
I am most times on the go so why get an expensive home phone system when you don’t really use it that much. For a while I used Skype and other VOIP systems but then I ran in to MagicJack.
MagicJack is a VOIP system that lets you make calls in the US and Canada for free OK not completely free but almost. You need to buy a starting kit for 40 dollars. The starter kit contains a USB plug kinda thing (see the picture) and it pays for 1 year in calling to USA and Canada that will cost you 20 dollars a year (so almost free if you use it enough).
The USB plug is you phone system. One side has an USB connector and the other side a plug for a phone.
now when you plug the USB plug in to your Windows or MAC computer the software will start and you can start calling through you own phone that you connect to your MagicJack.
If you use MagicJack on a Windows computer then you can also just use a headset that is connected to your computer. And the Windows software has some other features like a address book.
So what did I think of MagicJack?
First of all MagicJack works great I am using it for more then 4 months now with no real problems calling people. On little problem can arise if like me you live in Canada. MagicJack offers an “local” phone number so that you can receive calls as well. But it does not offer this for Canada so I got an American phone number. And that is where a little problem start. For instance if you call DHL’s free phone nr then the route you to the US DHL instead of the Canadian one. There are more problems like this so keep that in mind if you get the option English and Spanish instead of English and French then you are probably on a US call center instead of a Canadian one.
Besides that calling in the US and Canada didn’t give me any problems.
That was calling in person. I also use a Telxon scanner for my job and that needs a phone line to send data to head office. MagicJack says in there info online that these kind of things don’t work. But they do ok often you need to retry a couple of times but till now I am able to send my files out when I need to.
Support. Once I needed support because one phonenr did just not work at all while it worked on my cell phone. Support at MagicJack is funny because the service is cheap they don’t offer phone support but they do offer a chat service and then you just chat with someone on you computer. The person that helped me knew what she was doing and was able to locate my problem quickly but it took overnight to get it fixed.
You can also use MagicJack for international calls. To do this you need to buy airtime first and then you can just call international. I call Europe one in a while and pa 2 cents a minute for that. The call quality for international calls is not always good but still better then some other VOIP systems just keep it in mind.
My conclusion is that I will keep using MagicJack it works great for my use and gives me the opertunity to make dirt cheap phone calls. It is a shame that I need a computer to do this but I can live with that.