There’s no doubt that Voice over IP (VoIP) and “voice chat” programs have become quite popular.  They have been great ways to cut your phone bill for quite some time now.  With Google Voice now allowing you to make free calls (at least in the US for now), you could potentially eliminate your home landline altogether.

So, which one is the right one for you?  Which is the best?  Well, LifeHacker did a survey of its readers and chose the “Five Best VoIP or Voice Chat Apps”.  So far, Skype has the lead in votes at 51%, followed by Google Voice/Chat with an impressive 33%.

For me, it was tough to know which to vote for, as I posted earlier about how I’ve integrated them together in “Google Voice Call Switching Turns Your Number into Rudimentary PBX”.  However, I came down on the side of Skype because that really is still my main application, with GV handling the details.

I just finished a fantastic review of 3 of the most well-known VOIP solutions out there.  It is a bit dated, but there is a lot of information packed into one review that I’ve not seen anywhere else.  It is on the Spot Cool Stuff Tech blog, and the article is “MagicJack vs. Skype vs. Vonage: The Internet Phone Service Showdown”.

In fact, I went through every comment after the article just to catch up on anything that either was missed or updated since!  I ended up leaving a comment even given its age because in spite of some of the comments, I noticed that there were a couple of items that could be read the wrong way.

Bottom line?  Well, it isn’t Magic Jack!  One thing that the review points out is that it has no automatic uninstall.  You actually have to go into the registry to remove items manually!  That is definitely what I would call stupid software.  It goes against Microsoft standards (not to mention common sense) to not have an automated uninstall program.  I refuse to recommend something that will potentially leave a user’s system in a screwed up state.  I also refuse to support stupid software with my money.

Oh, and this comes from a company where the founder called a competing solution a piece of ****.  Talk about hypocrisy!

Even Wikipedia has an article on Magic Jack with a Criticisms section that has enough information to make you think twice about it.  In particular, the act of blocking the phone numbers of smaller companies in the US is disturbing and results in false advertising.

As for the rest, let me tell you where I am coming from.

When I was trying to decide upon a landline replacement, we already had cell phones.  Since we generally upgrade the phones for one reason or the other over the course of time, we already have cell phones capable of good 911 service.  The only reason we had a landline, frankly, was because of concern over quality on overseas calls.

So, we were paying for landline and cell service, which seemed to be mostly a duplicated effort.  In large part, that was true.  One thing I didn’t really take into account was the minutes usage, but that wasn’t because of calls we made.  It was from people calling us.  Something to account for if you make any changes!

At any rate, I finally convinced the wife to give up the landline, only then to start going over our cell minutes.  We would tell people not to call all the time during the week, but it fell on deaf ears.  I refused to get an unlimited plan, and I got sick and tired of screening the caller ID for people who refused to listen.

Vonage was just too expensive, IMO.  The base price for it was almost as much as a regular phone.  Sure, we could get long distance in Canada and the US, but we already got unlimited long distance on our cell phones.  Most of our long distance would have been overseas, and we had reached a compromise with calling cards and the cell phone on weekends.

Enter Skype.  For $2.99/month call anywhere in the US?  Deal!  For ~ $30/year for an online number?  Deal!  Be able to turn off the phone and/or block callers for free?  Deal!

It just made sense.  The only additional cost is either a headset or a webcam, neither of which is outrageously expensive.

So, when I wanted to start my own business and needed a business line, what was the logical choice?  Again, Skype.  I could forward it to my cell number if I wasn’t around.  I had since gotten a BlackBerry, so with T-Mobile wi-fi calling, it would even be less expensive (at least, until they screwed that up).  Since I had already had most people trained to use my “home number” in Skype, I wasn’t as worried about the minutes that would get used for business if I was on the road.

I have to tell you that while I was travelling around with my laptop in tow, it came in handy.  As long as I could find a decent Internet connection, I was good to go.

Some people miss having a “real phone”.  I don’t.  I don’t miss fumbling around with it, trying to crook my neck so I can cradle it on my shoulder so I can type while staying on the phone.  In fact, I really don’t understand how some people can hold the phone up to their ears so long without their arms falling asleep.

If you are travelling, then Vonage is a hardware solution and not a very good solution.  You would have to pack the equipment up to take with you.

Remember, with Skype you can forward calls, check your voicemail, etc.  It all just depends upon the package you buy.

Recently, Thailand was added to the list of countries available for their world package.  Sweet!  So, now it costs $13.99/month and the wife can talk all day to whomever she wants.  If you compare that to the > $80/month for the landline with restricted minutes and long distance that was only good in the US, this is still a great deal.

One thing MJ users like to point out is that you can mail a MJ unit (they are quite small, evidently) to someone and call them for free.  Well, for the cost of a headset, you can do that on any laptop with the same Internet connection.

Neither Skype nor MJ seem to have ideal customer support.  Skype has an email option which I can attest to usually netting you with canned replies of sorts.  They are famous for not really paying attention to the actual reported problem or decided it is as designed whether or not the customer agrees.  They also have online forums, but they aren’t official support.

However, as bad as that sounds, there are even worse horror stories requiring company responses of how MJ has virtually no support other than difficult to find email forms.  Then, there are the more recent reviews of angry customers.

I can tell you today I was on the phone with the MJ enthusiast, and the suddenly I couldn’t hear him.  This isn’t the first time, either.  Is it MJ or Skype?  I cannot prove it is his end, but Skype rarely ever does anything like this when connected to a “regular” phone.

For more detailed information on these and other VOIP applications, you might want to check out the Wikipedia article on “Comparison of VoIP software”.