Bob Feeser
05-28-2008, 11:32 PM
Ooma Hub Uses Your Broadband Connection
You Hook Up Your Regular Phone To It
The Only Difference is No More Phone Bill
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41CCqJg0UeL._SL500_AA280_.jpg
7 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/x-locale/common/customer-reviews/stars-5-0._V47081849_.gif True Genius At Work, February 4, 2008
By Bob Feeser "WoodWorkerForums.com"http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/x-locale/common/icons/drop-down-icon-small-empty-arrow._V13355991_.gif (http://www.amazon.com/gp/pdp/profile/A14JBDSWKPKTZA/ref=cm_cr_pr_pdp) (Springfield, PA USA) - See all my reviews (http://www.amazon.com/gp/cdp/member-reviews/A14JBDSWKPKTZA/ref=cm_cr_pr_auth_rev?ie=UTF8&sort%5Fby=MostRecentReview)
http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/x-locale/communities/reputation/c7y_badge_tr_5._V47082063_.gif (http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html/ref=cm_rn_bdg_help?ie=UTF8&nodeId=14279681&pop-up=1#TR)
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this? (http://www.amazon.com/gp/vine/help))
I am currently a Lingo VOIP customer, and I pay about $25 per month for unlimited phone calling, local and long distance, all over the US, Canada, and about 17 countries in Europe. (Vonage, which is like Lingo costs a few more dollars than Lingo per month.) I have switched over to using Ooma, and now I pay $0 (zero) dollars per month to make unlimited local and long distance calls all over the US. If I had a cable modem, I could disconnect my regular phone line, and use Ooma exclusively. If you use DSL, which is what I have, it depends on your phone line for the connection, but you can strip down the phone line, still get your DSL through, and use it just for incoming calls, and place the rest of your incoming, or outgoing calls on the Ooma line. No more expensive local calling package, features which are all included with Ooma, or long distance charges.
Ooma connects to your broadband connection right at the modem. It does not hook up to your computer. Your computer does not need to be running. It literally has nothing to do with your computer, just your modem. Your broadband modem is on all of the time, so is your Ooma telephone.
When you use the Ooma phone you use it over your regular phone system, cordless, or wired telephone. When you pick up your regular phone that you now use to make a phone call, you hear a dial tone, and make a call, the same exact thing goes on with Ooma. Once you pop for the purchase price of the Ooma device, it is possible to say goodbye to your phone bill. Although it is recommended that you keep a basic regular phone line for making 911 calls for example, if in case the power goes out. If you lose electricity, you will lose your internet connection, and your Oooma phone usage.
I talk to a lot of people about VOIP, which is "Voice Over Internet Protocol", and a lot of them don't have the foggiest notion of what I am talking about. I realize that I am in the middle of Amazon, tech savvy central, but for those who are new to VOIP, I started this review, very clear, and plainly. Now let's get excited about what this phone does.
I love the fact that you are really getting 2 phone lines in one, although they operate under the same phone number. For the life of me, I can't see any reason not to classify it as a totally separate phone line. You can plug 2 different phones into it, 2 different people can pick up those phones, and make private phone calls, you can join those 2 calls together and make a conference call out of it, by simply pressing down on the 2 top buttons on the Ooma console hub, or scout, at the same time. So if I am on the Ooma phone, and another call comes in, the second phone will ring, or you can let the voice mail take it. Someone else can take the second phone call, on a separate phone. You need to buy an inexpensive Ooma scout, which is like a mini Ooma hub, with all the same features, and buttons in order to fully take advantage of all of second line features. Like using a totally separate second phone with it. The scout is like they took the bottom right corner of the Ooma control hub, and cut out the controls including the speaker out of it.
Ok if I can I digress but just for a moment. I love the blue light. I have little red lights on my cordless phone console, and the Ooma sitting next to it, with the clear tab extending out the top of the phone, which glows blue is something that I get a charge out of seeing. It glows when the phone is on during any time of the day, but when I turn the lights down to watch TV, or off at the end of the night, and see the red and blue accent lights on the consoles, I get a rush out of that. Ok, sorry, back to the features.
The other thing I like about Ooma is that you can send a fax with it. Lingo doesn't send faxes with there regular service. You do have to dial 99 before sending a fax, but that is a small inconvenience to being able to send faxes nationwide, without a bill, as in totally free.
The sleep button is something that is worth the price of the phone alone. It may not be important to you, but if you have your Ooma hooked up to a wireless phone with multiple stations around the house like I do, and sure enough someone is calling you, and ringing the phone when you are taking a power nap, or at 7 am in the morning. With just one button, it silences all the phones in your house, and goes into voice mail mode.
The other thing I like about Ooma is that unlike Lingo, which is really just a dumb terminal, you hook up to where it comes into the house, Ooma is really a professional workstation. Even though your voicemail is stored on the Ooma servers, something you can access from anywhere on the web, the call light flickers on the voice mail button to let you know you got a call. It is like having a fully functional answering machine console, even though the calls are stored by the Ooma service. Let's call this advanced technology.
The biggest advantage to Ooma is the clear strong signal. I do not hear any difference between my land line and the Ooma line. With Lingo, I get very good sound quality, but it technically is weaker, so much so, that sometimes when asked to press 1, to get through the techno operators, it does not register, and I have to passively sit by and wait until it runs out of options and rings through to the operator. Not so with Ooma. Both of the services that I had that problem with in Lingo, work perfectly with Ooma.
The console also has a trash can button, so with a single push, your saved message can be deleted while hearing it. (Plus Ooma stores deleted messages for 14 days for you, just in case you accidentally deleted another family members message, and want to retrieve it.) The Ooma lounge is the online web site, where you can access all of that, plus a lot more. It is Ooma central so to speak.
This review is getting really long, because I am really excited about the new Ooma freedom. One last thing I want to share with you is that I tried to use this Ooma phone in conjunction with the Lingo VOIP service. Although it works, but because you are sharing the same modem to connect through, it creates a slight hum when the phone is in use. I don't know why but when I turn off the Lingo adapter, the Ooma is perfectly quiet, the hum goes away. So from my experiment, I am going to use the Ooma phone without the Lingo line.
That makes the hookup something of interest. Normally you hook up your Ooma device directly into your broadband modem, then hook up your computer, or network router, into the Ooma device. So the Ooma takes precedence. I didn't do it that way. I have a network, and I want to give my internet connection the same priority as the Ooma hub, so I use an old Linksys router, and connect the modem directly to it, in one of the 4 middle positions, (not in the WAN port) so it strictly acts like a switch with no processing, and then hook the Ooma device up to one of the other 4 available connections on the router, and do the same with the network. So it goes from modem, to a splitter so to speak (switch ports on the router, or you could use a dedicated switch) then into whatever other devices I want. In this case the Ooma hub, and my network receive the same priority, and it works great. I do not realize any bandwidth speed differences using my 1.5 meg DSL connection with the Ooma device hooked up to it.
I knew that the other reviews, and the Ooma description covers the features really well, so it was my intention to cover some of the other more interesting aspects of using the phone. Hope this helps. Get the Ooma hub, I understand they have a 30 day return policy. When you add up what your phone bills are costing you, it doesn't take long to recapture the purchase price, let alone that you may have free phone service for the next 3 years, 10 years, or a lifetime for that matter. This is a Wow.
See It at Amazon
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0010WG2H2?ie=UTF8&tag=toolsreviewco-20&link_code=as3&camp=211189&creative=373489&creativeASIN=B0010WG2H2
You Hook Up Your Regular Phone To It
The Only Difference is No More Phone Bill
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41CCqJg0UeL._SL500_AA280_.jpg
7 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/x-locale/common/customer-reviews/stars-5-0._V47081849_.gif True Genius At Work, February 4, 2008
By Bob Feeser "WoodWorkerForums.com"http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/x-locale/common/icons/drop-down-icon-small-empty-arrow._V13355991_.gif (http://www.amazon.com/gp/pdp/profile/A14JBDSWKPKTZA/ref=cm_cr_pr_pdp) (Springfield, PA USA) - See all my reviews (http://www.amazon.com/gp/cdp/member-reviews/A14JBDSWKPKTZA/ref=cm_cr_pr_auth_rev?ie=UTF8&sort%5Fby=MostRecentReview)
http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/x-locale/communities/reputation/c7y_badge_tr_5._V47082063_.gif (http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html/ref=cm_rn_bdg_help?ie=UTF8&nodeId=14279681&pop-up=1#TR)
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this? (http://www.amazon.com/gp/vine/help))
I am currently a Lingo VOIP customer, and I pay about $25 per month for unlimited phone calling, local and long distance, all over the US, Canada, and about 17 countries in Europe. (Vonage, which is like Lingo costs a few more dollars than Lingo per month.) I have switched over to using Ooma, and now I pay $0 (zero) dollars per month to make unlimited local and long distance calls all over the US. If I had a cable modem, I could disconnect my regular phone line, and use Ooma exclusively. If you use DSL, which is what I have, it depends on your phone line for the connection, but you can strip down the phone line, still get your DSL through, and use it just for incoming calls, and place the rest of your incoming, or outgoing calls on the Ooma line. No more expensive local calling package, features which are all included with Ooma, or long distance charges.
Ooma connects to your broadband connection right at the modem. It does not hook up to your computer. Your computer does not need to be running. It literally has nothing to do with your computer, just your modem. Your broadband modem is on all of the time, so is your Ooma telephone.
When you use the Ooma phone you use it over your regular phone system, cordless, or wired telephone. When you pick up your regular phone that you now use to make a phone call, you hear a dial tone, and make a call, the same exact thing goes on with Ooma. Once you pop for the purchase price of the Ooma device, it is possible to say goodbye to your phone bill. Although it is recommended that you keep a basic regular phone line for making 911 calls for example, if in case the power goes out. If you lose electricity, you will lose your internet connection, and your Oooma phone usage.
I talk to a lot of people about VOIP, which is "Voice Over Internet Protocol", and a lot of them don't have the foggiest notion of what I am talking about. I realize that I am in the middle of Amazon, tech savvy central, but for those who are new to VOIP, I started this review, very clear, and plainly. Now let's get excited about what this phone does.
I love the fact that you are really getting 2 phone lines in one, although they operate under the same phone number. For the life of me, I can't see any reason not to classify it as a totally separate phone line. You can plug 2 different phones into it, 2 different people can pick up those phones, and make private phone calls, you can join those 2 calls together and make a conference call out of it, by simply pressing down on the 2 top buttons on the Ooma console hub, or scout, at the same time. So if I am on the Ooma phone, and another call comes in, the second phone will ring, or you can let the voice mail take it. Someone else can take the second phone call, on a separate phone. You need to buy an inexpensive Ooma scout, which is like a mini Ooma hub, with all the same features, and buttons in order to fully take advantage of all of second line features. Like using a totally separate second phone with it. The scout is like they took the bottom right corner of the Ooma control hub, and cut out the controls including the speaker out of it.
Ok if I can I digress but just for a moment. I love the blue light. I have little red lights on my cordless phone console, and the Ooma sitting next to it, with the clear tab extending out the top of the phone, which glows blue is something that I get a charge out of seeing. It glows when the phone is on during any time of the day, but when I turn the lights down to watch TV, or off at the end of the night, and see the red and blue accent lights on the consoles, I get a rush out of that. Ok, sorry, back to the features.
The other thing I like about Ooma is that you can send a fax with it. Lingo doesn't send faxes with there regular service. You do have to dial 99 before sending a fax, but that is a small inconvenience to being able to send faxes nationwide, without a bill, as in totally free.
The sleep button is something that is worth the price of the phone alone. It may not be important to you, but if you have your Ooma hooked up to a wireless phone with multiple stations around the house like I do, and sure enough someone is calling you, and ringing the phone when you are taking a power nap, or at 7 am in the morning. With just one button, it silences all the phones in your house, and goes into voice mail mode.
The other thing I like about Ooma is that unlike Lingo, which is really just a dumb terminal, you hook up to where it comes into the house, Ooma is really a professional workstation. Even though your voicemail is stored on the Ooma servers, something you can access from anywhere on the web, the call light flickers on the voice mail button to let you know you got a call. It is like having a fully functional answering machine console, even though the calls are stored by the Ooma service. Let's call this advanced technology.
The biggest advantage to Ooma is the clear strong signal. I do not hear any difference between my land line and the Ooma line. With Lingo, I get very good sound quality, but it technically is weaker, so much so, that sometimes when asked to press 1, to get through the techno operators, it does not register, and I have to passively sit by and wait until it runs out of options and rings through to the operator. Not so with Ooma. Both of the services that I had that problem with in Lingo, work perfectly with Ooma.
The console also has a trash can button, so with a single push, your saved message can be deleted while hearing it. (Plus Ooma stores deleted messages for 14 days for you, just in case you accidentally deleted another family members message, and want to retrieve it.) The Ooma lounge is the online web site, where you can access all of that, plus a lot more. It is Ooma central so to speak.
This review is getting really long, because I am really excited about the new Ooma freedom. One last thing I want to share with you is that I tried to use this Ooma phone in conjunction with the Lingo VOIP service. Although it works, but because you are sharing the same modem to connect through, it creates a slight hum when the phone is in use. I don't know why but when I turn off the Lingo adapter, the Ooma is perfectly quiet, the hum goes away. So from my experiment, I am going to use the Ooma phone without the Lingo line.
That makes the hookup something of interest. Normally you hook up your Ooma device directly into your broadband modem, then hook up your computer, or network router, into the Ooma device. So the Ooma takes precedence. I didn't do it that way. I have a network, and I want to give my internet connection the same priority as the Ooma hub, so I use an old Linksys router, and connect the modem directly to it, in one of the 4 middle positions, (not in the WAN port) so it strictly acts like a switch with no processing, and then hook the Ooma device up to one of the other 4 available connections on the router, and do the same with the network. So it goes from modem, to a splitter so to speak (switch ports on the router, or you could use a dedicated switch) then into whatever other devices I want. In this case the Ooma hub, and my network receive the same priority, and it works great. I do not realize any bandwidth speed differences using my 1.5 meg DSL connection with the Ooma device hooked up to it.
I knew that the other reviews, and the Ooma description covers the features really well, so it was my intention to cover some of the other more interesting aspects of using the phone. Hope this helps. Get the Ooma hub, I understand they have a 30 day return policy. When you add up what your phone bills are costing you, it doesn't take long to recapture the purchase price, let alone that you may have free phone service for the next 3 years, 10 years, or a lifetime for that matter. This is a Wow.
See It at Amazon
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0010WG2H2?ie=UTF8&tag=toolsreviewco-20&link_code=as3&camp=211189&creative=373489&creativeASIN=B0010WG2H2