My Virtual Office, Part II

A couple of weeks ago I announced that I would be testing a new VoIP service called Vonage. Unfortunately, the Vonage system took about 10 days to arrive, so I was unable to test it while in Colorado (it arrived the same day that I left to return to Europe). So I brought it back with me to Brussels where I have tested it under a few different conditions.

The Vonage �system� is quite simple: it is a �plug and play� modem-size device that works on all power systems (110-240) with the help of a simple adaptor (a voltage converter is not required). Plug the device into an electrical socket, an Ethernet connection into another socket, a telephone into a third socket, (I bought a very inexpensive 10 EUR phone at a local electronics store), and I was in business.

I pick up the receiver and I get a U.S.-style dial tone. And when I make phone calls from the phone, my correspondents in the U.S. tell me that the voice quality is actually better than when I call them from my Belgacom line (which sometimes has an echo).

The quality experience on my end has at times been somewhat less satisfactory. On some connections, I heard a broken (but understandable) voice on the other end, but in these cases my correspondent did not perceive a problem. My suspicion is that the Vonage algorithm is set up so that voice degradation (if any) is designed to affect the Vonage user�s quality rather than the person on the other end. If so, this makes sense, because a Vonage user would perhaps prefer to have his or her reception quality degraded on his or her end so long as the person on the other side does not perceive a problem.

Unfortunately, there were also several occasions when the phone did not work at all. In these cases the problem seems to be related to problems with my ADSL service at home. The Belgacom ADSL service at my home is often choppy and fitful, and when the ADSL service works imperfectly (which is a common occurrence), the Vonage phone does not work (of course, neither does my Internet). I should note that his has been an ongoing problem with my Belgacom ADSL service for the past two years that I have had it.

There is much more of a problem on occasions when people call me, as opposed to occasions where I initiate the phone call. If I were to speculate (I have not kept careful records), I would say that people that call me have a very low success rate (about 10%) where as it is much higher when I initiate the call (about 90%). This is a major problem that will have to be worked out.

But in other cases where I have a consistent Internet connection � and particularly when I initiate the phone call � the Vonage phone works about as well as any regular phone. And at other locations where the ADSL (or other high-speed) service is more consistent, the phone works great.

And of course, the best thing is the price. I am making several telephone calls to the United States recently to organize my affairs as I move back, and this will save me lots of money. The Vonage top-tier unlimited calling service is about $35 per month (for calls within the United States), and at this rate I will save at least a couple hundred dollars this month in international fees. Even if I use the phone to call within Europe, their international rates are reasonable: 3 cents per minute to Berlin, and 2 cents per minute to Paris, Rome, and London. This is far cheaper than anything I have at home in Belgium, be it my Belgacom line, my GSM, or anything else. So I am willing to put up with the difficulties for now because the cost differential is so great.

I will continue to test the service under different circumstances. For example, today I leave for a conference in Germany. Rather than paying the unbelievably high GSM roaming rates (or the even higher hotel phone rates) while in Germany, my hypothesis is that I would prefer to pay the (still high) hotel high-speed internet rates and plug in my Vonage phone. Even if I use the phone only one hour per day (I have many more calls than that planned), the money saved will still exceed the relatively high (up to 30 EUR per day) high-speed hotel Internet charges.

This is a promising technology. I�m testing it under the most rigorous of conditions (a U.S. number while in Europe) and it seems to be working, even if somewhat inconsistently.

More reports to come!