Voip Help In Chiang Mai

[earlofwindermere]

Our VOIP phone from North America has finally arrived and we've tried to get it working but no luck. Is there anyone in Chiang Mai who would have enough experience with these things to get it working?

We have a TOT line with BTC as the service provider.

Our VOIP company is Primus (uses the same equipment as Vonage).

Any advice on technicians would be appreciated.

Thanks

[ChiangMaiThai]

Our VOIP phone from North America has finally arrived and we've tried to get it working but no luck.  Is there anyone in Chiang Mai who would have enough experience with these things to get it working?

We have a TOT line with BTC as the service provider.

Our VOIP company is Primus (uses the same equipment as Vonage).

Any advice on technicians would be appreciated.

Thanks

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Last year I got Vonage and proceeded to spend 2 months trying to get it to work. Finally I did and its great. The problem was the ISP. I was using TSpeed from TT&T. They block the ports that allow it to work as they would prefer that you do not make these very cheap high quality calls. I am 95% sure that TOT also blocks the same ports. It will work fine with many of the ISPs available on a TT&T line including Ji-Net and CsLox. It will also work with TRUE cable internet.

I guess the thing to do would be to bring the box to a friend's place who has one of the above mentioned ISPs and see if you can get it working.

You also have to experiment with putting your router in bridge mode and programming the VoIP device with your ADSL user name and password. Initially I had a motorolla device from vonage and that's the only way it would work. I then switched to a Linksys device and it only works if you leave the username and password in the router and allow the Linksys device to find the IP address dynamically.

Let me know if you have any other questions. Once its up and running, its great.

[ChiangMaiThai]

Just to clarify one point. As it was explained to me, the TSpeed Service through TT&T depends on TOT also. TOT was the problem as they control the long distance calls in Thailand and they don't want you using Vonage and the like. So they block the ports. If you switch to another ISP on a TT&T line, TOT is no longer involved and it works. If your phone line is TOT, then I have to think that it will not work. You'll have to switch to a TT&T line, but before you do, test it at a friend's house who has one of the ISP's I mentioned.

[rholofcener]

I am successfully using Vonage with ADSL using TT&T. It is spotty at times because of flucuating bandwidth. My vonage router that I brought with me from the states was working fine at the beginning, but I think it is now fried. Until i get new router, I am using Vonage's softphone feature that lets me bypass the router using my pc as the phone. I have been unable to find a new suitable router in town (wireless adsl that has phone ports for voip), so I will have to order one from the states. Let me know if I could be of any help.

[meadish_sweetball]

You already have your VOiP phone, so I guess you want that to work.

For anyone else reading this thread, who has a computer and a broadband connection - I recommend you to just use Skype with a headset instead.

The quality of the calls is generally very good, but it depends on how busy Internet is at the time. With Skype, you can voice chat (computer to computer) with other Skype users free of charge, and call the fixed telephone network in most countries for a very low fee. Seems a lot simpler to me than what you have to do to get your VOiP phones working.

[earlofwindermere]

Thanks. We used Skype too. However; with a VOIP phone, people can call us free here for the cost of a local call back home (Canada). For many of our non-technical computer friends, they appreciate it and we talk a LOT more to people with our VOIP phone. (I think it's probably due to perception of people back home rather than better connection quality).

FYI - VOIP phones do work with TOT phone lines. (It took my wife 5 minutes to connect after me trying for 2 weeks!) As with Skype, the busiest times of the day make the connection not the greatest either.

[meadish_sweetball]

You can register a regular phone number in your home country with Skype too, and the people who call you will only pay for a local call, in the same way you describe. The service is called "SkypeIn" and works well.

[earlofwindermere]

I didn't know that. Thanks.... too bad we already have oru VOIP phone then.