Viatalk

[hammerheadhank]

Hi, I am considering using Viatalk for my voip service,

1) how is there service ?

2) can your phone number be unpublished, kept private from phone book listings ?

3) can the two phone line feature be used with a spa3102 ?

[erikthebean]

Well....I had them over a year ago..with their old servers...they were fine. Now i re-signed up just for the heck of it...STAY AWAY...a frigin nightmare.. They are having massive audio issues right now..and they are using very poorly configured asterisk servers now.. Broadvoice is good and believe it or not Teleblend is good now as well. The only downside to Broadvoice is the startup fees and the faxing of the licence and credit card. But extremely stable.

[DracoFelis]

Originally Posted by hammerheadhank

1) how is there service ?

Reasonably decent, and fairly feature rich, if not perfect.

Originally Posted by hammerheadhank

2) can your phone number be unpublished, kept private from phone book listings ?

As far as I know, the number is "unpublished" by default. However, you might want to ask on this other (more active) ViaTalk forum to make sure:

http://www.dslreports.com/forum/viatalk

Originally Posted by hammerheadhank

3) can the two phone line feature be used with a spa3102 ?

That "feature" seems to be different (and more limited) than most people think, when they see the ads.

Most people seem to think they will get two separate phone numbers, whereas that feature really gives you two jacks (off the same adapter) that are linked to the same phone number (with the first jack/phone to answer an incoming call, gets the call). So you won't get two independent "numbers" with this feature. What you can (in theory) get, is the ability to have one family member talking on one line/jack/phone, while another family member makes (or answers) a call on the other "line". But both "lines" will be connected to the same adapter (just different jacks), and both "lines" will have the same phone number.

Furthermore, last I checked (and I've been with ViaTalk for some time now), they still don't offer the "2nd line" details to BYOD (bring your own device) folks. So those of us that supply our own adapter (even if/when the adapter model might be the same as ViaTalk would have supplied) don't have the "2nd line" option per se.

However, even though it isn't "supported", their is an "unsupported" way to partially fake the "2nd line" with BYOD. The "trick" is to realize that ViaTalk lines are provisioned for 2 call paths, not one. So as long as you aren't doing (supported) "3-way calls" at the time (a 3-way call uses up both call paths), it is actually possible to link into your same account from two VoIP adapters (or in your case, two jacks on the same adapter) at the same time. To do this, you would "register" the line you want to ring in (only one of the lines "ring" in this setup), but also put your ViaTalk credentials on the other line WITHOUT REGISTERING. In this setup, only one of the lines can accept inbound calls, but both "lines" (the one you "registered" on, and the one with just the login credentials without registration) can make outbound calls (even if/when the other line is "in use"). So while this is even more limited than the usual (if you accepted their adapter) "2 lines" that ViaTalk provides (because with the ViaTalk adapter setup, you at least get both lines "ringing" when a call comes in), this is at least one (unsupported) way to get 1 1/2 lines (both lines out, but only one line accepts incoming) with ViaTalk BYOD.

NOTE: An SPA-3102 only allows for ONE phone (line) connection. So even if you wanted to use the "unsupported" way of going with a "2nd line" (that gives you two outbound lines, but only one that will ring inbound), you would still need a second adapter to get the 2nd (outbound only) "line" (because while an SPA-3102 is powerful with what you can do with that line, including hooking up multiple VoIP providers on it, it really only has one usable "line" for normal operations).

OTOH if you really want two phone lines in the house, two SPA-3102s (configured so that they don't overlap on SIP or RTP ports) isn't the worst idea out there (because it will give you two very powerful "phone lines" into the house, if/when properly configured). In fact, I do something similar here (with both adapters behind the same home NAT router), using a combination of my older SPA-3000 (a now obsolete adapter, that predates the SPA-3102) and the newer SPA-3102 I recently purchased. i.e. my older SPA-3000 is setup to "register" with my ViaTalk account, and therefore can be used for incoming and outgoing calls. OTOH my newer SPA-3102 (wired into my phone's "line 2") simply has my ViaTalk account setup as an outgoing only "gateway" provider. As a result, I can call out using my ViaTalk account from either "line" on my phones, but can only answer incoming ViaTalk calls on "Line 1" (my SPA-3000). Now I can still make a call out on "Line 2" (my SPA-3102) while someone is talking on "Line 1", but (with this setup) I can only answer a ViaTalk call if/when "Line 1" (the SPA-3000) is not currently in use (which is why I usually make most outbound calls on "Line 2", even if/when both lines are free). Of course, due to the flexibility of the SPA-3000/3102, I also have several other providers (beyond my ViaTalk account) also programmed into those adapters as call out options. So I have much more (including multiple "free calling" options) than just my ViaTalk calling on those two lines/adapters.