to be the cheapest plan.
30/yr for an incoming phone number. & $3 a month, so anoth $36 a year. So for $66 a year, I can make and get unlimited calls with skype and I don't have to watch magic jack's ads.

Ahhh ,I just found what I was looking for...
http://www.phonenumberbank.com/

So I get skypein, and phone numberbank and forward my landline to the skype number.
pnb is $10 a month, so for $120 a year I can keep my land line number.

hmmm... or alternatively, I get a big cell phone plan, and forward my landline to my cell.
All these interesting possibilities...