Vonage vs SunRocket - Fax and Tivo

When I setup my fax modem and Tivo on Vonage, I had to adjust the bandwidth saver to maximum (90 Kbps) on the user portal. The fax worked fine after several attempts. I was able to get Tivo to successfully complete the dial out test, however since I use a CacheCard in my DirecTV Sony T-60 Tivo and use the ,#401 dial prefix (for Internet based daily calls), I was never sure that my Pay Per View billing information was being sent. For security purposes billing information uses the dial up connection, rather than the Internet. When I periodically checked my DirecTv account during my July Vonage evaluation, my Pay Per Views never showed up.

When I switched to SunRocket, I made no changes to my Tivo box. The next day I checked my account and my June and July Pay Per Views showed up. This could just be a coincidence but it did verify that my Tivo works with SunRocket.

On the fax side SunRocket uses the T.38 fax relay protocol by default. SunRocket is supposed to detect whether your fax equipment can support T.38 and automatically switch to analog transmission if it does not. I had no problems sending faxes but I could not receive them. The admin capabilities of the InnoMedia MTA 6328-2Re provides the ability under VOIP/User Account to set the "Enable T38 Fax" setting to No. Once I did this, I was able to receive faxes. You can request the admin password from SunRocket customer service or request it via the SunRocket forum here. Modifying admin settings can affect your service and you make changes your own risk. BTW, the SunRocket forum is a very informative site, well organized and great for questions.

Another major cost advantage with SunRocket is the inclusion of a Signature number with the account. The Signature number has two primary benefits;

1. It allows for a distinctive ring.
2. You can request any available US area code which allows callers from the selected area code to make local calls to you.

The Signature number is not an additional line, it is a second number on your primary line. Vonage offers this feature as a Virtual Number starting at $4.99 per month, however they have many more area codes and country codes choices.

I chose to use my Signature number for incoming faxes. I setup the Signature Number on the SunRocket user portal to use Ring-2 which is supported by my Intel based fax card. Unfortunately, Microsoft Fax and TAPI in Windows XP has been crippled and do not support distinctive rings. It does work in Windows 98! I found VentaFax, a full featured voice/fax application that supports distinctive ring (you must set VentaFax to answer on at least 2 rings) and can run as a Windows XP service. I run my Media Center PC 24x7 and this now means I can receive faxes anytime without having to be signed on. The business version of VentaFax can also email the received faxes. The voice features (voicemail, auto attendant, etc) are very sophisticated but at this time I have no use for them.

So far my trial of the SunRocket service is working out well.

Comments

[Kevin]

So, when you were able to configure your Sunrocket gizmo 2nd port, does it just give you 2 ports for the same number and you ran a line to your computer with the second port and a distinctive ring specifically for the fax number? Is that correct?

Thanks!

[Stephen Skarlatos]

The main number and signature number are on the same port. Each number is associated via the portal to a different ring pattern. I used a splitter to feed a line to my computer's fax modem and my handset. I then configured the venta fax software to recognize the distinctive ring I associated with the signature number. I configured my Panasonic handset to only recognize the main number's ring. Hopefully this helps.

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