🚀 go-pugleaf

Nole Boaday <nobody@home.net> wrote:

> I was thinking about the same thing recently. I currently have:

> - iiNet ADSL2 Medium (the old plans) $49.95 month

With 20G downloads.

> - iiPhone (which was originally $29.95) $33.34,

Yeah, me too.

> - ... and free iiNetPhone (I signed up for their VoIP when it was completely free).

I didnt see that coming and was stupid
enough not to sign up for it while it was free.

> It still adds up to $83 bucks, which is fucking expensive when you think about it.

Yeah, tho you should really be considering the difference
between that and what you can get elsewhere.

I could save a bit, maybe $15-20 by going for one of the
more risky ISPs and could even get unlimited downloads,
but currently I value the reliability more than the lower price.

Bit hard to justify tho, particularly with an operation like exetel
which isnt likely to be at that much risk of a major glitch from
their upstream provider again now that they have shown that
they can handle that reasonably well. The main downside with
them for me would be the lack of a 1300 support number and
limited phone support hours to report faults in the telstra system.

Its arguable that there is much point in even bothering to report
telstra faults, someone is likely to report them eventually and its
less that clear that when I have reported them to iinet that its
actually got telstra to look at them sooner, even when its been
a fault thats unique to my phone exchange etc.

> I was going to change plans, up then I'd have to accept the stupid
> iiNet increased line rental ($34.95), and fucking PAY for VoIP now.
> So that would be $49.95 + $34.95 + $9.95 = $94.85 = Fucking RipOff.

> I'm thinking in order to save a few bucks, change to Telstra Homeline
> Budget (then Telstra get shafted $10 or so bucks) $19.95, and then
> I'll have to pay for VoIP $9.95, but hopefully make more savings with
> 15cent Australia wide calls.

I dont make enough calls for that to ever pay for itself.
The absolute vast bulk of calls I make are local or
1300/1800 calls. It would be handy to be able to have
cheap calls to mobiles, but none of the major voips have that.

> All-In-All I'll still would have to by a VoIP adaptor, and in my case I'd want it to pass-thru 
> PSTN calls:
> http://www.jmgtechnology.com.au/product_info.php/cPath/24/products_id/312

I wouldnt really care that much about pass thru. I'd be
quite happy for the incoming calls to come in on the
homeline budget line and just use voip for outgoing.

> Take two years+ for it to actually pay it off, given low call volumes.

In my case it wouldnt pay for itself at all.

> It's the fixed component I want to reduce anyway.

I'd certainly go for a lower fixed cost if it was available, but
currently arent prepared to sacrifice on reliability to get it.

Hard to justify that choice tho, except for the most flakey
end of adsl ISPs which can see the plug pulled on their
operation by their upstream provider and be out for weeks
etc. That would piss me off very comprehensively indeed
and currently I'm prepared to pay say $100 per year to
insure against that. Hard to justify tho like I said.

> Meh.


> Sammy Jnr wrote:
>> I currently use dial up and am looking into getting ADSL.
>>
>> A package deal would be nice: landline, ADSL and voip or each
>> separately - whatever gets me the best deal. 512K download 10-20GB,
>> unlimited download over off-peak would be great.
>>
>> Also, what hardware would be recommended for the above combination
>> including wireless option for 2 laptops, pocket pc and VOIP on the
>> same router to receive normal calls and make VOIP calls on a
>> standard cordless phone. Suggestions would be appreciated.... thanks!