call1899 - Cheap VoIP Provider

PaulVarjak :

Now, I am not a technical boffin and would like to know what sort of Internet phone I could use with 1899 so I do not have to switch on computer to make calls. Any ideas?

Like I said above, the Grandstream 102 works fine. £50 on ebay.

mwild :

PaulVarjak : Now, I am not a technical boffin and would like to know what sort of Internet phone I could use with 1899 so I do not have to switch on computer to make calls. Any ideas? Like I said above, the Grandstream 102 works fine. £50 on ebay.

If I were you, I would rather spend a little more money to get a 100% SIP compliance ATAd device and attach a cordless phone to it. That way, I don't have to be sitting in one spot while talking.

PaulVarjak :

I have had phone service with 1899's sister company (18866) for some months and calls from a UK landline to a UK landline are just 1p/call! And this is a PSTN service - not VOIP! NO charge to register, and no monthly rental. So, it is probably cheaper than using most VOIPs and more convenient! Now, for UK landline to UK landline calls, 1899 charges 3p/call but some overseas destinations are also 3p/call! If you use the VOIP computer to landline service the 3p/call is waived and you pay only the per minute charge (but this 0p/min to UK and some overseas destinations). It is important to note that 1899 is for calls to LANDLINES, though, I suppose if you have an Internet phone number you can call that too. 1899 will not supply you with an Internet phone number - whats the point? If everyone used 1899 we could still all use our landlines for incoming calls - without having to switch on computer! Now, I am not a technical boffin and would like to know what sort of Internet phone I could use with 1899 so I do not have to switch on computer to make calls. Any ideas?

Greetings Paul - You don't happen to have a Girlfriend called Holly Golightly do you? Breakfast at Tiffanys was always a favourite of mine anyway

Your observations are keen and it has been a pet subject of mine for some time. There is still a disparity between Carrier Pre select companies like 1899 and some of the commercial VOIP operators. It comes down to the fact that carrier preselect has been around longer and the investment required to set up a commercial VOIP operation is fairly significant - especially in terms of customer service, quality control, reduncancy and marketing.

VOIP 'for the masses' is in its infancy (telecoms companies have been using it for years to reduce their own costs and to make more money from us) and we are approaching a point where it will grab the mainstream market. There are several factors still to overcome, one is probably router and NAT issues the other is lack of plug and play - all users currently need to be quite technically aware.

As and when the technology allows the usage to reach a more critical mass and a large percentage of calls can be connected VOIP to VOIP we will see the real revolution begin, with some commercial price cuts and some serious introflection on the part of the established telecom companies.

People like 1899 are able to offer the prices they do BECAUSE they employ some innovative VOIP technology to do their switching. It won't be too long before the market expands a little further and the impetus and interest created by users of groups like this one begins to take real effect.

These are exciting times - get yourself a VOIP equipped telephone, get yourself an incoming VOIP number here and use the community as it is suggested that you do. Get a low cost SIP phone or an ATA and try it out.

As and when independent companies (and I mean independent from the existing GSM providers) manages to get wide area wireless broadband access available - VOIP is going to give the GSM operators a run for their money too ! Wireless broadband has at least the same capabilities as 3G and even subsequent standards.

This is the biggest revolution in telecoms since the phone took over from the telegraph (there were those that said 'morse code has to be the most efficient signalling method ever invented why do we need to change that?') Read through some of the resources here, follow the good advice above and get some startup equipment so you can explore some more and enjoy and appreciate what happens next !

please help me i have a 1899 account and sipps i have read all the post and have used the settings other people have used, i get to the registers bit it showes acquired then unreachable ?? is it me:(

regards

Solved my 1899 problems with asterisk, you have to use setcallerid(regnum) to set the callerid to the number registered with 1899,
so
setcallerid(08xxxxxxx)

before dialling works fine for me now.

Anyone used www.voipbuster.com just setup now works fine with asterisk and iax.

Thanks for that Stephen - please could you help us out by posting the setup info for Voipbuster on both Asterisk and IAX ?

This will be of interest and a big help to others (dont forget to blank out your password and user name)

Sure no problem, downloaded the client from www.voipbuster.com signed up and got a username and password. The client uses iax, used etherreal to reveal the iax server address, iax.conf setup as follows:

register => user:pass@213.61.187.150

[VB]
type=friend
context=incoming_voipuser
username=user
secret=pass
auth=md5
host=213.61.187.150
disallow=all //this bit is optional
allow=gsm //this bit is optional

then from extensions.conf

exten => _00.,1,SetCallerId(user);
exten => _00.,2,Dial(IAX2/user@VB/${EXTEN})


replace user with your username pass with your password.

no problems so far works well to the listed countries, quality is fine, im usuing GSM to save bandwidth but it worked well on 711 i even managed to ge a fax out over it the ultimate test. Like 1899 wouldnt work till i set callerid, this might be because i dial into my asterisk over isdn and it tries to pass on the callerid from incoming ISDN line.

Hi Stephen,

I got a little problem with asterisk and 1899 and my hfc-s isdn pci board. After dailing, the phone will ring for about 5 times and then asterisk just hangs up.

Code:

-- Executing Dial("Zap/2-1", IAX2/1899xxxxxxxxx@1899com/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz|60|T") in new stack     -- Called 1899xxxxxxxxxxxxxx@1899com/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz     -- Call accepted by 213.61.187.150 (format gsm)     -- Format for call is gsm     -- IAX2/1899com/2 is making progress passing it to Zap/2-1     -- Channel 0/2, span 1 got hangup     -- Hungup 'IAX2/1899com/2'   == Spawn extension (macro-callwithvoip, s, 3) exited non-zero on 'Zap/2-1' in macro 'callwithvoip'   == Spawn extension (callfromhfc, zzzzzzzzzzzzz, 6) exited non-zero on 'Zap/2-1'     -- Hungup 'Zap/2-1'   == Primary D-Channel on span 1 down for TEI 64

I'm pretty sure it is the zap configuration, since with firefly connected to asterisk it is no problem at all.

If you have, can you post your zapata.conf?
[edit] found the solution myself. overlapdial=no

Thanks,
Pieter

Just noticed this on the 1899 website

<Quote>

In order to save capacity for our 1899 client software users, we will discontinue supporting other SIP/IAX devices on our network as from 20.05.2005 Please switch over to the 1899 client software before this date.

<Unquote>

You will only be able to use the service using their own client.

Hi,

Darn.

Oh well - they wont get any more business from me then!!

--ian

That's pretty bad news as their own client software is fairly poor when compared with Firefly & X-lite.

I had been using it with Firefly and was considering getting an ATA - looks like my plans are scuppered now and I'll have to find another VoIP service.

It looks like not only are they dropping SIP support they are also going to start charging to UK land lines. The whole site still says 0p per minute but if you go to the rates text file http://www.call18866.co.uk/printer_version.php it says 0.5p per minute

That was always going to happen at some point.

Any new commercial VoIP startup has to do something to get you "on board". The free calls thing is the obvious way to do it. They then hope that you like their service, and will continue to used it on a charged for basis.

It's a risky tactic. I suspect that many providers will fail with that approach - especially now with so many coming to the market.

You can look at this the same way as you look at the recent (last couple of years) mass of credit card companies offering 0% transfers. Many of their customers simply hop from one to the other, hunting out the best deals. When their 6 months interest free expires, they transfer to another one offering the same deal. And so on.

I suspect that we'll see a lot of this over the next 12-24 months.

This is a teething time for VoIP - the brands you see right now are not likely to be the major brands you see in a few years time.

Dean

Is that not just the new rate for 18866? It still seems to be 0p per minute on 1899.com (plus the 3p connection charge).

I know they are both part of the same company though, so maybe 1899 will follow suit?

Anybody known any alternatives for 1899 or 18866 that still do support VoIP configuration?