Is VoIP Taking Over?

This Philips phone can use Skype's VoIP service.

As popular VoIP services, such as Vonage, continue to increase quality and go down in price, a popular question is whether or not it's time to discontinue your home phone in favor of VoIP.

Some households have already ditched their home phones and have gone completely cellular, but for those who frequently call long distance and international, this might not be a practical alternative.  VoIP, on the other hand, offers excellent rates for calls.

A popular complaint about VoIP was that call quality as not always the best, but in recent years, this has significantly improved.  I regularly use VoIP, and the person I'm talking to on the phone doesn't know the difference--the crystal clear call quality is most apparent.

Have any of you completely gone VoIP at home?  If so, what VoIP service do you use?  Skype?  Vonage?  Another?

Skype 5.0 and VoIP... the start to service consolidation?

Skype 5.0 will integrate with Facebook to become an even more powerful, consolidated messaging platform. In addition to the normal messaging, this will bring a VoIP interface when simultaneously logged into Facebook.

Are we heading towards a service consolidation concept in which a person can maintain and entire social network and contact them via text, email, or voice all via an Internet connection? It seems like it's getting closer and closer everyday.

What are your thoughts on this?

Update: Windows Server is up and running... now I'm thinking about installing Ubuntu Server

 

As an update to my post last week, I have Windows Server 2008 R2 up and running on my spare computer at home.  I've barely gotten around to messing around with it, but since a lot of you suggested that I do the Linux server, I have that stuck in the back of my head.  I'm pretty familiar with Windows Server, but there's always the intrigue of learning something new (this is why I also run OSX).

Now I'm thinking that I should go the Linux route?  Is it fairly simple and easy to maintain?  What are your thoughts?

Anyone run a Hackintosh Computer?

Hackintosh laptops and desktops have been gaining some cult popularity since the Mac went with Intel processors.  From what I've heard, you have to jump through hoops to get it setup, but once everything works, you're good to go.

Is anyone running a Hackintosh?  What are your thoughts?  Was it worth the trouble?