VOIP Mentor – VOIP service reviews

Axvoice Review

Being one of the leading internet telephone service providers, Axvoice offers high quality, reliable VoIP services at extremely affordable rates. The calling plans start form $4.99 per month. The best deal is $99/year with unlimited FREE calls and 25 free value added features. Axvoice offers a diverse range of calling packages; residential US/Canada, corporate/business calling plans and it also offers residential/business international package to make almost free calls to over 50 global destinations.

The services have received further endorsements by positive customers’ feedback and consistent growth over the years. Located in the U.S., the company has a coverage network of over 50 global destinations. Axvoice renders high quality voice with multiple value-added features. Some of the calling features include call forwarding, call blocking, caller ID, anonymous call rejection, international call blocking, voice on hold, number portability, emergency call and many more.

Additionally, you can enjoy Axvoice services on your smartphones as well. In this regard, you just have to get VoIP app for your device and sign into Axvoice. Here again, the services are not restricted to just one device or operating system like Android, you can use it on IPhone, BlackBerry, Galaxy or any other Smartphone, which can download and run the compatible VoIP apps.

For general subscription, you just need to visit the company website www.axvoice.com and select the most suitable calling plan for you. Upon sign up, you will be provided free equipment. If you just need VoIP for making local calls to US/Canada, you can sign up for residential package. On the other hand, for making local as well as international calls, international package will be most suitable one as in just 27¢ per day (calculated mathematically), you will have the utility to make almost free international calls.

Use the combination of Google Voice and Skype for free phone calls

Several years back, when you wanted to make a phone call, you had to go through the normal channels of the phone company. You were pretty much limited to them and their high prices. There were very few alternative options for you to use in those days. The other options were more expensive than the regular way to make a phone call. But luckily, those days are over. You can now use several services on the internet to make a phone call whenever you would like. Even the phone companies are slowly switching over to VOIP services for their regular customers. It is a cheaper way to make phone calls, especially if they are international. Even though the use of the internet has lead to cheaper calls, they are still not free. There are some services such as Skype, that will allow you to call computer to computer for free but if you want to call a normal land line then you have to pay. There is a way that you can get around this payment. All you need is a Skype account with a phone number and an invitation to use Google Voice. Once you have these two, you will be making free phone calls in no time.

There is actually not much to explain to get this trick done. Some people may think that you have to perform some sort of hack to allow these services to make free phone calls, but that is not true. The hardest part about this actually is to get a Google Voice invite. You need to know someone who uses the Google voice service. If they have invitations then they can send you one. It may take you a couple of week before they let you in, but once they do, you will now be able to set everything up. The first thing that will happen is that they want you to set up a number for them to call. This is where the Skype number comes into play. Let them call that phone number and listen to the numbers that they give you. These numbers are to verify that it is your phone number that you are using. Once that is verified, you can now set up the extra little things in your account. Such as setting up the phone numbers that you will call on a regular basis and setting up the voice mail messages that will answer people when they call the phone. After that is all set up, you are now ready to make your first phone call.

To make the first phone call, hit the call button and then type in the number that you would like. They are going to ask you what number you would like to use to make the call. Even though you have a Google voice number, the phone call is going to be routed to your Skype number. It will still come up on the caller ID as if the Google Voice number is calling the person. So after you hit the call button, you will receive a phone call on Skype. Once you answer it, you will hear the phone start to ring. It is now calling the person you originally called in the first place.  Once they pick up, you can now start to have a conversation.

Making free phone calls with these two services is very easy. Once the Google invite is out of the way, ou can now enjoy free phone calls.

Use VOIP on your cell phone for cheaper international calls

Even though most of the expenses of making a phone call have gone down, there is still one area where making a phone call can be an expensive proposition. And this is making a phone call internationally. If you live in the same country as a person, you can enjoy phones calls that are sometimes even free. But when the person that you are trying to contact, lives on the other side of the world, then you can expect to pay a pretty penny. If you are smart, then there are ways around this fee that you can utilize. If you cannot get around the total fee then you can use a service to at least make the phone calls cheaper. We will show you a couple of ways that you can do this on your cell phone. Now you will not have to break the bank whenever you want to make a phone call that is outside of your borders.

The first way that you can do this is to get an invitation to Google Voice. The service is in beta form right now but it should be available for everyone pretty soon. You get it to work by hooking the phone service to correspond with your cell phone number. This will then allow you to make or take phone calls through the Google service. You will no longer be talking through your cell phone provider’s line. They will also give you a phone number that you can use as well. To make international phone calls with the service you have to pay a fee but it is very cheap.

The second way that you can make a cheap international phone call is to use the Skype service on your cell phone. Depending on the cell phone that you have, you should be able to install a version of Skype on it. When you use Skype on your cell phone, you will be using the data plan portion of your phone to make the call and not the normal way that you would make a phone call. So you must have the internet available on your phone so that you can use the program. Again, you will still have to pay a fee with Skype to make international calls but these fees will be a lot cheaper than it would be if you were to use your cell phone to make the calls directly.

We have shown you several ways that you can use a VOIP service to make cheap international calls on your cell phone. It is up to you to decide which way that you like the best. There are a few more services that you might want to take a look at as well such as Yahoo. See who offer the cheapest rates and the best quality. When you find one that you like, go with them.

Skype into Nokia devices

Skype and Nokia announced a partnership that will bring Skype to the Nokia mobile phones. It will start with the Nokia Nseries and Nokia N97 will be the first in the 3rd quarter of 2009.

The Skype will be part of the address book of the Nokia N97, enabling presence – seeing when Skype contacts are online – as well as instant messaging. Owners around the world will also be able to use 3G and WLAN to easily make and receive free Skype-to-Skype voice calls, in addition to Skype calls to landlines and mobile devices.

Sun Rocket No More

Well known voice over IP (voip) provider, Sun Rocket, has closed its doors today. It appears that the companies nearly 200,000 customers will need to look for a new voip service.

The decision to close down Sun Rocket was made quickly and the site was swiftly replaced with a notice to customers. It was revealed today that the company was in debt to its internet network providers and therefore Sun Rocket’s ability to provider voip to its customers was taken away from them

Packet8 has agreed to migrate Sun Rocket’s customer base to its service and has agreed to honor each customer’s Sun Rocket contract. Are you a former Sun Rocket customer? Why not head over to the Packet8 customer reviews page and have a read of what the Voip Mentor community thinks of Packet8?

Update: It appears that a new voip service called TeleBlend, have also promised to migrate former Sun Rocket customers to their system. Since no-one at Voip Mentor has ever heard of TeleBlend we are unable to tell you if they are worth your money or not.