Toying with getting rid of my land line.... anybody else done this?

[Bob Sanders]

About the only thing I get on the land line these days are telephone solicitors, and my daughter's friends.... and I get to pay $50 a month for that. Meanwhile we're running 4 cell phones in the house (one for each of us). My older son takes care of his own cell phone bill and we have a "prepaid" phone which we keep up so we can keep track of our 8 year old without having to give her one of our more expensive phones.

I ran across a base station that will connect up to 3 cell phones through blue tooth and channel them through the house phones so you can take/make phone calls on any of the cells through any one of the home phones.

http://www.myxlink.com/index.aspx

I'd really LOVE to do this but at the same time feel a little apprehensive over the whole issue. Is there anybody here running their life strictly though cell phone? If so... how is it? Have you missed the land line at all?

[Janke]

Have you missed the land line at all?

Not at all.

[Almohada]

Have you missed the land line at all?

We still have a land line. Same number for many many many years. SICK AND TIRED of the random calls. Especially when it says 0000000000 they call numerous times per day!!!

[Janke]

I was able to transfer my land line number to a cellphone, and the lower rates for land line calls (local as well as long distance) still apply. Can you do that?

(Fortunately, phone-spam is rare here...)

[Krane]

If there is a disaster, your landline will be much more secure than a cell phone. For that reason, I strongly believe in having one since I never put ALL my eggs in one basket. AT&T also gives cable TV and high-speed internet service via phone line. Again a choice. And competition is a good thing.

One more thing, I don't trust cell phones. Their long term safety remains undetermined. And although I have one, it's usually in the bottom of my bag and kept tuned off except when I'm making a call. I also believe they're Big Brother's content location tracker and monitoring tool for virtually every man, women, and child. I bet you though they were going to put tag on us?

Oh, was that last part out loud?

[Janke]

I never put ALL my eggs in one basket.

Me, neither. I have two cellphones, different operators. If one goes wonky, the other one should still be alive and kicking.

Land lines can malfunction, too. It only takes a careless Caterpillar operator...

[EvilBastardProductions]

People still have land lines for reasons other than ADSL? With phones attached? What is this crazyness!?!?!

In short, haven't had a phone attached to a phone line in years- and even if I did, well everyone calls straight to the mobile anyway so it would be a waste of money, and mobile phones are MUCH cheaper. Pay line rental for my ADSL2 connection, but thats it. Never looked back.

[Janke]

ADSL is outdated, too.

We'll be getting optical fiber to this condo in a few weeks (Cat6 gigabit cabling is already installed), then it's goodbye to ADSL for me.

[1]

If there is a disaster, your landline will be much more secure than a cell phone.

But who'd you want to call anyway?

You:
"Aunt Clara, there's a disaster, and we're all about to die!"

Aunt Clara:
"Oh isn't that nice, dear. So will you be coming for Thanksgiving, or not?"

[EvilBastardProductions]

I dont even think we have a proper Fiber optic infrastructure here.
I would love to replace my ADSL2+ with a cable connection- unfortunately in Australia cable is ridiculous- half the country cant even get it yet, and those who can pay through the roof- I pay around $70 a month for 150gb, same price on cable, 5gb.

But then again, this is a country where they where the idiot politicians tried to create a shitty wireless broadband network over a cable one, and tried to claim it would be faster :/
Luckily, that didnt happen and they're SLOWLY rolling out the cable- the cable that would already be everywhere, if not for the fact they got lazy when building the cable tv network years ago, stopped laying the cable, and started using satellite dishes instead.

[1]

I pay around $70 a month for 150gb

Yeah, in NZ I have to pay something like NZ$100/month....and of course, being NZ, it's NOT unlimited.
I get very little...I forget, but it's maybe 30gb per month included, and $2.50/gb after that.

VERY expensive!!

[Janke]

I pay around $70 a month for 150gb

That's 150 gb of data, not the speed? Ouch!

My current 8 mbps ADSL plus a mobile GSM 8 mbps total 28 euros per month. The new cable connection to the condo will cost me about 8 euros per month for 10 mbps, or 20 euros for 40 mbps. I'll still keep the 8 mbps mobile GSM connection for my laptop, at 12 euros/month.

The amount of data (the "gb") sent/received is not limited at all in any of these contracts.

[EvilBastardProductions]

NZ$100/month.... maybe 30gb per month included, and $2.50/gb after that.

tumblr_m4oompWnAr1rw41szo1_1280.png

^^thats what I think of that!! Ouch!!

[EvilBastardProductions]

That's 150 gb of data, not the speed? Ouch!

Yep thats data. Speed wise....

2120738499.png

^thats about average for me. barely good enough for my uses sometimes. And the server used is my ISP. If I go over my data limit, it gets shaped down to around the speed of an old ISDN line (somewhere around the 64kb/s mark from memory- to think that used to be fast!)

[EvilBastardProductions]

I'm so hating my country right now :/

[1]

My current 8 mbps ADSL plus a mobile GSM 8 mbps total 28 euros per month.
The new cable connection to the condo will cost me about 8 euros per month for 10 mbps, or 20 euros
for 40 mbps. I'll still keep the 8 mbps mobile GSM connection for my laptop, at 12 euros/month.

The amount of data (the "gb") sent/received is not limited at all in any of these contracts.

Yeah, but you HAVE to live in Finland to get all that, so it's not ALL good!




Kidding, of course!

[Bob Sanders]

We still have a land line. Same number for many many many years. SICK AND TIRED of the random calls. Especially when it says 0000000000 they call numerous times per day!!!

YUP. I am soooo F*UCKING tired of the phone solicitors. I get maybe 1 or 2 a month on the cell... but the land line is more like 2 or 3 PER DAY!

[Bob Sanders]

Not at all.

Don't forget though.... I'm not a single guy. We're a family with an 8 year old. I wouldn't want to be receiving my little one's calls and neither would my wife so we would probably have to upgrade her phone to a month-to-month lease and get rid of the prepaid system. That makes me nervous because kids lose things very easily. What if she loses her phone and some one picks it up and spends a few hours on 1-900-love-you-long-time?

Yes... I can have the house number transferred to the cell... but then I carry over the telephone solicitors too... not a good idea.

[Bob Sanders]

If there is a disaster, your landline will be much more secure than a cell phone. For that reason, I strongly believe in having one since I never put ALL my eggs in one basket. AT&T also gives cable TV and high-speed internet service via phone line. Again a choice. And competition is a good thing.

The one thing I have noticed with the newer (land) phones we have today is that when you have a power outage the cell phone still works while all the newer phones (which require an additional plug-in power source) are dead.

Now I do keep an older line powered phone around for that specific purpose... but what a pain this old clunker is.

[Bob Sanders]

ADSL is outdated, too.

I get all my services through the phone line... hi def tv... phone... internet. I don't mind it at all. The adsl is a bit slower than cable... but then much more reliable. The adsl is a dedicated line all the way to the switching stations. whereas with cable it's common between houses in the neighborhood. In other words the advertised speed of cable is only there if the whole neighborhood is not on the computer all at the same time (which is becoming less and less often). I get up to 20Mb/s on the adsl and frankly I'm not at all sure why I would need it faster than that. Now out in the middle of nowhere (at the cottage) we're still on dial-up..... now THAT is so slow it's actually painful!

As far as fiber optics is concerned, North America in general is SOOOO far behind with that sort of stuff.

[1]

but the land line is more like 2 or 3 PER DAY

No do-not-call list in Canadania?

It actually, and surprisingly DID work for us back in the day in the USA.

[Netguru]

The one thing I have noticed with the newer (land) phones we have today is that when you have a power outage the cell phone still works while all the newer phones (which require an additional plug-in power source) are dead.

Now I do keep an older line powered phone around for that specific purpose... but what a pain this old clunker is.

Bob, I keep my 2-line cordless phone system up and running by plugging it into an outlet on my UPS. I'm looking at getting a new system and have noticed that some models now come with battery backup.

I get all my services through the phone line... hi def tv... phone... internet. I don't mind it at all. The adsl is a bit slower than cable... but then much more reliable. The adsl is a dedicated line all the way to the switching stations. whereas with cable it's common between houses in the neighborhood. In other words the advertised speed of cable is only there if the whole neighborhood is not on the computer all at the same time (which is becoming less and less often). I get up to 20Mb/s on the adsl and frankly I'm not at all sure why I would need it faster than that. Now out in the middle of nowhere (at the cottage) we're still on dial-up..... now THAT is so slow it's actually painful!

As far as fiber optics is concerned, North America in general is SOOOO far behind with that sort of stuff.

All my services are through cable. A while back Videotron upgraded the feeder (ie: common) lines to fiber optic. I always get or slightly exceed my rated download and upload speeds no matter how many neighbours are online. The 2-line telephone modem comes with a minimum 8-hour back-up battery as well.

Michael

[Netguru]

No do-not-call list in Canadania?

It actually, and surprisingly DID work for us back in the day in the USA.

Yes we have a DNC list in Canadania.

[Bob Sanders]

No do-not-call list in Canadania?

It actually, and surprisingly DID work for us back in the day in the USA.

Tried that. It works for calls originating inside Canadian borders but most of the solicitors these days seem to be international.

[wgzn]

havent had a landline in over 5 years and aside from slightly better call quality and lack of call drops - i havent missed it at all.