Vonage Internet Telephone Modem For High Speed Internet In Thailand?

[pumper]

I've seen a thread on using a vonage internet telephone in Thailand but could not find today.

The thread I found previously reported that a Vonage US initiated telephone modem would work with Thai high speed internet.

I plan on attempting THE move to Thailand this year & am curious as to how close to home I can be.

I understand that if I do not want to live in Thailand I should stay in the US.

I retire this year, will be able to meet Thai retirement visa requirements & would like to give it a go.

I am on a cable internet connection now & the vonage phone is more trouble free than the phone company .. 3 years without problem.

Set up was an issue. but since that day it has been trouble free.

what type of internet connection is required? will DSL / ADSL work?

Apartemnet supplied high speed? or is a dedicated internet connection required?

even if it worked only poorly & intermittently a US phone would be invaluable.

other options?

I have heard of 'Skype' ..

a US # that worked in Thailand would be invaluable to ME

[sumrit]

I've seen a thread on using a vonage internet telephone in Thailand but could not find today.

The thread I found previously reported that a Vonage US initiated telephone modem would work with Thai high speed internet.

I plan on attempting THE move to Thailand this year & am curious as to how close to home I can be.

I understand that if I do not want to live in Thailand I should stay in the US.

I retire this year, will be able to meet Thai retirement visa requirements & would like to give it a go.

I am on a cable internet connection now & the vonage phone is more trouble free than the phone company .. 3 years without problem.

Set up was an issue. but since that day it has been trouble free.

what type of internet connection is required? will DSL / ADSL work?

Apartemnet supplied high speed? or is a dedicated internet connection required?

even if it worked only poorly & intermittently a US phone would be invaluable.

other options?

I have heard of 'Skype' ..

a US # that worked in Thailand would be invaluable to ME

Don't know about vonage but I use skype all the time. PC to PC video calling is free anywhere in the world and PC to telephone calling is very cheap. High speed internet here costs about 1000 baht per month. Look here 'http://www.skype.com/helloagain.html' for more info on skype.

[pumper]

I do not mind paying for my occasional over seas calls.

But, what about receiving calls from a standard phone to a VOIP phone in Thailand?

others easily contacting me is what I'd like to see happen. any unusual prefixes or dialing (much less expense) would discourage others from contacting me.

I would not mind paying a minimal fee for their call.

can skype in Thailand have a US prefix .. if there is no computer in the US?

[Rice_King]

The most recent Vonage thread.

[Veazer]

I do not mind paying for my occasional over seas calls.

But, what about receiving calls from a standard phone to a VOIP phone in Thailand?

others easily contacting me is what I'd like to see happen. any unusual prefixes or dialing (much less expense) would discourage others from contacting me.

I would not mind paying a minimal fee for their call.

can skype in Thailand have a US prefix .. if there is no computer in the US?

First, you should be able to bring your VoIP adapter with you and simply continue to use your vonage number seamlessly unless vonage differs from other providers and checks where the service is being used from, not sure why they would bother to do this. You would need to either bring a US phone or have someone configure the adapter for a thai phone, but the potential problem with the latter is that vonage often locks the configuration pages for their devices. I personally feel that vonage's prices are way out of line.

I have used a few US discount VoIP providers with ATA devices (analog telephone adapters) that plug in the back of the router. They work pretty well but the internet service in thailand is generally rubbish unless you're paying for business class service, and even that doesn't seem to guarantee you anything. My 512kbps connection went from 430-440 kbps for international traffic last week to 40-45 kbps the past few days and this is deemed acceptable by my ISP. In the words of the customer support rep "I will explain that your packge is home package , mean speed in thailand is good but outside country not so good up to traffic." I've seen people pay the extra cash for "premier" service and end up with the same problems. It usually works, but don't expect VoIP to work as reliably in the land o' smiles as it does at home.

A low cost VoIP provider will be cheaper than a SkypeIN number and won't require you to have your PC on, but it is a bit trickier to get everything setup and working. Skype-to-Skype (ie PC to PC) calls are much better quality than a phone line but SkypeIn calls (phone-to-skype) are the same or worse than a typical phone call.

The provider I am currently using costs 1.1 cent per minute outgoing (anywhere in US) and 2 cents per minute incoming (because i chose a 1-800 number). The monthly rate is a whopping $1. I have had mulitple problems with their customer support so I prefer to not name them in the risk that someone else might suffer the same. However, I have heard good things about Vitelity (here) and their prices are very similar, 1.39 cents outgoing and 1.9 cents incoming. Monthly fees are 50 cents for toll-free numbers and local numbers vary from $1.49 to $7.49 per month. Note that there is no charge for incoming calls on local numbers, hence the higher price.

EDIT: Note that you can also get 100% free incoming numbers from ipkall.com, but they are all Washington state numbers at this time. I was extremely fortunate, when i signed up they happened to give me a phone number from my home town. I don't pay anything to receive calls in thailand.

Edited December 21, 2006 by Veazer

[Veazer]

[ DOUBLE POST - DELETED ]

Edited December 21, 2006 by Veazer

[Rice_King]

You would need to either bring a US phone or have someone configure the adapter for a thai phone...

This is an absolutely false statement. I am using a telephone that I bought here in Thailand and it works perfectly with the Vonage router. The phones sold here use RJ-11 jacks just like the phones back in the US. It plugs right into the Voange router without any type of an adapter.

Edited December 21, 2006 by Rice_King

[Veazer]

You would need to either bring a US phone or have someone configure the adapter for a thai phone...

This is an absolutely false statement. I am using a telephone that I bought here in Thailand and it works perfectly with the Vonage router. The phones sold here use RJ-11 jacks just like the phones back in the US. It plugs right into the Voange router without any type of an adapter.

I'm not talking about the plugs used on the cords, I'm referring to the specs of the of the phone itself. Dial Tone, Ring Back Tone, Ring Cadence, Busy Tone, Caller ID Method, FXS Port Impedance and Ringer Voltage vary from region to region. North America uses an impedence of 600 ohms, New Zealand uses 370+620||310nF, Australia uses 220+820||115nF, etc. I know Vonage blocks access to many setting on their adapters and if regional settings cannot be configured then this could potentially cause problems with caller ID, echo, etc. Finding these settings can be difficult depending on the country, my advice would be to find a shop selling Linksys PAP2 adapters configured for thailand and copy the regional settings from the administrator page if you wish to use a thai phone.

Rice_King, that's great if your setup works as is, but adapter settings should match the region of the phone used to ensure it works as good as possible.

[Rice_King]

I stand corrected Veazer. Thanks for enlightening me.

Had I known about the phone settings you mentioned, I may have brought a phone with me from the US just to be on the safe side. I agree (now that I know) that these "settings" should match.

On the other hand, my Vonage setup has worked nearly perfect for almost two years now. I've used it in Pattaya and in Chiang Mai and with two different ISPs. Caller ID, dial tone, rings, and busy tones all seem to work just fine.

Could it be that Vonage has tuned their device in a way as to accept a wide variety of (world) phones?

[Veazer]

...Could it be that Vonage has tuned their device in a way as to accept a wide variety of (world) phones?

Hmmm, I doubt it. For Vonage to try to find a setting 'in the middle' would mean deviating from US telephony standards and this would definitely not be in their best interest given their customer base. OTOH, if you told them you were using the service outside the US they may ask what phone you are using to ensure their settings are correct.

I think it's more likely that the Thai phones use settings that are close enough to the US settings that they work, but this certainly would not be true in all countries. Some of the settings have a pretty big usable range/tolerance too, US phones use a ringer voltage standard of 90V but many phones will still ring even if the adapter has been left at 70V if I recall correctly. Port impedence IS quite critical from the discussions I've read, though I have never intentionally set it wrong to see what happens.

[yom07]

Don't expect to have something like in the US. It will depend on your location. Even in Bangkok, all locations are not served by the same company. There are mainly two ISP (True and TOT) for 'high speed' Internet.

I have a 1meg DSL cnx with TOT, and I'm using skype. It's working fine most of the time, but can be very crap from time to time, depending on the connection status.

But anyway, it's fine and cheap. The DSL worth 1000B/month, and calling 'real' phone number (Skype out) is very cheap in a lot of coutries. You can subscribe to a "real" phone number in the US (skype in). Calls to that number will be routed to your skype connection, wherever you are. It's very helpful if some friends or relatives want to call you at local rates.

I would just recommend to buy an external skype phone instead of the std PC speaker/microphone. The quality is much better. I personaly use the Linksys CIT-200. I guess netgear has issued a PC-free version, which is not requirering Skype software to run on your PC.

[siddv]

Wow this is to much techs for me but I might add that I just connected my Vonage systen here in Bangkok. I received some great guidance on this thread I might add. Anyways I bought my Vonage system in the USA but I'm using my old Thai telephone sytem and I'm not having any trouble. Its a Panosonic dual phone fax and not to fancy or expensive either. In fact the trouble I encountered was back in the USA when I was trying out ther system before bribngin it here. I couldn't get the dam thing to work and must have spent 1 hour talking to the people in tech suport. ALl I got for my trouble was a headache. Anyways, I procrastenated in tackeling the system here in bangkok a week but today took it on. I was done in less than 30 minutes!!!!! I am so freaking happy!!! Anyways good luck to those who are going to try it. Thanks again.

[Jingthing]

Curious about this issue of needing to hook up a Thai telephone to a Vonage box with a US number.

I find this VERY hard to believe that this is really needed. Anyone try to hook up with a Thai phone and have it not work, then hook up a US phone, and have it work?

The reason I find it very hard to believe is that Vonage markets these boxes as being easy to go on the road with internationally. They never say one word about the need to bring along a US phone, only the Vonage box.

Edited December 25, 2006 by Jingthing

[Veazer]

Curious about this issue of needing to hook up a Thai telephone to a Vonage box with a US number.

I find this VERY hard to believe that this is really needed. Anyone try to hook up with a Thai phone and have it not work, then hook up a US phone, and have it work?

The reason I find it very hard to believe is that Vonage markets these boxes as being easy to go on the road with internationally. They never say one word about the need to bring along a US phone, only the Vonage box.

From the brief bit of of research I did on some VoiP forums, it looks like the thai phones use the same impedance (600) as US phones or at least it is close enough that things work. I still have not been able to find any info that positively verifies this. Several people have posted here that their thai phones are working, so from that you may conclude that it is not needed. I'm simply suggesting that it is best to configure a VoIP adapter to match the phone attached to it or use a phone that the adapter is already configured for.

There is a another possible, but unlikely, answer to all of this. Vonage uses the 'provisioning' feature of the VoIP adapter which means they can control and adjust all the settings for the user from their end. This means that they can fix problems with volume levels, echo, firmware upgrades, etc. from their end rather than having the customer do it. It's technically possible that they configure the region settings for you based on your IP address, but I don't think they would ever bother with this because it would create problems for those who *do* bring a US phone with them.

I've also attached a screenshot of the regional settings page for those interested. The adapter I'm using is not locked to Vonage so I have full access to all settings.

EDIT: typos

Edited December 26, 2006 by Veazer