Smart Spending

By DollarBill

February 5, 2009 9:08 AM | Link to this

MagicJack works as long as you have a somewhat new computer with plenty of RAM and good internet connection. Big plus with MagicJack is you use a regular telephone handset. Sound quality became an issue on my laptop so I have switched to Skype. Skype works better and compliments your cell phone using your cell phone number as caller ID on Skype. Skype sound quality is very good. I just use Skype for outbound calls.

By Koala

February 5, 2009 9:13 AM | Link to this

For $20 a year - maybe 0.5c per day, magic jack is just fine and dandy. I have to restart it from time to time, but i can call Australia for 2c a minute and all around the U.S. for free. So I’m not going to whine about the occasional issues with it.

I save $50 a month by not having my bellsouth line. Sounds like a deal to me.

By Dean

February 5, 2009 9:14 AM | Link to this

I call it Magic Crap

By Edward

February 5, 2009 9:17 AM | Link to this

I’ve had a Magicjack for over 2 years now with very little problems. Last fall I sent it to a friend who lives in Shanghai China, so now we can talk to each other anytime and for as long as we want without a huge expense. Call quality has been great, easily as reliable as a cellphone call. Sure, there is the occasional “burp” or dropped call, but that happens with my cell and other friends cell whether it is AT&T, Verizon, Sprint… I’m pleased with the Magicjack, and the couple of times I’ve needed their tech support they’ve been very good. Friend and I just resubscribed for another year of Magicjack service and he loves having an Atlanta phone number in the middle of Shanghai.

By ByeByeMaBell

February 5, 2009 9:20 AM | Link to this

After my husband was axed by MaBell he was trying to find an alternative to sending any of my hard-earned money to her (the unemployed can be a bit bitter if you haven’t noticed). We just tried JoiPhone (VoIP) but I was really not impressed with the quality (lots of background noice and delays) and cancelled the service. But for $40 a year, some folks might be willing to live with degradation of quality. That’s obviously true as we see the increased sole use of cell phones and continued cancellation of land lines.

I work from home and sit on many calls so it’s not practical for me to use something that charges by the minute or that isn’t high quality. So for the time being I think I’m ‘stuck’ with a land line but for most people, I think the trend will continue towards cancellation of landlines. This should force MaBell and other landline providers to rethink how they sell their service. I would venture to guess that you’ll start seeing flat rate local and long distance prices drop. Especially since these services technically don’t cost the company any more to provide them than the initial installation cost (which was done years ago in most neighborhoods) and the cost to print your bill (look for a hook in that you must receive your bill electronically). It’s not like there’s an incrental cost for each minute you spend on the phone; the equipment is there and has been paid for regardless of whether people use it or not, might as well use it as a marketing ploy to get people to send you some money per month and to entice them to buy some of your other services (DSL, IPTV or Dish, etc) that actually are in demand and do make you money.

By Mark

February 5, 2009 9:21 AM | Link to this

Our family has switched from Vonage to Magic Jack. This gizmo will save you a ton. It is just fine if you are like me. Neither my wife or I like to talk on the phone too terribly long - so our conversations are usually short. The quality is just like Vonage but we love the ability to put the other caller on “hold” and have it play music for you while you wait (i know, corny but…)…

bottom line - for $40 bucks, you can give it a try for a while. if you don’t like it, go back to what you were using.

By DALLAS

February 5, 2009 9:32 AM | Link to this

magic jack works fine for me

By LoveVonage

February 5, 2009 9:35 AM | Link to this

I’m a Vonage guy but I did have a MagicJack at one time. We switched to Vonage for their unbelievable international plans. My wife calls her family in Thailand unlimited for $34.99 per month. Some momths she talks 3,000-4,000 minutes per month. Their asia plan also includes other Asian countires. Basic rate is $24.99 with unlimited to Asia for another $10. My coworker recently sent his MagicJack to Vietnam and his family can call him for free just like they are in the local Atlanta area. MagicJack is awesome and so is Vonage. My in-laws do not have a reliable high speed connection or they would have MagicJack as well.

By jeed

February 5, 2009 9:35 AM | Link to this

I have a friend who has it and LOVES it.

By Cleveland Browns Fan

February 5, 2009 9:44 AM | Link to this

My friend has MagicJack. Her phone goes in and out. I always joke about how terrible the quality is when I call her.

By Printwerx T Shirts

February 5, 2009 9:49 AM | Link to this

Order your ” I love MagicJack” T Shirt!

We also sell Banners, Signs, Magnetic Signs etc.

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Only $20 Bucks

By mickey

February 5, 2009 9:54 AM | Link to this

I HAVE A MAJIC JACK AM WELL PLEASED WITH IT IT ALSO BEATS PAYING 60 DOLLARS A MONTH TO MABELL

By MS

February 5, 2009 10:01 AM | Link to this

Could not be happier with Vonage, and don’t see how anyone would keep paying the AT&T ransom

email me and I’ll tell you about Vonage, even save you some $ when you sign up: atlantaguyATgmail dot com

By Samuel

February 5, 2009 10:02 AM | Link to this

Bold: I love my magicJack I have had it for about six months and my sound quality is great. Also, when I travel with my laptop, I never miss a call and it beats my cell phone rates anyday. get a magicJack and beat the Verizons and Comcasts at their own game.

By JH

February 5, 2009 10:10 AM | Link to this

I’ve had ITP for over a year now and have been very pleased. As soon as ATT offered naked dsl in Atl, I dropped my land line and haven’t looked back. I pay $15/month for 500 minutes and have never exceeded my minutes. It’s much more economical than the so called great rates from ATT which have so many junk fees and taxes.

By walters

February 5, 2009 10:11 AM | Link to this

I tried magicJack, and it worked fine. I didn’t like the fact that only one phone could be utilized with the product.

I have used VOIP service for years now and am completely satisfied. Bye Bye landline

By geekboy

February 5, 2009 10:17 AM | Link to this

I have used it for over a year. It works fine, usually. When it does not, I restart the computer and all is well. It is so cheap that you cannot go wrong, as long as the service remains in business that is. The program that pops up on the screen can be annoying, but I have magicjack on a spare compute I keep plugged in just for the phone.

I use it with a cordless phone and it behaves pretty much like a regular phone. Visitors/callers have no idea it is not a regular phone.

I have my magic jack hooked up to an old laptop that uses a wireless card … it works fine … but a computer with an ethernet line would probably be better.

The AJC wrote a review on magic jack some time ago … http://www.ajc.com/search/content/shared/money/stories/2008/07/TECHVOIP0715COXF5749.html?cxntlid=inform_artr

By Ron

February 5, 2009 10:30 AM | Link to this

Would love to try magicJack or something simular, but zip 30013 has no dsl service other than AT&T and Comcast, other than dial up. If I could solve that problem, landline would be gone.

By sd

February 5, 2009 10:42 AM | Link to this

I have used a cell phone only for 5 years. I can’t think of any reason to have a landline, or internet phone.

By hoodtechie

February 5, 2009 10:44 AM | Link to this

shows you how dumb the masses are.tried this device and vonage extremely poor quailty.had an issue with house fire 2 houses down.couldn’t get thru to proper 911 service.shuttled around because my address couldn’t get routed to correct 911 service.not to mention that none of these services work with my security system.i would rather pay the phone company for the service of high quality and reliable service,just ask the guy down the street from me who lost his 400k home because none of the cell providers or voip could provide the proper address.it’s amazing how ignorant as americans we have become in such a short period of time

By TRAVELER

February 5, 2009 10:44 AM | Link to this

I travel for a living and I love my MajicJack.

I hook it up to my laptop and make calls from anywhere using my verizon card or free wi-fi points as I find them.

I have had good sound quality and no complaints. Several of my friends now have bought them so we can talk!

By Dick

February 5, 2009 10:54 AM | Link to this

A great alternative is OOMA. Once you acquire the equipment (check out Amazon, or www.ooma.com ), the service is very inexpensive compared to the others. The quality is outstanding, and you can use multiple phones, with multiple phone numbers. It includes online control of voice messaging, call blocking, etc.

I’ve switched, and love it.

By micha

February 5, 2009 11:20 AM | Link to this

The only reason I still have a home line is for faxes. Also, my clients all have my number and changing it would be a real hassle. Any ideas what I should go with to cover my needs?

By carol

February 5, 2009 11:37 AM | Link to this

I have had a MagicJack for about 1 year now. I have found it to be an awesome product. I have since bought one for each of my 6 kids to stay in touch with family and friends, near and far. It is awesome.

The only problem I have found is that occassionally you do need to re-boot it to get quality of sound back to the line, but that is a very minor inconvenience.

I have used it to send and receive faxes as well. It worked just fine.

I love the savings and the fact that you can take it anywhere. What an awesome idea! I wish I had thought of it!

By Casey

February 5, 2009 11:52 AM | Link to this

I’ve had magic Jack since November and I have had no problems. My family and I use our cell phones the majority of the time anyway so this is really just a backup. I enjoy it, especially the once a year bill of $20.00. The sound quality is fine as well.

By Casey

February 5, 2009 11:52 AM | Link to this

I’ve had magic Jack since November and I have had no problems. My family and I use our cell phones the majority of the time anyway so this is really just a backup. I enjoy it, especially the once a year bill of $20.00. The sound quality is fine as well.

By NDGrad86

February 5, 2009 11:55 AM | Link to this

I have been using a service called VOIP Your Life (voipyourlife.com) for almost a year and found it to be much better than my previous service with AT&T. I was able to port over my existing number fine, have 911, domestic & canadian long distance and all the other stuff I was paying about $50 a month for from AT&T for only about $260 for the year from them (about $24 a month). Because I travel, I also have a portable application that allows me to use it as long as I have internet access with my bluetooth headset. I use comcast for high speed at home and have had no problem taking calls or dialing calls while the entire family is online surfing and VOIP’s support is outstanding. I get a live person everytime I have had to call (which was twice - once during setup of the equipment and once when Comcast changed my ip address on my modem). Technology has definitely improved since the earlier part of the decade so I wouldn’t hesitate to suggest you try it.

By Butterflypages

February 5, 2009 12:36 PM | Link to this

I decided to send Magic Jack back because it didn’t work with our alarm system. I had a couple of issues with dialing but it worked okay.

You should also be asking about the ease of return. They make you contact customer service to receive a # that will allow you to return it. I used the live chat and that worked fine.

I think it is worth a try. When MJ didn’t work, I called ATT/Bellsouth and was able to reduce my bill from 80 to 50 dollars a month for phone and internet.

By j h

February 5, 2009 12:37 PM | Link to this

Ma Bell service is only 17.00 a month. It is all those charges that add up. My monthly charge is 49.00 including all the city, county, fed charges.

By Paul Crumpler

February 5, 2009 12:38 PM | Link to this

We have Vonage. Great sound quality, reliability, and price. My wife calls England and Holland to talk with her family. Contrary to some of the comments above, 911 service works fine as well.

Yahoo also offers voice service through Yahoo Messenger. I use this to make calls from my computer while on the road; sound quality is affected by the quality and speed of your high speed connection.

There is no reason to have a hard phone line. If you need a fax line, Fax over IP works as well as over the telephone line.

By Gary B.

February 5, 2009 12:42 PM | Link to this

Magic Jack is a great little device…works just as advertised and as long as you have a high speed connection for your computer…its well worth the price !

By Willdeblack

February 5, 2009 12:51 PM | Link to this

I’ve used Magic Jack for a few months. My experience with the device is not so good. First, the quality is bad. Voices tends to be choppy and not understood. There is a 3-5 second delay between conversation. There have been a few times I was hung-up on because the person didn’t hear me say hello. Maybe the device is only as good as the computer it is connected to, or the services running on the computer. Not to say my computer is bad. I have a P4 and 512MB of RAM. But I also have a firewall, antivirus and SpyWare running.

By sem

February 5, 2009 12:53 PM | Link to this

I am hearing impaired and can hear BEST on my Magicjack internet phone! I do have to restart it sometimes, and I sometimes lose the connected call and have to try again. But it is still worth $20 per year. Cut my landline 2 years ago and have never looked back!

By Mom of 4

February 5, 2009 12:59 PM | Link to this

We now have Magic Jack and have also used Vonage. Both services work just fine for us, with the exception of occasional “echo’s” on MJ. But…for $100 for FIVE YEARS of service, that’s ok!!! It suits our needs, but our needs are minimal: we have 5 cell phones in the house and we don’t utilize faxes. By the way, you can indeed have more than 1 phone on the magic jack: if you plug MJ line directly into a phone line, it “lights up” the whole house! I used a double phone jack (less than $5 at Walmart) and it works just fine! We love our Magic Jack!!

By dirk duran

February 5, 2009 1:14 PM | Link to this

I have T-Mobile at Home and it works great. Only $10 per month. Free long distance, unlimited minutes, etc. Therefore I do not have to use my cell phone when at home.

By stonoguy

February 5, 2009 1:22 PM | Link to this

I do not have the MagicJack nor do I want to. I have AT&T (formerly BellSouth). I live on the SC coast (Charleston area) and during & after Hurricane Hugo in ‘89 the landline telephone service never went out. I had a cellular phone at the time and had to depend on Sprint employees to re-fill the generators to power the cell towers. This was very erratic. Some tower weren’t accessable for weeks. Also, the cable was out for over a month. No thanks, for my situation, I stick with AT&T for local & their cellular for LD….except when their service is disabled!!

By everydayjane

February 5, 2009 1:31 PM | Link to this

You can’t beat the price of MagicJack. However, til the 911 systems catch up with technology I will rely on the the landline for emergencies. Although, I believe you can still dial 911 without an active landline. I’ll have to check into that. I did downgrade my landline to basic phone service.

By Eric

February 5, 2009 1:34 PM | Link to this

I wouldn’t waste the time or money on this—more unnecessary gadgets!!

By Tony

February 5, 2009 1:40 PM | Link to this

Been with Viatalk for 2+ years and ZERO complaints!! VoIP is all about the quality of your Internet. Got sucky Interent…you will have sucky VoIP.

By mica

February 5, 2009 2:04 PM | Link to this

I’m having issues with ma bell right now and would love to know where should I go to get a majic jack and how will it work with other lines and the fax machine in the house. Do I need to buy one for each connection. I also need input on where to switch my dsl to so please feel free to give me some tips.

By Nancy

February 5, 2009 2:12 PM | Link to this

I think it’s a piece of garbage. I couldn’t get mine to install, spend several hours while their tech support worked on it only to decide it was defective. But they still made me pay the return postage for their defective devise! !

By J Moore

February 5, 2009 2:12 PM | Link to this

The secret to using any VOIP is to get Verizon FIOS first. I use both Vonage and MagicJack. I save maybe $ 2500 per year for my business. You can avoid all those government fees for one thing.

By ATLien

February 5, 2009 2:24 PM | Link to this

I’ve been using VoIP for years now and am extremely satisfied with the results. Always remember that whether you are using VoIP or MajicJack your phone service is only going to be as good as your internet service. One goy mentioned 911. You have to make sure that your VoIP provider has the correct address. With Vonage this is done easily through its web interface by logging into your account and verifying that the address is correct. That guy also mentioned not working with his alarm system. Most alarm companies now make use of wireless alarm systems that can work with your current system. I’ve a wireless alarm system and it works just fine … actually even better than being attached to a landline because it can’t be cut.

By Tried It

February 7, 2009 10:10 AM | Link to this

Returned my Magic Jack after trying it for a week. I didn’t like the fact that I had to keep my computer turned all the time to receive calls. The sound quality was not the best. The automated voice for voice mail echoed. Didn’t like to have to wait for the Magic Jack icon to disappear everytime I started the computer. Beside, I’ll stick with my Comcast unlimited local and long distance for $33.00/mo.

By Kathy

February 7, 2009 10:22 AM | Link to this

I used Vonage for almost 4 years without a problem. I purchased several MagicJacks about a year ago for my family and have very few complaints. My internet connection is wireless and was using it with a cordless phone also. MagicJack works better if your internet connections is hardwired to your computer. Then the cordless phone is not a problem.

Recently cancelled Vonage and I am now using T-Mobile at home. I have a BlackBerry Curve which is WIFI (UMA technology) and allows me to make calls from my cell phone for free (Hot Spot) without using any of my minutes. I mostly work from my home office anyway, I am using 5,000 or more minutes per month on the WI-FI Hotspot. No more overages for me.

So with the Magicjack and T-Mobile at Home, I am saving hundreds of dollars a month!!!!!!

By Drexel Gal

February 7, 2009 11:42 AM | Link to this

I have used Magic Jack for two years now. My computer is used for a lot of online backups and downloading. My computer has 4-GB of RAM and a 3-GHz processor. During those times when my DSL is very active with data transfers, the receiving end of my Magic Jack calls hears a warble and intermittent audio. However, on my end, the audio is excellent, with no drop outs at all. If your connection is fast and your computer isn’t doing much, it should work fine.

By eea

February 7, 2009 11:59 AM | Link to this

We have magicjack and it seems to work out pretty good for us. We use Skype for overseas calls, and cell phones for all other. The quality of skype and magicjack are comparable to cell phones and cost is even better.

For the little amount of time we are on the phone, our system rocks.

By eea

February 7, 2009 12:00 PM | Link to this

We have magicjack for local calls (as it seems folks in ga complain that we didn’t have a local number to call) and it seems to work out pretty good for us. We use Skype for overseas calls, and cell phones for all other. The quality of skype and magicjack are comparable to cell phones and cost is even better.

For the little amount of time we are on the phone, our system rocks.

By Jack

February 7, 2009 12:53 PM | Link to this

I have not used MagicJack, but have used Packet 8, AT&T CallVantage, and Comcast Digital Phone. All 3 over AT&T DSL or Comcast Internet service.

I’d say these VOIP services have a ways to go before I would ever go back. While I could hear people quite well, people on the other end told me I sounded like I was under water. So many of you who think it’s great may not realize the people on the other end aren’t so happy. Sometimes the services would not recognize touch tones if dialed too fast.

I work from home a great deal, so need a quality connection. So far a landline is it. With bundling, the price of a landline is not much more than some of the larger VOIP services.

My 2 cents is you get what you pay for - want a quality, reliable connection including 911, go with a landline. Want to save a few bucks and dont care about call quality, go with a VOIP service.

By el martin

February 7, 2009 1:43 PM | Link to this

Agree with Tried It…………..it is not worth leaving your computer on 24/7/365 (no one ever tells you that) or have your calls go to the message center when the computer is off. With all the hackers and viruses out there computer security is paramount.

By Jim

February 7, 2009 2:39 PM | Link to this

Just remember - unkile a landline, when the power goes out you have NO PHONE!!!!! That’s something the “bundle people” will not remind you of when they are banging on your door.

By paul

February 7, 2009 4:04 PM | Link to this

after ma bell—charged me interest for being 2 days late on a bill i didnt mind the $5 late fee..i was late but interest?? nah i dont think so…. i picked up the phone and switched to vonage…..

i went from an average of 130.00 a month to 32.23- i call the UK all the time as well as several other countries —-all for free… att would be 5.95 a month plus 5 cents a minute….

have not had a problem with call quality or 911 either.

By Eddie

February 7, 2009 5:47 PM | Link to this

I have nagic jack and I love it. I am in Ga and my son has a girlfriend in michigan and it has saved me tons of money. No complaints at all.

By LoGruvz

February 7, 2009 7:12 PM | Link to this

I have Vonage and figured I would try MagicJack. Like one of the pevious posters said it is probably best to have the latest hardware PC which I have - nothing elaborate but the latest processor and sw. MagicJack works like a champ. I will cancelling Vonage eventualy. Actualy it works better than Vonage. I have had bad problems with Vonage with choppy calls and when you rae on the phone and a another caller calls in it drops the line. Yes I am a techie and I have done all the tweaks you can do to make Vonage work better to no avail. MJ has a 30 day try it or return deal which I am in my second week. Unless something changes I will keep it.

By HappyMom

February 7, 2009 8:13 PM | Link to this

On my son’s advice, we bought MagicJack just before my daughter left for an extended stay (2 years) in Hong Kong. Sent her off with a laptop, a $9.99 Trimline phone, and very little technological know-how. She calls us almost daily with no problems, so we are thrilled with it. I would (and will continue to) recommend it to anyone with family out of the country. Beats phone cards or cell phones which may or may not work where she is. She has her cell phone just for Asia and her Magic Jack for us. We even set up our web cams and put her on speaker phone at Thanksgiving and Christmas - unlimited talk time! Only stumbling block we had was when she forgot to take her laptop with her on vacation … This is her third time out of the country, and it’s the first time I’ve been “connected.” Well worth the low cost.