[johnb]

I am about to buy a gateway for my home. We have three computers, but only one of them is connected to the internet. I know a gateway will allow all three to be online at the same time.

I am also seriously considering signing up with VOIP. My 14 year old daughter's boyfriend moved to another state and now our phone bills are astronomical. I like the idea of giving her a line that has unlimited long distance calling.

So here are my questions.

Is there a special gateway I should get to use the computers and VOIP at the same time? Are there some that are better than others?

[FamilyGuy]

I think by gateway you mean router. I have tried quite a few and so far the Microsoft MN-100 or 500 (wireless) seems to work best. They are all pretty cheap these days anyway.

[ringring]

Linksys makes routers with QoS built in. It allows you to give priority to certain connections. If you have a teenager in the house who is downloading music from the internet, it could make your voip line unusable because all the bandwith is being eaten up by the download. With QoS, you can essentially make the voip connection a higher priority, which means that if you make or take a call on the voip line, the router will take away from the download whatever abndwidth your call needs.

The Linksys router is the BEFSR81, and you can read about it at http://www.linksys.com/products/prod...9&prid=155.

[boza]

I had an old Netgear router and got the Linksys with QoS about two months ago. I really haven't seen any difference in voip calls with the Linksys. If anything, quality has decreased, though that's probably more due to Packet 8 growth than the router. I'm not sure that QoS makes any difference, but maybe I don't have it set up right. Do any of you guys know if there's something special I should be doing in the settings in the linksys for voip?

[johnb]

I ordered the Linksys based on the advise here and other reviews. I am waiting to receive it and I'm also looking for any tips to set it up with Packet8.

Thanks