Anyone use Magic Jack? Got some questions

[Mad_Hatter]

I wanted to get rid of the home phone all together because everyone in the house has a cell phone and every time I answer the home phone it is a telemarketer. But everyone in the house wants to keep it.....

I'm trying to trim the bills so Magic Jack came to mind.

1) Is it worth it?

2) How does the quality and consistency compare to regular phone providers?

3) Is says you can keep your current phone number. Is that difficult to do since my current provider is Xfinity/Comcast?

4) Which one should I get? I was thinking about this one.

But was curious if there are any other better ones, perhaps one with wireless connectivity or one that offers more range as I will have 2 phones (one being across the house).

5) Lastly, are there any other cheap alternatives to Magic Jack? The customer service I heard blows and lot of customers seem to be getting screwed over. I would prefer a US company.

[samsonlonghair]

Alternate idea:
Call Xfinity and tell them you are considering switching to Magic Jack. Find out if they will offer you a free month or two of phone service.

[flojocabron]

from what I've heard, that company supplies their own phone numbers.

So, if you get a phone number from them, it may have belonged to someone else before.

[deathsled]

get the number ported to google voice.

From there the potential is limitless. You can access it from all sorts of devices.

[marurun]

So, if you get a phone number from them, it may have belonged to someone else before.

If you get a new phone number from ANYONE there's a good chance it may have belonged to someone else before.

All phone interchange providers are required to comply with phone number portability rules, so if he wants to keep his old number he shouldn't have a problem.

[Mad_Hatter]

Alternate idea:
Call Xfinity and tell them you are considering switching to Magic Jack. Find out if they will offer you a free month or two of phone service.

How did I not think of this? Thanks.

I remember calling them saying my bill was too high and I was going to switch to DirectTV and they lowered my bill.

get the number ported to google voice.

From there the potential is limitless. You can access it from all sorts of devices.

So I can port my current phone number to Google Voice and use my current house phone with it?

[fastbilly1]

get the number ported to google voice.

From there the potential is limitless. You can access it from all sorts of devices.

So I can port my current phone number to Google Voice and use my current house phone with it?

No. Google Voice is only allowing porting from mobilephones, not pots or voip phones.

I used Magic Jack twice, both times were bad experiences. High levels of static in calls. Their demux is most likely the problem - aka something that you cannot fix.

[stickem]

I set 3 up for my boss at our office, he wanted to trim costs also. Same ones you linked. I think they work pretty good. It did cost an extra 10 to 20 bucks, can't remember, to port the numbers over. Then they cancel your older phone service for you when that's done. Usually 3-5 days. Had to get used to dial area code when dialing out though. But other than that its worked great the last year. And there is no customer support.

[Frag Mortuus]

get the number ported to google voice.

From there the potential is limitless. You can access it from all sorts of devices.

So I can port my current phone number to Google Voice and use my current house phone with it?

No. Google Voice is only allowing porting from mobilephones, not pots or voip phones.

I used Magic Jack twice, both times were bad experiences. High levels of static in calls. Their demux is most likely the problem - aka something that you cannot fix.

I've used Magic Jack for about 5 years now and the only time I experienced those problems was when the network had excessive use or the person's PC was old and unable to reliably process the MJ service and run the Windows environment. So, if you have a decent connection of about 5mb or higher and a PC that is not 10 years old you shouldn't have static issues.

For the money you save it's totally worth having to deal with a few annoyances. I didn't check the link that OP provided, but one I bought my mom for Christmas this year is great. Her desktop was the one that is super old and really unable to handle the MJ. So I bought her the one that you plug into the wall and your router. It works amazingly well.

My advice is to buy it, install it and use it for a while before you decide to port your number. If it you don't like it, you're only out $50. The reason I got into them in the first place was about 5 years ago I was working as a store manager at a Sprint Kiosk that was half owned by Sprint and half owned by Radioshack. One day I got a shipment of Magic Jacks in with my phone shipment. I thought it was just a new item we were going to sell, but when I tried to check it in, they weren't coming up in my system. So, I called my district manager and told him that I got them and asked what I should do with them. He said we couldn't sell them and that we couldn't send them back because our return warehouse was a Sprint one, not Radioshack. So, he told me to keep them. Basically I got a box of 24 Magic Jacks for free. I gave them away to family members and kept two myself. I have had nothing but good luck out of them.

[KrazyJoe]

No. Google Voice is only allowing porting from mobilephones, not pots or voip phones.

Not true. I have ported my POTS number to Google Voice. There's a $20 fee for porting.

To the OP, why does everyone want to keep the landline phone? I think your idea of getting rid of it since you have a cell phone is a good one.