Its a review about this product
First off, what's up with the $110 price by Zalmar? Unless this seller is including a 2nd years subscription, the price is a rip-off. You can get it at any reputable retailer like radio shack or magic jack directly for $70 and first year service is included....
SKIP TO BOTTOM IF YOU JUST WANT TO READ MAGIC JACK PLUS REVIEW, AND DON'T CARE WHY THIS MAY NOT ECONOMICALLY BENEFIT CABLE TV SUBSCRIBERS:
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I have some food for thought for those who have a "bundle" with their provider such as Time Warner, Verizon Fios, etc. and are looking to lower their monthly bill. I have the triple bundle with Verizon: Phone, Internet and Fios Cable. My base price for these services jumped to $120 after my 2 years promotional price expired. I'm talking just "base" to keep things simple. Base is before equipment and tax charges, so in actually, my bill comes out to a little over $150 a month. But anyway, my base is $120, and in my statement, it clearly shows that of the $120, $27 is for the phone service, $52 is for my channels, and $41 is for my broadband. I figured okay, lets drop the phone line and save $27 monthly. My base would then be $93 a month. Lets make the move to Magic Jack!
Wrong!!!!!!! That's not how it works. :(
If I remove the phone services, all the pricing changes because I'm no longer in a bundle. The savings is none existent. I was with the several reps in a span of a week playing around with all the possible combinations of upgrading or downgrading channels and internet speed. To cancel my phone, the best they came up for me was a $95 base for just internet and tv. But that required me to lower my channels and lower my internet speed. You know what, I didn't mind, the speed downgrade was minimal and the channels I subtracted I never watched anyway. I figured great! $95 for tv and internet. I save $25 a month, now lets move on to Magic Jack Plus for the landlines.
Not so fast!!!
I also asked them to present me with current triple bundle promotions for existing customers. To make a long story short, my final triple package came out to $115 base, but an upgrade in 25/25 mbps broadband and a $300 visa prepaid card. But because I was a customer on the verge of jumping ship, they gave me a $20 credit for the first 12 months. So even though the base is $115, if you factor in the $20 credit for the first 12 months and the $300 prepaid, that comes out to $92.5 base. At the end of the day, it was a better deal for me to keep the phone service, tv and have an even faster internet plan. I ended up re-upping for another 2 years, and based on these savings, the magic jack plus became moot.
So I realized that unless you're ready to dump cable tv completely, which I'm not, bundle pricing quirks and promotions will make you think twice on whether or not dropping the phone line is really a good idea. If you don't mind doing a little song and dance every 2 years when you're promotion is up, your cable company will give you goodies to retain your services. At the end of the day, I think only those who are not dependent on cable tv bundles will see a true benefit to the magic jack. If you're on direct tv or dish and you have a standalone broadband and phone services, I see the Magic Jack benefiting you. For me, I came full circle! Got myself one, ready to ditch verizon's phone line, but at the end of the day, I have to return the magic jack, it does not benefit me economically after Verizon gave me some perks.
MAGIC JACK PLUS ITSELF: 5 stars all the way!
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As for Magic Jack Plus unit itself?? I don't understand the extreme range of reviews I see on the internet, it seems that people either love it or hate it. For the few days I had it, it was AWESOME!!!!!!! That's why I was gung ho on dumping my verizon phone services. I suspect maybe a portion of the people who have bad experiences have lower tier internet speeds? My broadband was 20/5 mbps when I was trying out the Magic Jack Plus and the quality was great. We had a relative overseas call us to test it out and it was perfect. But the unit does run hot, so I have doubts about it's longevity. But if you plan to keep it, when you go through the set-up, you'll have the option to order $1 replacement insurance. I wonder if they'll refund me this buck now that I'm returning it. LOL! Keep in mind, there are lots of upsells during the set-up, just dodge them all! I got my unit from Radio Shack for $59.99, first year service is included. After that it's $29.99 a year or $100 for 5 years. If I were you, I would do it annually because if they release a newer unit or model, those left over years don't transfer if you want to use the newer model. Original Magic Jack owners are upset that they can't transfer their years to the the Magic Jack Plus. I'm always skeptical of products I see on tv at 3 in the morning, but hey, this thing works. But I think a key is to have good broadband speed... I know that people like to search alternatives and one alternative is to use obi100 or obi110 with google voice. One big advantage is that there is no yearly fee after you buy the obi equipment which is like $50. But one disadvantage is that if you do this and ditch your land-line, google voice does not do 911, which is very important. The magic-jack user interface specifically has a 911 section so that you can enter your address and they register your location. People who are doing the google voice have to also subscribe to anther service for 911. Then again this could be moot because I'm sure you have a cell service, right? If you have good reception in your home, then just make sure the battery is always full, and your cell can be your 911 go-to phone. Keep in mind, they don't know if google voice will remain free next year. I suspect if GV starts charging, then it'll be competitive with magic jack. But what if it's not? What if they view their service as more higher end? Because GV is indeed cool, I have an account myself. So those are your pros and cons.
INTERNATIONAL TRAVELERS:
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If you travel a lot, I think this is very beneficial. For that reason alone, I may keep this after all. We travel to China and Hong Kong a lot.
BENEFITS OF TAKING THE MJ WITH YOU: The customer rep says that if we have broadband in our home or hotel in China, we can just hook up the magic jack to the router, the same way we would hook it up in the US. You don't have to redo or go through any set-up process again. Now your family back in the US can just call you as if you were also in the US, meaning they don't have to dial any country codes. They don't have to have a magic jack, and they won't get charged for international calls. Vice versa, you can call back into the US without having to dial any country codes.
USING MJ IN THE US TO CALL OVERSEAS: Something to know about international rates, that is calling outside the US through your MJ phone line... From my understanding, you cannot use third party calling cards or services through the MJ phone line. If you're not happy with some of their international rates, you'll need to use your traditional land-line, if you're ditching your traditional land-line, then use your cell.
