Ooma Core VoIP Phone System
by ooma
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List Price: Our Price: $170.00 You Save: $79.99 (32%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: CE See more product details |
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Customers in the UK,
Buy this product at amazon.co.uk
for British Pounds
Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Ooma Core VoIP Phone System
Customer Review: Ooma Core...get it while you can!
Summary: 5 Stars
Here's a quick review of the Ooma Core System I hope will help some of you who may be on the fence about purchasing this product.
1) Don't fear the hardware...it works in front of, or in back of, any modern router (QOS engine equipped) with ZERO issues
2) Voice quality, which is paramount when making VOICE calls, is as good or better than POTS. While the standard quality setting would be acceptable for most, I have bumped mine to the max setting (230K) to make it hyper good...again, equal to or better than POTS...it simply doesn't get any better than that.
3) Regardless of network location, I have detected only slight bandwidth degredation during an active call. As many here have already done, I have gone out of my way to stress the network during calls and voice quality has remained stellar
4) While the Telo is the latest device from Ooma, and by now I'm sure they have worked out just about all of their initial launch issues, for me the Core is the only viable solution...here's why:
Like so many these days, I have a "network closet" where all of my network hardware resides. From that closet I have multiple Cat-5e runs to every "phone jack" in my house. Given the single device nature of the Telo this means it must either a) reside in the closet where it can easily integrate with my alarm system and phone or b) sit on counter next to the phone in the kitchen which would make all of the buttons easily accessable, etc. The problem with option b) however is that in my home I have a monitored alarm system. SOP for alarm monitoring is they must have first position in your phone network, giving them the ability to grab your dial tone and then kill everything beyond it. Given this requirement option b) would require me to run the dial tone from the Telo in the kitchen up to the closet (alarm panel), back to the kitchen for the cordless phone base unit and then back to the closet for home wide dial tone distribution. Even with multiple Cat-5e connections in my kitchen this is ugly.
Enter...the Core.
All of the above issues are removed because you have two devices. In my case I have placed the hub in the closet and the scout next to the cordless phone in the kitchen. In this case the hub's phone routing can easily run in and out of the alarm box then on to all of the phone jacks in the house EXCEPT the jack that is reserved for the Scout which has a seperate line run to it where it generates a seperate, clean dial tone for the cordless phone. Almost too easy!
5) I've read lots of horror stories about Ooma's customer support. Let me tell you my experience has been world class. I did not have to call them at all to set up the system but as I added features I got a little ahead of the curve so needed their help to get it sorted out. Much to my surprise each time I have called them the wait time has been in the 1-2 minute range and each rep has been friendly and very knowledgeable. Yesterday I even made a request to disable the broadcast caller id on my second line to ensure my primary line is always displayed when making a call from either line. Not only did the rep take care of this issue but he called me back today to make sure I was happy with the performance!!!!
Bottom line, I believe Ooma's got a great set of products and the support to back them up so you can't go wrong with either product. That said, I would encourage you to carefully think about how you will configure your network and phone hardware before making your final decision.
Customer Review: IMPORTANT INFO ABOUT THIS ITEM THAT MIGHT HELP
Summary: 5 Stars
I was hesitant to buy this item after reading from a few reviewers that the customer service was so bad SO, before buying it, I called customer serviece a few times at different hours of the day/night etc. It was very good. The hold time was very short. They told me that when they first started up, they were understaffed and that has been cleared up now.
Now about the product. There are a few things you MUST be aware of since customer support didn't know about this problem. When I first hooked it up, I was using a WESTELL 7500 wireless Modem/Router combo. My DSL speed went DOWN DRAMATICALLY. OOMA didn't know why. I then tried a Westell 2200 and a Westell 6100 It worked GREAT with those two OLDER modems. So now I have one Westell 2200 and 2 Westell 6100 modems. I bought them because the newest Westell 7500 is NOT compatible with the OOMA and will slow up your speed DRAMATICALLY. I informed OOMA about this conflict. Now, with either of the other two modems that I own, the OOMA works GREAT. You computer does NOT have to be on, be BE AWARE that when the computer IS on, it does affect phone quality since it is sharing bandwidth with the OOMA. If you have a very fast internet connection, no need to worry, but if you have less than a 1500 download speed, be aware that the OOMA is not going to work as well when your computer is on.
I do not pay extra for the OOMA Premier which gives you some extra services that I do not need. I am very happy that I get free long distance in the US, Canada, Guam and Puerto Rico, call waiting, caller ID, voice mail etc. I chose to take an OOMA phone number so I can't tell you about any trouble some people have mentioned about porting their number from Verizon to OOMA. Rather than hooking up the OOMA Scout in another room, I chose to go an easier route by buying an AT&T Cordless phone answering machine combo that comes with three handsets. This way, the other two handsets have a docking station in any room you want without running any phone wires around your house. You just plug each docking station into the AC outlet on your wall so that the extra two handsets stay charged. I like that I don't have to run phone lines around the house this way, so I have no use for the OOMA Scout that comes with it. With the OOMA scout, you must run hard wire phone lines to each scout and also plug each scout into an AC outlet. That would be more work, more wires and more expensives if you wanted 3 or more phones in your home.
All in all, I am VERY happy with this product. It's MUCH better than Vonage and that other item that you plug into a USB port into your computer. I forget the name of it, but its something JACK. With that you must leave your computer on, and I really didn't like the way it performed compared to the OOMA. I'm really surprised that it works this well. JUST REMEMBER. It does NOT work well with the Westell 7500 modem which is the latest modem that Verizon is pushing. I hope that they are not intentionally making their newer modems incompatible with the OOMA. Not accusing Verizon of anything, but I find it strange that the NEWER Verizon modem pushed by Verizon slows down your internet speed to a crawl. So, just to be careful, like I said, I bought TWO brand new 6100 Westell modems from Verizon and one Westell 2200 on Ebay just to have extras in case a modem burns out since the newest model is NOT compatible.
If you have a compatible modem, this is a GREAT PRODUCT. I've had it for 3 to 4 months now and am enjoying FREE phone service.
Customer Review: Ooma core is the way to go for free phone service
Summary: 5 Stars
I waited till after the ooma telo launch to make my ooma purchase, but after comparing service plans between the telo and the hub/scout I decided the old ooma core would serve me best without having to pay a cent in recurring fees. If you want the ten dollar a month premium plan then I would recommend the telo, but if you want the zero dollar a month freemium plan with full functioning caller ID and voicemail and no taxes ever then the old hub/scout core appears to be the better choice.
I've now had my ooma long enough to save $23.28 from not having to pay my November 2009 PhonePower bill. PhonePower is a great VOIP provider, so good that I felt bad breaking up with them, but they just can't compete with ooma. I've got better quality and reliability with ooma, and in ten months the ooma will have paid for itself. With a one year warranty on the ooma equipment I can't lose as long as ooma stays in business.
I also like the fact that I own my ooma equipment. I had to return the router I leased from PhonePower as part of the termination process, which entails packing it up and paying the postage to send it back. I will never have to return my ooma hub or scout (unless one of them were to break under warranty I suppose).
Ooma is a utopian type product in a world of planned obsolescence and recurring costs. In the long run it is always better to pay more up front for a long lasting optimal solution than to get suckered into a contract through the enticement of low startup and initial contract fees only to find those recurring fees rising over time. For example, I run my ooma over Verizon fiber optics (FIOS). Shortly after I got my ooma and terminated my PhonePower service, Verizon decided to raise my monthly FIOS bill by $10.00/month, and when I tried to have my plan downgraded from FIOS to DSL I was told by multiple Verizon representatives that once a home is converted to FIOS it can never be converted back to DSL, even though when I asked that same question prior to going with FIOS I was told it wouldn't be a problem switching back to copper. So, although it is technically possible to switch from FIOS to DSL, Verizon will not do it because it is not profitable for them.
I wish I could find something like ooma for my internet service, but since nothing like that seems to exist I'm on the lookout for a good high speed internet service with a rate that is locked in for life so that the ISP can't raise my rates at will after the expiration of the original contract.
So, between picking up high def TV through an antenna and running ooma on top of FIOS I essentially have a phone/TV/internet bundle for $42.99/month (soon to be $52.99/month) with every penny of that going to pay for my 5/2 Mbps (eventually going up to 10/2 Mbps) internet. That beats the daylights out of any bundle Verizon or Comcast has to offer. I'm thrilled with my free TV and phone, so if I could just lock in a low rate on my internet I'd be all set.
In summary, ooma is a rare find in this greedy world. I hope they can stay that way and remain profitable at the same time because I don't ever want to have to give up my ooma. All the phone companies I've dealt with in the past were like girls I dated but couldn't marry, but ooma is more like the wife I'm married to right now. We'll be together till death do us part.
Customer Review: Wow, A great VOIP
Summary: 5 Stars
After trying two different VOIP companies, we were afraid to waste the money on another. We first had *ingo (starts with an L) which was awful. Poor call quality, an adapter that had to be reset every day, dropped calls and awful customer serivce. We then moved on to Sunrocket which was great, except they went out of business 3 months after we paid for a year in advance. We looked at Vonage but the reviews made us pause. We called them 2 times and both times we experienced VERY pushy sales people who made us realize they weren't the company for us. We had COX for our home phone service which is a VOIP (In case you didn't know) but their prices do not reflect a VOIP service.
Last week we decided to take the plunge with OOMA after looking at the reviews and the price. We will break even in under a year so it wasn't a hard choice for us. All we can say is WOW!!!! Even the packaging was impressive. Everything was neat and honestly looked very nice and professional and organized. I haven't purcahsed anything in a long time that just looked nice in the package and made me stop just to admire what a good job they did. Setup was easy and would have been done under 15 minutes but we didn't have a phone jack near our cable modem so we had to wait until we got a 50 foot cord. Once that was done, HOLY COW, A service that works as advertised! The quality is beyond great. We love the premier features and the scout is cool. We were going to wait a while before deciding on the premier services but after only one day, we were so impressed that we had to have it. Now we can have 2 calls going on at the same time. We can't say enough good things about OOMA.
For those online gamers, we play online games and haven't had any network degragation (lag) in the games because of the OOMA.
If you are like us and have been on the fence for VOIP and have high speed internet, this is the service for you. (DSL owners may have a different experience since that service is typically slower). This is a awesome product and is worth every penny. We have tested the service with multiple phone calls lasting at least an hour long and haven't had ANY issues. People on the other end say it sounds like normal phone service. We haven't had any dropped calls, laggy sounds, weird sounds or any of the problems that go with a poor VOIP.
You can read about all the services on the website, but one that is undermarketed is the blacklist feature. Finally, those annoying telemarketer calls will be a thing of the past. We haven't found a feature that wasn't useful. It finally feels like a company is on our side and giving us the choice and tools to block those unwanted calls instead of allowing every telemarketer to contact us and tell us we need to refinance, buy or invest in their products. (Even after being on the Do not call list for years, and yes, we renewed our names on the website)
Again, this is a great product and represents the GOLD standard of what VOIP services should aim to be. If you want a VOIP that works, don't waste your money on onage (starts with a V) or those other nickle and dime VOIPs. Just pony up the $200 and see how much better free service can be.
Customer Review: Initial Thoughts
Summary: 5 Stars
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
You can see the hype in the product description, you can see why ooma is a good idea money-wise, and so many people have written long reviews about the service. For me it came down to, why take the leap with this service? It sounds too good to be true, there has to be a hitch somewhere. So far I haven't found one.
Hardware is excellent, very well built. These units look almost Bang and Olefson in their simplicity and elegance. They look darn nice. The packaging is even kind of cool, a bit Apple-esque.
Instructions. I'm an instruction reader. I spent about 10 minutes reading both books. That is seriously not necessary at all. The Quick Start Guide, that's all you really need.
Activation - you will have to activate the unit before you install. There's a decision point that is not obvious, and it has to do with your current phone number. Ultimately I chose, port my old phone number. That's probably the safest cheapest way to go. After you activate ooma on the the website, and do the install, everything will work just fine. I'm going to try this service for a month or so, and then call ooma to actually shut off my landline (I could also never call them to shut off my landline service). Ooma will work perfectly in that mode. When you dial out, local calls are routed through your landline automatically; and long distance is routed through ooma. Easy as pie, simple and intuitive. Incoming calls, don't really care; people still call my same old phone number. If this service is really that great, I'll pay the $39.99 to have my landline shut down (it takes 3-4 weeks to complete the shut down).
Set up - it's not 10 or 15 minutes as a lot of people have written. That's almost impossible to install one that quickly. The tricky part, you need to be next to your DSL or Cable Modem, your router (if you have one), a phone line, and an electrical outlet. DSL installs will probably be easier than cable modem installs. But, you'll end up doing some rerouting of wires to do this install. I had to think pretty carefully about where things were going. The install right now is very ugly, but won't be too hard to dress up nicely.
So first impressions, this is a darn nice device. The forums and reviews debating this system all seem a bit old and wrong right now. The device appears to work exactly as advertised, no hidden costs, no surprises.
Let's all hope their business model is sound and they stay around for a long time.
Update - After 2.5 weeks of use, this device is incredible. The call quality is better than anything we ever had from ATT / landline. I too have noticed a tiny amount of low level background hiss once in a while, nothing objectionable at all. I've been on receiving and sending end of calls and quality is very clear. Use is absolutely intuitive, easy to understand. I'm about ready to port my number now.