I know very few people under the age of 35 who have a traditional landline telephone. What was once a staple of virtually every Canadian home is now seen by some – especially younger urbanites – as an unnecessary and expensive throwback in the age of ubiquitous cellphones.
But there’s something to be said for having a physical telephone in your home. For people who work from a home office, it’s helpful to have a separate line, and I know from experience that it’s often easier to talk on a traditional phone handset, rather than moving around to find the spot with the best cellphone signal strength or hoping your Bluetooth headset doesn’t crap out.
Enter voice over Internet protocol, or VoIP. This is the technology that allows you to use your Internet connection as a phone line, and it’s been around for years – VoIP actually forms the backbone of the so-called digital home phone services offered by many Canadian telcos and cable providers.
But there are now inexpensive, all-inclusive products that allow consumers to basically buy a phone service in a box without shelling out a monthly fee. The NetTalk Duo ($79.95) is one such gizmo, and while it’s been kicking around the U.S. for some time, the company is now offering service to Canadians.
Like the MagicJack we looked at back in March of 2010, the NetTalk Duo connects any standard telephone to the Internet, transforming the phone into what for all intents and purposes is a traditional landline.
Unlike the MagicJack, the NetTalk Duo doesn’t need to be plugged into your computer (although that is an option, and is especially useful for travelling). Instead, it connects directly into your broadband Internet connection, which for most people means plugging it into a port on their cable modem or router.
The tiny device includes a year of free local and North American long distance calling, with additional years costing $39.95 each. Setting up the NetTalk Duo is done via the www.nettalk.ca website and takes only a few moments, at which time you choose the area code you want for your phone number. It doesn’t have to be a local area code, either – you can live in St. John’s and have a Vancouver phone number, if that’s somehow beneficial to you or your business.
Once the device is activated, you simply plug any standard telephone into the NetTalk Duo’s phone jack, and off you go. Pick up the phone, hear a dial tone, press buttons, talk to Mom. It couldn’t be easier.
Having your phone mated with your Internet connection offers both advantages and disadvantages. The main perk is price – for $40 per year, you get the same services that cost $40 per month through traditional telcos, including call display, call forwarding and voicemail. One great voicemail perk is that once someone leaves a message, the recipient immediately gets an email with it attached as an audio file. You can also go online at any time and review call history and voicemail messages and download them to your computer.
The downsides of plug-and-play Internet phone gizmos are a reliance on the stability of your connection. If your Internet goes down, the phone does too. If your connection is slow or otherwise poor, it can affect call quality. And even with a robust connection, the normally clear calls on the NetTalk Duo can waver. People I talked to said my voice sounded fine, but there were regular half-second hiccups where I cut out.
But it’s a small price to pay, literally, for having an old-school desktop phone in my home office that I can use to call anywhere in the U.S. or Canada. I won’t be ditching my cellphone, but I will be giving it more rest when I’m at home.
NetTalk Duo
Price: $79.95, including one year of local and North American long distance calls; additional years are $39.95. Available at Sears, Zellers and most major electronics retailers. For more info, see www.nettalk.ca
Verdict: While call quality will depend on your Internet connection, the NetTalk Duo offers a suite of attractive features, free North American long distance calls and solid customer support for a very affordable price.
Other options
If you want a more traditional telephone experience at home but don’t want to shell out big bucks for a landline, here are some other options to look at.
MagicJack – The darling of late-night infomercials, the MagicJack (www.magicjack.com) is another easy-to-use Internet telephone device, but with one key limitation – it must be plugged into your powered-on computer to work. But the device does have a desktop software interface with a few nice bells and whistles.
Vonage – Like NetTalk, Vonage (www.vonage.ca) offers a device that plugs directly into your broadband Internet connection rather than your computer. The service costs more ($20 to $30 per month), but the plans offer more features, and the top-tier package includes free calls to dozens of different countries.
Retro handsets – If you don’t want an Internet-connected phone thingamajig but still crave the physical sensation of talking on a phone, handsets such as the Yubz Retro Handset ($49.95, available at Roots stores) can be connected to most mobile phones to give you an old-school telephone sensation.
Tags: magicjack, nettalk duo, Phone, voip, vonage
You missed one other downside. In the event of a power failure your modem and router go down. Hence no internet and no phone. At least with a cell phone you’ve got until the battery runs down. And with a conventional landline you’re likely to still have service (provided you’ve got one phone that’s not cordless).
I hope you do a review of freephoneline.ca, a Canadian company that does offers these distinct advantages over the carriers you recommended.
You are not tied you to any particular device, Freephoneline works with almost all SIP complaint hardware. Choice is always good.
The service has a totally free, try before you buy option, with it’s softphone. No credit card shenanigans required to use the softphone either.
SIP settings cost $50, a pre-configured Grandstream HT-286 cost another $50. There is no yearly or monthly fee after that.
For $25 more, you can port your old number to freephoneline.
I have a set of 4 cordless phones if I plug it the main will the other ones still work?
Who, in this day and age, doesn’t have a small UPS that supports their router and switch. They are dirt cheap and last about 4 years before you need to change the battery.
Be careful not to eliminate your house alarm connection. It still requires a line to the monitoring station. A landline is the easiest way but a new dedicated cell line can be set up for it as well.
I have the same arrangement on my VOIP with another carrier and it works fine.
The out of power issue was important to us as well – but then I figured out that a minimal cell phone plan makes a great back up. My husband and I are retired, trying to get by on a small income. Five years of service on Magic Jack is about $60. A base cell phone is under $20/mo. We just make sure our cell phone is always charged, and have survived several power-outs. and we do have our cell phone available for any car trips we need to take.
I went to the NetTalk site. There is no list of Cdn area codes or city exchanges that I could find. That should be front and centre right after how it works. That for me brings into question some business qualities of the company.
Does this have E-911 Service in Canada? That is very important to me as a person with children at home. The website seems to say that 911 is for United States only….
You and your contacts need a number to dial into so doesn’t this mean you have to have a relationship with a Telco? I have an old handset I keep around for power failures as the telephone lines are power separately from my house electrical power, besides I prefer Skype or iChat for talking to family and friends
I do not own a cell phone and I never will! When I am outside the house, why the heck do I want people to be able to track me down!? Call my home phone and leave me a message!
And as for this NetTalk thing and the MagicJack….no thanks! I will keep my landline….the sound/quality over a landline is TOTALLY SUPERIOR to a call made on any other device!!
try talkit.ca based in Hamilton, Ontario
Why pay any fee for long distance? I got a $15 headset and downloaded KNCTR, I can call free to land lines and cell phones using my computer (not sure why I’d need another thingy – the headset eliminates feedback if your mic picks up the sound coming from your speakers. Can also call other KNCTR users – like Skype but they charge you to call landlines and cell phones…. Put my my cell phone on “free local incoming” and I hardly pay anything if I just let out of town callers leave a message and call them back using KNCTR.
F.Y.I if you setup an email with google called (gmail.ca) you can call people in Canada and USA from your computer for free, no device is needed.
Sorry for the missprint it’s gmail.com thanks
Are you serious? The vast majority of computer owners would look at you cross eyed if you asked them if they had a UPS, let alone a UPS specifically for their router and modem.
If you don’t care about your privacy or that everything you say or do on line being recorded and stored on their harddrives for ever then go with google.
I’ll stick with the regular phone line.
Um dude…. It’s called Vonage and it’s been around for um.. about 10 years.
I have the netTALK DUO I have a local number form Hamilton, works great, no computer required. better than my old magic jack.
my call quality is equal to my land line.
love it!
nettalk you get E911 no additonal charge, they also have live tech support, compared to magic jack chat support.
@D3TZIWT
its called having a life!
Besides, i just recently got my unit. i heard about it a month ago and decided that i should give it a shot. great quality, technical support helped me out just fine trying to find a number and they actually have a sense of humor.
i havent had a problem and if i ever do, i have faith that netTALK is able to help. i used to have vonage, it was ok but the cost was not worth it. to many features, to much money. i like simplicity! call me, call you, voice mail. DONE!
i decided to call technical support for you:
they offer E911 for the US and Canada
this setup does work fine with nettalk. i have been roaming around their forums and you can learn a thing or two from the ppl hanging around there.
Yea the main base can be plugged into the duo and the smaller bases can be wirelessly connected to the main base.
you guys should really check out the forums…instead of just asking here, find some useful info on the main webpage, forums and blog.
interwebs is of no use to anyone these days