![]() ![]() ![]() A landline-style home phoneĪka that retro pluggy-in-handset thingamabob we were talking about a second ago. It'll only take a few minutes, and it's completely free to do. If you don't, head to the Google Voice website and set one up. If you already have a Google Voice phone number connected to your Google account, you're all set. It still works, though - and it's the backbone of this home phone setup. Remember Google Voice? It's that phone number management service Google made a big deal about some years back and then kind of set aside. An active Google Voice account/phone number The cheapest OBi box, the OBi200, is currently available on Amazon or Newegg for about 50 bucks and should be more than sufficient for most people. My own personal OBi box, hard at work in my humble home office. You plug the box into an electrical outlet, plug the phone into the box, and bingo-bango: You've got a functioning home phone, sans the monthly bill. In a nutshell, an OBi box taps into Google's free Google Voice calling service and makes it work through a regular ol' landline-style home phone - the kind you can buy for 10 bucks and up from pretty much anywhere that sells electronic-type stuff. It's something we've covered before, way back in the early 2010s (ew!), but a lot has changed since then - and a lot of people still ask me about this - so I thought it'd be worth revisiting with the most up-to-date info. An adapter box from OBiĪ company called OBi (the "B" is capitalized but the "i" is lowercase so you know it's cool) makes an unassuming little contraption that makes this all possible. And if said service is free to use, why the hell not? Plain and simple, having a home phone can be a nice convenience - something that makes life just a little bit easier. You might want a reliable way for anyone in your household to call 911 and instantly relay your house's location in an emergency you might enjoy having a way to make and receive (or, ahem, ignore) calls without eating up your phone's battery or consuming your monthly mobile minute allotment or you might just prefer the warmer-sounding connection or more comfy-against-your-face quality a non-cellular handset can provide. (You'd be surprised how chatty turtles can get around mating season.) You might want a simple and dedicated "business line" to use from a home office, for instance, or you might want a quick and easy way for your kids and/or reptiles to make calls without tying up your personal cell phone. So why would you want to bother having one in this day and age? Believe it or not, there are plenty of valid reasons. ![]()
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