The slow death of the landline

[Dos_Box]

Some interesting stats in this article from BBC News today - https://www.bbc.com/news/business-44654802

Especially regarding the wholesale costs of providing a landline falling by a quarter yet prices rising!

I thank the deities I'm on cable broadband.

[mavhc]

Bit weird conflating two stories of a company not providing desk phones with landline usage though

[synaesthesia]

Been overdue if anything. Finally convinced VM at home to get rid of our landline and drop the price as a result rather than having it artificially increasing the price. No landlines at work either, a BT OnePhone system using a mixture of rubbish Nokia handsets for general offices and Samsung J5's for roaming staff users. Works surprisingly well.

[mikeprice]

I know I am an old git - but I still get people to ring me on the landline wherever possible

 

main reason is that I have never lived in a house where the mobile reception was good enough to actually hold a conversation in every room all the time

 

although some foreign sounding people do seem to think I am just being racist when I say I can't understand them - actually I just can't hear them properly

[elsiegee40]

I am increasingly giving out my mobile rather than the landline. The landline is used only by our parents... and Mr gee40 when he is working from home as certain international call areas are free with our Sky package and it makes sense to use it.

[SpuffMonkey]

Yeah - I'm cable bb only - but have a sipgate landline number so the elderly parents can still ring me

[rad]

We have just moved house, I decided not to have evening and weekend call package as my mobile contract has unlimited calls.

So any landline calls will be chargeable, OH FB messengers her P’s and I call mine from my mobile.

 

Death of the landline....yes.

Will broadband be replaced by 4g?

[chrisakak9]

yep ditched paying for mine too. i still have a "lanline" setup using sipgate basic and a Grandstream ATA so i have both a local number and a home phone

[Norphy]

Same. I have Virgin Media broadband and I use Vonage to get a land line number.

 

Although, interestingly, the SuperHub 3 that I got with my new connection has a pair of RJ11 plugs on it so I’m guessing that Virgin are either no longer installing analogue lines or are planning to phase them out.

[chrisakak9]

I saw that in a review i watched, the suberhub 3 is a rebranded cisco but the voip and rj11 ports are currently disabled by firmware. i can see them going this way though makes install and service easiereiqsierq and chqeaper for them.

[mukz]

Virgin are defo planning to phase out analogue lines. It was on the news last year i think it was

[mavhc]

VM trialled a voip thing you could install on your phone, then stopped it.

 

Question is: who can I call via sip, not pstn?

[Jamman960]

I’ve found that sip apps kill battery very quickly on mobiles, I tried to use Bria on my mobile

 

I imagine there aren’t many people you can reach via sip that aren’t reachable via pstn as most will be using providers that are linked to the pstn via trunks.

[chrisakak9]

I’ve found that sip apps kill battery very quickly on mobiles, I tried to use Bria on my mobile

 

I imagine there aren’t many people you can reach via sip that aren’t reachable via pstn as most will be using providers that are linked to the pstn via trunks.

ive not had too much of an issue with zoiper but i do have it run only on wifi connections

 

Sent from my SM-A510F using EduGeek mobile app

[chrisakak9]

VM trialled a voip thing you could install on your phone, then stopped it.

 

Question is: who can I call via sip, not pstn?

i beleive they did trial a small area with voip via tbe router but firmware issue halted it for now.

 

Sent from my SM-A510F using EduGeek mobile app

[Arthur]

I’ve found that sip apps kill battery very quickly on mobiles

I use Google's native SIP client that's included with Android together with a SipGate account and haven't noticed it having too much of an effect on the battery (even with the option to receive incoming calls enabled).

 

 

VM trialled a voip thing you could install on your phone, then stopped it.

Surely it was made redundant by many smartphones natively supporting Wi-Fi Calling?

[hardtailstar]

We still have a landline but that's because my parents still call family from that. I can't say I've used the landline this year to make a call.

Everything is done via my mobile.

[elsiegee40]

We have just moved house, I decided not to have evening and weekend call package as my mobile contract has unlimited calls.

So any landline calls will be chargeable, OH FB messengers her P’s and I call mine from my mobile.

 

Death of the landline....yes.

Will broadband be replaced by 4g?

Given that mobile signals are from from universal - even here in Kent - I think that unlikely right now. If the government made it mandatory that we could roam for a signal that would help. You don't have to venture far out of our town for signal to die completely

 

It's great when you're abroad and your phone just jumps to the strongest provider's signal

Edited July 1, 2018 by elsiegee40

[Norphy]

At the risk of going off topic, I wonder how long it’ll be before mobile networks are treated like Transco, the National Grid, Openreach and the like, i.e. have the main infrastructure owned by one large company and let other companies sell the usage of it. MVNOs are already a thing so it’s not as if the technology isn’t already there.

 

I can see advantages and disadvantages.

[Wubbalubbadub]

I have a landline from VM.. as it meant my package was cheaper.. don't own a landline phone however.. I haven't used a landline since I was 4..

Landlines are long overdue there demise..

Edited July 1, 2018 by Wubbalubbadub

[MatthewL]

When I worked in the NHS we ditched our traditional system and upgraded to Avaya and use the extension mobility add on to interface with mobiles so one number regardless of where we was working with a softphone, the local authorities to me all have softphone on laptops and all promote agile working.

 

At home I had a landline from Virgin as it was cheaper but got rid when I changed my package around. I have a Vonage line now as I like a phone I can use with headset when working at the PC but only ever give the mobile number out these days, I prefer the one number approach. My Vonage number does ring my mobile too if I do get any calls on it but rarely use voice anymore.

[mavhc]

I use Google's native SIP client that's included with Android together with a SipGate account and haven't noticed it having too much of an effect on the battery (even with the option to receive incoming calls enabled).

 

Surely it was made redundant by many smartphones natively supporting Wi-Fi Calling?

 

Can't install Google Phone app, and my Huawei phone doesn't have it, sigh.

 

Well, this let you call "from" your home phone number, using wifi. Which confused VM when I phoned to say my home phone wasn't working

 

https://ee.co.uk/help/help-new/getting-started-and-upgrading/using-your-phone-features/how-do-i-use-wifi-calling

https://www.o2.co.uk/connectivity/wifi-and-4g-calling

Three inTouch - Wi-Fi Calling - Send a Text or Call over Wi-Fi.

[TIOAOA]

Out of curiosity how much do you guys pay per month for just internet with Virmin MEdia @synaethesia @Norphy ?

[ICTDirect_Dave]

I have a landline from VM.. as it meant my package was cheaper.. don't own a landline phone however..

 

Likewise, even though I asked not to have it, it made the deal cheaper so we have a landline with VM but no connected phone.

[Katy]

Out of curiosity how much do you guys pay per month for just internet with Virmin MEdia @synaethesia @Norphy ?

I pay £50.24 a month for the 350Mbps down/20Mbps up "no traffic management" broadband only (it used to be £45 this time last year but they put the price up every other month, and it's advertised as £48 a month currently)