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Comcast Begins Rollout of VoIP

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the voip-is-a-funny-word dept.

rufey writes "Comcast is beginning their rollout of their Internet phone service, according to a press release released today. It seems that the increased competition has gotten the attention of the baby bells, who "have realigned their attention to target cable's success and plan to invest billions of dollars of their own to upgrade their decaying copper network with speedier fiber-optic lines". With Comcast owning the network that the voice calls will traverse (until it gets to POTS, if needed), will Comcast's VoIP quality be better than their competitors such as Vonage, which relies on third party Internet connections to carry their VoIP?"

2 of 229 comments (clear)

  1. Disadvantages of owning the network by bookemdano63 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Comcast has a major disadvantage that the other VOIP providers don't have, that you can't move your box and phone to any IP connection, you have to be on the Comcast network. And since VOIP only requires about 90kbps any broadband connection should be able to handle it.

  2. Too late. by Seumas · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Comcast has been advertising VoIP service in my area for about two years. I called up four months ago and asked them about it, because I wanted to add it to my internet service.

    The woman on the phone responded with nothing more than "what are you talking about?". She had to speak with a supervisor, who eventually just said "We don't offer that in your area. Or any area, actually. And I doubt we'll even have such a service for a couple of years".

    Didn't explain why they've been advertising it for eons.

    Anyway, they've lost money here, because I went with Packet8.net. Great quality, cheap prices. Unlimited long distance to the states and Canada for $20/mo, including all of the features that most companies would charge a hefty extra fee for (call return, caller ID, call blocking, call forwarding, voicemail, conferencing). And rates to other locations are typically between two and four cents per minute. Can't beat that.

    Comcast would have to beat that service by at least 20% to make it worth my time *and* provide the adaptor for free (since you have to buy one with most VoIP providers for about $50).