Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Troglodyte]

Internet Phones

What are these? I've seen that a lot of people have them at home and at offices. There's also one at the school i'm working at. Someone tried explaining it to me but i'm not sure if it understood correctly. The ones that I saw were from KT, but maybe other companies produce them also. I don't know. It seems that when you buy one and sign up for a monthly plan, you get a sort of wireless transceiver along with the handset. The transciever looks kind of like a wireless router but a bit smaller and comes in a nice shiny white case with the KT logo on it. You plug it into your internet connection. Apparently it doesn't matter where you plug it in. Some of my Korean colleagues even took them to the USA in the past so that they could call back to Korea cheaply. So, after it's connected to your internet connection, you can use the handset to call any other internet phones (from KT only, i think) for free. You can also call to other phones (fixed or mobile) but then you pay a fee. The fee depends on the monthly plan you sign up for. Apparently they are very cheap to sign up for and if you only ever call other internet phones, you just pay the monthly fee. You have to be within about 20m of the transceiver.

The part that I wasn't sure about was whether your ID is stored in the handset or the transciever unit. If it's stored in the handset, does that mean that I use my handset if i'm within 20m of any other KT transceiver box? I don't mean pirating their phone line. I mean, could I use someone else transciever with my handunit and have the call billed to my account? If so, this would be useful because most of the time I'm either at home or work (and there is already a KT internet phone at work).

If the transceiver box require just any old internet connection, are there versions of them that can connect to the internet via a wifi signal (maybe something battery powered or with the internet connector and handunit combined)? (i.e. could I use it if i go to a wifi spot somewhere in town?)

[crossmr]

Just a regular voip phone. The thing with a voip solution is that yes, technically you should be able to use it equally from any where in the world. Some companies limit that through various means. Once you're off their network they can no longer control the quality of service.

Lots of countries and companies provide them. I have one from Linksys which is skype powered. I could plug it into the internet anywhere and use it the same regardless of where I was.

in terms of where all the info is stored, I couldn't tell you without some documentation on it.

[Jeonmunka]

I'm getting one of these - LG070 which works in NZ as people in Korean community have them. You pay in Korea just 2000 won month and I know that you can call Korea, maybe keying it in just as a local number even though you are calling 'internationally'?
What I want to know is whether I can use it to call locally in NZ from NZ. Why? Well, I have an SK internet phone at home in Korea and it is dirt cheap to NZ, less than 1 cent a minute. But, cellphone calls within NZ are 40 cents + per minute.
So, I may be able to use it just as I do here, keying the numbers in as international. It would save a lot of money if I can do that.
Any ideas on that?

[crossmr]

[Jeonmunka]

[crossmr]