Most every person on the face of the civilized planet has an interest in saving on their telephone bill, so it is very easy to understand why magicJack telephone service would stand out as a possible solution. Any phone service that offers one entire year of unlimited phone service for less than 40 bucks per year is going to stand out. Like everyone else, I must say that I was intrigued, and decided to give it a try. This is my review of the magicJack telephone service.
When I got the magicJack telephone service in the mail, it really was a breeze to set up and the whole process took less than ten minutes. The magicJack telephone service works via a USB connection on your computer. You plug the jack into a USB, and then any normal phone line into the jack itself. You then can use your home telephone as a regular phone. Set up was absolutely easy and no problems at all popped up during the process. So far so good for magicJack.
Next it came time to test the call quality of magicJack phone service. I was a bit nervous picking up the receiver the first time and was half expecting the call quality to be horrid. Things were just going too well. I picked up the receiver and got a good strong dial tone. I dialed my Father’s cell phone and heard the ring clear as a bell. He answered, we talked, and I must say the service was awesome! I could hear him and he could hear me clear as a bell. Now I was exicted. I should not have been.
After that initial call, most every single call I have made with the magicJack has been distorted heavily. The other end hears me just fine, but I get broken sounds from them over half the time. In an effort to be fair, I contacted the online customer service with magicJack. After going through a number of different troubleshooting methods, I was finally told that “it must be my phone” and that I
should try a better quality phone. I then proceeded to realize that this was magicJack’s standard answer for their call quality. There was absolutely nothing wrong with my telephone, and the old “it must be your phone” thing can be repeated over and over for each successive phone.
At this point, I resigned myself to other phones with no real change in the service. Oddly, there are times when the phone works brilliantly, and other times when it is impossible to hear anything resembling words. That said, the claims on their website and infommercials of “crystal clear” and so on are big time exaggerations at best, and outright bull at the worst. The phone service is average at best and horrid at the worst.
The frustrating part is, I can see how the technology could be fantastic with some time. I think that magicJack telephone service may one day be as good as they are claiming to be now. But not yet…
Image credited to Flickr User pvera
So far the Magic Jack has worked very well for me. I use a GE 6.0 portable phone system, which gives me great coverage all over my home, upstairs and down. I have cable wireless internet, and it supports the MJ perfectly. All calls are very clear whether local or long distance. I am always told that I am heard crystal clear. I am so impressed that after a two month trial, I dumped my cable landline. That alone saves me $500 a year.
Comment by Kevin — May 7, 2009 @ 5:05 am