New house - ADSL only - what/who to go with?

**wratterus** · 11-02-2016, 07:05 PM

Finally bought a house....

Anyway, am in the process of sorting out phone/internet etc etc and was wondering what is the best option at the moment, I'm a bit out of touch.

I'm thinking that going with unlimited broadband and a VOIP plan could be the go?

Unfortunately there is only ADSL where we will be moving to, which does suck a little. I was looking at bigpipe, who have unlimited naked ADSL for $79 a month. I've got extremely limited experience with VOIP - is that a good option on ADSL? Are there any VOIP providers in NZ who could set us up with a 'local' number so it doesn't cost people calling locally?

Any thoughts from who has done this recently, or has more experience than me with the whole voip thing would be appreciated!

Thanks heaps.

**wratterus** · 11-02-2016, 07:20 PM

Just looking at 2talk - their $10 + GST plan looks pretty legit. And I assume a 'local' number means that anyone in that same area can call from a normal landline for free?

**decibel** · 11-02-2016, 08:42 PM

Originally Posted by wratterus

Just looking at 2talk - their $10 + GST plan looks pretty legit. And I assume a 'local' number means that anyone in that same area can call from a normal landline for free?

Yes, it just appears to be a normal local number for other people and calls are free. I like 2talk.
One thing I found though is that if you don't already have a local PSTN number to port across, you get given a number starting with "9" and I have been surprised at the number of people who query "what sort of number is that?"

In Carterton, "all" numbers start with "379...." and my VoIP number confuses some people easily.

**Alex B** · 12-02-2016, 04:30 AM

VOIP doesn't always play nice with CG-NAT. So if you go with BigPipe, make sure you pay the $45 one off cost for a static IP.

**gary67** · 12-02-2016, 06:37 AM

I feel your pain we are on ADSL here in Brightwater, nothing else available, we transferred our Snap account from Christchurch (now 2Degrees) still very happy with the service we did have a Voip no with them but in the end dropped as paying extra for something we didn't use seemed pointless. The Voip worked just fine however we have the Fritzbox router which is very good, not sure if 2d still give those out.

Where have you bought? Out Riwaka way?

**Chilling_Silence** · 12-02-2016, 08:54 AM

If you're going with VoIP, because of the pathetic upload (~500-800kbps usually) of ADSL2+ you'll want some sort of a router that can prioritize it, and an ISP that will also do likewise.
2talks support blows, they're a pain to get hold of, but thankfully their service is probably the most reliable VoIP service in the country (I do VoIP for a living). Their DSL services aren't too bad either, and their "Private IP only" connections actually work really well. As Alex B mentioned it _can_ cause some issues, but 2talk do it well and because the voice service is theirs along with the DSL service, it works absolutely fine.

Mixing and matching 2talk with BigPipe may not be too wise unless you get a public static IP like he said though.

**wratterus** · 12-02-2016, 10:41 AM

Thanks for the thoughts guys. Yes - I would definitely go with a static IP so the CG-NAT thing shouldn't be an issue. Currently I'm paying a dyndns sub, so that can go away too which would save a few $$.

Bought in Mot Gary - been a bit of a rigmarole finding a place to be honest stuff sells like hotcakes around here, but feels good to finally have a place locked in.

Chill - is there a different solution you would recommend, or possibly trying to consolidate the DSL and VoIP with the same provider? I currently have a Draytek 2710, which (while I've never used it) does seem to have decent QoS built in.

So would I be right in saying all I'd need is a Cisco SPA112 or equivalent, configure it up and away we go?

**Chilling_Silence** · 12-02-2016, 11:09 AM

I've never used the QoS on the DV2710. Always used the QoS in Gargoyle, and hung the rest of the network off that, so DV2710 -> Gargoyle -> Rest of network (Including ATA)

Yeah the SPA112 will work just fine