[TriLUG] Time Warner Digital Phone

[Jon Carnes]

On Sat, 2004-03-20 at 20:26, Randy Crews wrote:
> Has anyone used this service from TW?  Do you have any feedback on
> quality versus existing POTS service?  
> 
>  
> 
> Randy 
> 
I have the service (comparing it against FeatureTel). It works
fine.  The sound quality is very high and the unlimited LD is
a nice feature. 

There are some caveats:
 - No voice mail
 - You lose a call during a local network "reset", but those
   aren't common, and service comes right back
 - You need to have a cell phone for emergency backup (if there
   is an extended loss of power - like during our ice storms or
   hurricanes).
 
The cool thing about TWTC doing the VoIP is that your call stays on
their local network, so the latency to the Servers is very low.  As long
as the latency stays under 50ms the call quality is crystal clear (they
even have to run a "white noise" generator so you know the call is still
active). 

Latency is the time it takes for a data packet to travel from the server
to your phone. The shorter this time, the clearer the call. Anything
above 50ms and the callers begin to hear echos and breaks in the call.

TWTC also has QoS running on their internal network so that call
information has priority out of your local network pipe.  Thus, your
neighbor can hog the pipe with his porn downloads all he wants, and your
call still goes through crystal clear.

The alternatives like Vonage, Packet8, and local vendor FeatureTel all
have their servers off net from TWTC so their publicly available
internet offerings all have higher latencies and no QoS. As an example
FeatureTel's servers average a 32ms latency for customers off of TWTC.
The call quality is still pretty good with FeatureTel, but the lack of
QoS allows for latency spikes to occasionally break up the call (similar
to when you switch towers during a Cell phone conversation) 

On the other hand, all the other vendors do have Voicemail, and
FeatureTel also has a webportal for use by its users.

Jon Carnes