Notice to all negative posters on this forum / blog - you are in the minority.
People that post to these blogs / forums are always angry. I am here to dispell the myth, at least on this forum / blog, that ViaTalk is not the evil empire it's being made out to be. Read on.
I have had nothing but a great experience with ViaTalk. I don't know anyone that works for them, nor do I live in NY (I'm in MN, if you must know). I have no connection to this company other than being an extremely satisfied customer.
I didn't know a darn thing about VoIP prior to signing up -- all I knew was that Comcast was too much money for a REGULAR phone ($35 a month for ONE phone line, including having to pay for blocked calls, and an unlisted number)...keep in mind, this is a REGULAR phone line, NOT DIGITAL. Comcrap digital is $40+tax, at least here in MN.
That said, I, like millions of other unsatisfied Comcast phone customers, began to research VoIP technology, its pros, its cons, home infrastructure requirements, and how to set it up. It took a few solid evenings of poking around on the Internet, reading about VoIP technology, how it works, and how to set it up. It also took many solid evenings of looking at reviews, both pros and cons.
After solid research and thorough understanding of VoIP telephony and setup (it's really not that hard people), I settled on ViaTalk. Not only does it offer WAY better options and features than Vonage or SunRocket (at the time they were still in business), but they blew Comcast Digital Voice off the face of the map...and they still do!
I suggest you have Comcast or Verizon or some other form of HSI backbone, rather than DSL, because if you're surfing the internet at "high speed" (1.5Mpbs, pfffff, whatever!), checking email, download from an FTP, and expect to use both of your ViaTalk phone lines at the same time, good luck. Get a solid cable HSI backbone to your home network and you're good to go...unfortunately, I have to pay Comcast...but that, at least of the negligible Comcrap offerings, works.
Final thought -- to this day, I laugh whenever I get to the end of a Comcast tech support phone call (because guess what? Comcast's digital TV SUCKS TOO!!! So Comcast gets a phone call from us every couple of months) when they try to sell me their digital voice for $40 / month + tax. I glibly retort, "can you get me 2 phone lines and all of these features for $10 a month?". The operator always laughs and then says, "Thanks for calling Comcast".
Bottom line, research, understand, then buy...blindly jumping into VoIP, or any other of life's "bigger leaps" will make you angry, upset, and post non-descript, bashing, and uneducated posts to blogs, such as this.
Here endeth the lesson.