[superuser2]

Or the hacker's solution to maintaining a landline: get yourself a cheap SIP-capable handset and an account with a wholesale SIP-trunking provider like Flowroute ($1.25/mo for the number, $.0098/min outbound to CONUS, $.012/min inbound).

Proxy through OpenVBX or Asterisk (can be hosted in the cloud or in your home) if you want to get fancy with voicemail, IVR menus, forwarding, extensions for different rooms in the house, etc.

ISP bundled phone services are essentially just packaging this for you with 10x markup. (I worked on VoIP installs for a summer when I was 14; it's not that hard).

Only downside is most of these phones anticipate PoE, so you need to buy the power supply (or a PoE injector) separately. You also have to trust yourself to set up E911 correctly, or keep your cell phone around for that.

[jrcii]

There's one more factor which is the configuration of QoS. This can be as easy as checking a box in a GUI for home routers. I've also spent days configuring Cisco switches, OpenBSD queues, VLANs, etc to achieve this.

[drzaiusapelord]

>Asterisk (can be hosted in the cloud or in your home)

There's a FreePBX image that installs right on the Rasperry Pi, which some people just glue or tape to the back of their voip phone and plug right into one of the phone's ethernet ports. Clever solution for the price conscious voip customer. Toss in a $100 Yealink or Grandstream with a big color screen and off you go.

http://www.raspberry-asterisk.org/

[JoeAltmaier]

But won't that fail at the same time your home internet access fails - when the ISP link goes down? I have a land line as a redundant link, for security.

[superuser2]

An actual POTS circuit provides redundancy, but many people's landlines aren't actually POTS anymore, they're the ISP's proprietary version of this with an ATA inside the cable modem. This should have the same failure profile, while being cheaper and more fun.

[BHSPitMonkey]

Isn't Google's offering here VOIP based? Sounds equivalent.

[jauer]

More or less with a number of caveats :)

Telco/ISP provided "VOIP" is often technically Voice over IP (as in the protocol), but regulations and implementation can be subtly different from VOIP (what people think of as Voice over the Internet AKA "over the top" or OTT).

ISP-provided Voice often comes with requirements for battery backup in the fiber/dsl/ata box so the user can call 911 during a power outage. There's also reporting requirements for outages that prevent a user from dialing 911.

Also, with ISP-Voice the VOIP part is considered a implementation detail so it can be given absolute QoS priority over internet traffic on a given last-mile link. This helps with being able to call 911 while someone leaves bittorrent open or whatever. OTT voip doesn't get that benefit (and that's not technically a net-neutrality violation).

[jonah]

What are the regulations surrounding this? They say it works for 911.

Is it like Vonage or like telephone bundled from your cable provider?

Are they providing a battery-backed modem with RJ11 jack?

[Symbiote]

At least on some Android phones, you can add a SIP account directly. That might be your cheapest-available handset.

Mine warns that more battery is consumed if receiving calls is enabled, but I only use it for making particular international calls.