1. Unlock your SunRocket gizmo

First I had to unlock my old VoIP router so I could provision it to use with the new VoIP provider. You can skip this step if you buy off the shelf VoIP router. The gizmo I had was InnoMedia MTA6328-2re and these are the exact steps that I had to follow to unlock it:

1. Unplug cable from gizmo WAN port (so you are disconnected from Internet).
2. With PC connected to gizmo LAN port, go to http://192.168.251.1 , log in with user and welcome.
3. Open this URL: http://192.168.251.1/restore2.ssi ; after about 15 seconds you should see a message about reset to defaults. Wait another 30 seconds.
4. Close browser window. At this point your gizmo should be in the same state as when SunRocket first shipped it to you.
5. Open a new browser window, go to http://192.168.251.1/Voice_adminPage.htm (do not open gizmo home page first).
6. When prompted for password, use user: admin and password: slapshot
7. Go to IP Network->Provisioning Setting. Uncheck Enable Provisioning. Click Save & Reboot. Click OK to warning.

2. Sign up for CallCentric account

I suggest signing to the Pay Per Call plan first so you can try out the call quality first without spending too much money. The only fee to pay during the sign up is 911 Cost Recovery Fee ($1.50). Other than that the costs are just $0.0198 per minute when you call within the US and you can deposit as little as $5 into your account.

3. Configure your gizmo for CallCentric

When you sign up to CallCentric they will prompt you to go through the setup guide which has instructions for a number of popular routers. I didn’t look at all of them but the instructions they had for InnoMedia were very detailed and had several screenshots. It was really a piece of cake to follow them and get my gizmo up and running.

4. Make a few test calls

Once your gizmo is configured and provisioned with CallCentric, use it for a while to see if you like the service quality. You will not at this point be able to receive incoming calls (you will have to buy a phone number or port your existing number) but you still can test incoming calls with their ClickToDial tool. Another way to test incoming calls is if you know somebody who is already a CallCentric customer (they are giving you an internal 777 number that can only be used within the network).

5. Port your phone number

The last thing I did was buy a real phone number. The “Pay Per Minute” version is just $1.95 per month and $0.015 per minute. As you order the service you have a choice of buying a new number or porting your existing one. If you choose the latter CallCentric will ask you to provide some information about your current provider (name, address, a copy of recent statement) and will submit a LNP request which in my case is estimated to take 2 weeks to process. If you port – the porting fee is $25, if you buy – the new number fee is $3.95.

6. Enjoy your new phone service!

I have not had much time to use the phone yet but I love the service (my LNP request was processed withn hours) and the web interface is one of the best I have seen. In fact I am going to borrow some of the dashboard ideas for my own project. As my phone number gets ported, I will post in the comments my experience with the service quality.

This is June 2009 revision of the Popular Deal Sites list. You can find the last month revision of the list here.

The change in rating shows the difference compared to May results and includes all deal sites from my database that meet Alexa Rank < 100,000 requirement. The list has 40 sites, two less than last month

The average deal site gained 0.35% in Alexa rank this month with redtagdeals.com (26.36%) gaining most of all. The top losers this month are edealinfo.com (-14.75%) and dealhack.com (-14.01%).

#	Web Site	Alexa Rank		Page Rank		Online Since
1	slickdeals.net (info)	687	(1.15%)	6		10-Nov-1999
2	fatwallet.com (info)	1710	(0.93%)	7	(1)	29-Nov-1999
3	dealnews.com (info)	3799	(3.21%)	6		20-Jan-1999
4	techbargains.com (info)	4900	(-0.2%)	5	(-1)	03-May-1999
5 (1)	anandtech.com	6513	(2.35%)	6		24-Aug-1997
6 (1)	dealspl.us (info)	6869	(-6.25%)	5		15-May-2006
7 (1)	deals2buy.com (info)	6950	(5.89%)	5	(1)	15-Nov-2002
8 (1)	bensbargains.net	7733	(-5.41%)	5		21-Mar-2000
9	dealsea.com	9391	(-0.56%)	5		27-Jun-2001
10 (1)	dealtaker.com (info)	10131	(8.56%)	7	(1)	08-Feb-2004
11 (1)	dealcatcher.com	10162	(0.77%)	6		28-Jul-1999
12	cheapstingybargains.com	10473	(12.05%)	5		20-Jan-2005
13	dealigg.com (info)	14597	(-4.5%)	4		04-Sep-2006
14	resellerratings.com (info)	16413	(1.35%)	6		18-Jun-1998
15	savings.com	18463	(15.56%)	5		20-Apr-1995
16	spoofee.com	22422	(-2.02%)	4	(-1)	31-Dec-2000
17 (5)	couponalbum.com	27489	(3.93%)	4	(-1)	18-Jan-2006
18 (1)	xpbargains.com	28134	(-12.47%)	4		29-Nov-2001
19 (1)	dealsofamerica.com	28658	(-0.66%)	4	(-1)	06-Sep-2003
20 (1)	bradsdeals.com	28712	(-0.53%)	5		29-Jun-2005
21 (2)	dealofday.com	29653	(-6.39%)	5		30-Aug-1999
22 (4)	edealinfo.com	31217	(-14.75%)	4		12-Dec-2000
23	judysbook.com	32596	(0.95%)	5		11-Aug-2003
24	bargaineering.com	34577	(3.42%)	3		01-Dec-2004
25	bargainist.com (info)	39488	(-0.68%)	3		21-Nov-2006
26	gottadeal.com	43526	(-9.69%)	4		27-Jan-2003
27 (1)	buxr.com	44548	(-0.44%)	4		04-Dec-2007
28 (1)	deals.com (info)	49163	(-12.83%)	5		28-Feb-1995
29	logicbuy.com	50051	(3.34%)	4	(1)	13-Nov-2003
30	dealplumber.com	51017	(17.8%)	3		17-Jul-2006
31	passwird.com	68332	(-2.2%)	3	(-1)	28-Aug-2001
32 (6)	froobi.com	73712	(14.58%)	1		01-Jun-2008
33	gotapex.com	77328	(-3.77%)	4		29-Apr-1999
34 (2)	dailyedeals.com	78133	(-6.42%)	4		18-Feb-2000
35 (1)	ableshoppers.com	81389	(-5.01%)	4	(-1)	08-Oct-2000
36	webbyplanet.com	82045	(-3.58%)	4		09-Feb-2006
37 (8)	redtagdeals.com	87098	(26.36%)	4		08-May-2002
38 (3)	dealhack.com	89799	(-14.01%)	4		06-Feb-2005
39 (3)	dealslist.com	93218	(3.25%)	4		18-Jul-2000
40	hot-deals.org	94618	(1.06%)	3		10-May-2000

The discount in parenthesis is what you will get if you use Amazon Subscribe & Save program. If you like these Amazon coupons, I also recommend you to check out these Amazon discount codes. The best part is that these codes don’t have an expiration date!

Amazon coupon codes for July 2009

Alice.com is a new startup launched by the same folks who sold Jellyfish to Microsoft in 2007 and pocketed $50 mln, and it really promises to be something big. On the outside Alice is a neatly built shopping site to buy household essentials with thousands of names in stock and free shipping on everything. On the inside, Alice is an open platform for manufacturers to sell the kind of products they want at the prices they set, the first of a kind from what I know.

How Alice helps consumers

The shopping part of the site is very clean. Products are presented in a nice grid view, each one is provided with an image, details, and even price comparison. Some items come in several packaging sizes and if they do you can easily cross reference them. The overall interface reminded me of Endless.com, the shoe store by Amazon. It is very clean and very nicely organized.

As you add items to your cart you can also add them to your list of things to buy regularly and select the refill frequency. Alice will then send you a reminder when you are about to run out of toilet paper, toothpaste, or whatever else you added to your list. As I already mentioned, shipping is free on all orders, something a bargain hunter will certainly appreciate.

The closest competitor to Alice is probably Amazon, and I have to admit Alice stands favorably so far. Even though Amazon offers a greater variety of brands, Alice has the most popular ones covered and the package size assortment is much better. Amazon typically forces you to buy large amounts while with Alice you get same package size you will typically find in your local grocery store.

One more complain I have about Amazon is the third party and “soon to be in stock” offers which flood search results and really degrade your shopping experience. I wish there was a way to filter them out on demand. Alice on the other hand only lists in-stock products and all of them qualify for free shipping (did I already mention it? ;-) )

On top of the typical shopping functionality Alice offers some bells and whistles like Budgeting (these are in essence your monthly expense stats by product category) and Neighborhood (a basic set of social tools like friends, profiles, chat, walls, etc). There is not much going on yet in the Neighborhood except for the chat area which is dominated by the former JellyFish members some of whom have ported their screen names to Alice.

How Alice helps manufacturers

However it is not the bargain hunter and online shopper in me who was more excited by the Alice’s launch. It was me - the entrepreneur. What Alice is doing in the CPG market now is what Zecco have tried to do with online stock trading. This article explains a lot of details about why this is different from what has been done so far. In the words of Brian Wiegand (Alice.com CEO) himself:

We’ve created a platform that allows the major CPG manufacturers to actually become the retailer and sell directly to the consumer,” Mr. Wiegand said. “Retailers increasingly have become manufacturers. So the next logical step is for manufacturers to become retailers.

I am eager to see if the idea stands and if Alice grows enough to successfully compete with the traditional players and to become profitable. According to this Reuters post, the startup makes money off of manufacturers “by giving the companies spending data, advertising space and distributing samples for them to targeted customers”. My understanding is that with the traditional model the store makes money via price markup and so the revenue comes from the consumers.

Will this new model bring shoppers lower prices and better service? It is hard to say. Initially the answer is definite yes since everyone including the manufacturers is vested into the success of this enterprise and are willing to sacrifice some of the revenue in exchange for great initial impression. What will drive prices down later on? It could be the transparency that Alice built into the platform, or it could be the volume (if the site really takes off). Whether Alice.com is successful or not, I already feel it is promising to be a very interesting experiment!

This is May 2009 revision of the Popular Coupon sites list. You can find the previous revision of the list here.

The change in rating shows the difference compared to April results. This list currently has 34 sites - the same number as in April. On average the coupon sites have gained (1.12%) in May.

The best performer is savings.com (12.96%), which stays at the same relative position, and the worst result comes from couponshare.com (-18.01%) which also slides down by three positions. Enjoy the complete list below!

#	Web Site	Alexa Rank		Page Rank		Online Since
1	coupons.com	1384	(5.46%)	6		07-Sep-1994
2	retailmenot.com (info)	1528	(6.54%)	6		27-Oct-2006
3	eversave.com	1787	(-7.13%)	5		08-Apr-1999
4	coolsavings.com	2348	(1.68%)	6		03-Jun-1996
5	couponmountain.com	4622	(11.08%)	5		05-May-2001
6	couponcabin.com	8335	(-1.3%)	5	(-1)	27-Feb-2003
7	coupons.smartsource.com	11992	(2.73%)	5		27-Apr-1995
8	couponmom.com	16852	(2.24%)	6		25-Jun-2002
9	mycoupons.com	19420	(9.35%)	5		16-Feb-1999
10	savings.com	20033	(12.96%)	5	(1)	20-Apr-1995
11	tjoos.com	25946	(9.49%)	4		16-Jun-2007
12	ultimatecoupons.com	32624	(-2.63%)	4		02-Jul-2001
13 (2)	hotcouponworld.com	33132	(10.24%)	4		15-Jun-2006
14 (1)	fabuloussavings.com	34280	(4.76%)	5		27-Jan-1999
15 (1)	valpak.com	37858	(-0.51%)	6		22-Jun-1994
16 (2)	deallocker.com	39517	(-1.21%)	5	(1)	24-Mar-2007
17	8coupons.com	39782	(-5.33%)	5		11-Jun-2006
18 (4)	couponwinner.com	41107	(-11.98%)	4		30-Jan-2006
19	wow-coupons.com	41879	(5.96%)	5		26-Nov-2003
20	couponchief.com	43117	(8.42%)	5		15-Jan-2005
21	couponcodes4u.com	47691	(1.04%)	4		01-Aug-2007
22 (1)	thegrocerygame.com	50997	(1.49%)	5		28-Aug-2001
23 (1)	flamingoworld.com	56544	(-9.96%)	5		19-May-1999
24	couponseven.com	58810	(0.51%)	3		23-May-2006
25 (2)	couponbug.com	63522	(10.96%)	6		24-Apr-2002
26 (1)	couponcode.com	66588	(1.46%)	5		24-Feb-2002
27 (1)	couponsurfer.com	69376	(5.35%)	5		11-Feb-1998
28 (1)	currentcodes.com	79104	(1.18%)	6		27-Dec-2000
29 (3)	couponshare.com	80430	(-18.01%)	3		21-Jan-2002
30	webbyplanet.com	82016	(1.43%)	4		09-Feb-2006
31	gogoshopper.com	92707	(-10.06%)	4		16-Dec-1999
32	shopping-bargains.com	95175	(-6.88%)	4	(-1)	20-Feb-1999
33 (1)	thecouponclippers.com	96996	(0.61%)	5	(1)	21-Sep-1999
34 (1)	couponheaven.com	97885	(-2%)	3	(-1)	28-Sep-2003

This is May 2009 revision of the Popular Price Comparison web sites list. You can find the last month revision of the list here.

The change in rating shows the difference compared to April results. The list has a total of 33 web sites which is 2 less than the last month. I removed MSN Shopping since Microsoft has rolled it over into Bing (subsequently all sites are moving up by one position). Another change is that Live.com is now Bing.com as many of you already know. There are 18 more sites in my database that don’t meet Alexa Rank < 100,000 requirement.

The best performer this month is bottomdollar.com (21.76%) followed by shopper.cnet.com with a gain of (14.12%).

The worst performer this month is again dealio with a loss of (-14.79%) followed by pricerunner (-14.43%). mpire has finally fall off the list after a series of negative months. Please enjoy the complete list below

#	Web Site	Alexa Rank		Page Rank		Online Since
1	google.com/products	1		7		11-Sep-2001
2	shopping.yahoo.com	2		8		18-Jan-1995
3	bing.com/shopping	5		2	(-6)	22-May-2008
4 (1)	shopping.aol.com	32		7		22-Jun-1995
5 (1)	shopper.cnet.com (info)	73	(14.12%)	8		05-Jul-1996
6 (1)	nextag.com	503	(-6.57%)	7		15-Oct-1998
7 (1)	shopping.com	549	(2.66%)	6		03-Jul-1997
8 (1)	bizrate.com	667	(-1.83%)	7		24-Apr-1996
9 (1)	shoplocal.com	1089	(-1.68%)	7		24-Sep-1998
10 (1)	shopzilla.com	1257	(-2.53%)	6		04-Jul-2002
11 (1)	pronto.com	1274	(-1.92%)	8		01-Jan-2006
12 (1)	pricegrabber.com (info)	1412	(-1.07%)	7		10-Mar-1999
13 (1)	smarter.com	1712	(3.77%)	6	(1)	28-Apr-1998
14 (1)	epinions.com	2087	(1.23%)	7		12-Feb-1999
15 (1)	thefind.com (info)	2112	(6.88%)	6		19-Oct-2006
16 (1)	dealtime.com	2609	(1.77%)	6		07-Oct-1998
17 (1)	become.com	3482	(6.07%)	6		20-Jan-2004
18 (1)	shopwiki.com	4129	(-4.72%)	5		15-Dec-2004
19 (1)	dealio.com	5230	(-14.79%)	5		08-Sep-2004
20 (1)	retrevo.com	6032	(1.77%)	6		10-May-2006
21 (1)	like.com	7217	(-9.1%)	6		22-Feb-1995
22 (1)	pricerunner.com	8662	(-14.43%)	6		19-May-1999
23 (1)	mysimon.com	8672	(0.68%)	8		15-Apr-1998
24 (1)	calibex.com	10187	(-9.87%)	5		02-Oct-2000
25 (1)	ebates.com	12347	(1.67%)	6		29-Dec-1998
26 (1)	pricewatch.com	16142	(-0.86%)	6		26-Sep-1995
27 (1)	dealighted.com (info)	20180	(11.27%)	6	(1)	09-Oct-2006
28 (1)	bottomdollar.com	21583	(21.76%)	0		04-Jul-1997
29 (1)	sortprice.com	36264	(0.52%)	5		15-Jan-2004
30 (2)	hawkee.com	42943	(0.26%)	5		02-Jan-1997
31	bestwebbuys.com	44431	(-7.92%)	5	(-1)	06-Jan-1998
32 (1)	pricescan.com	52638	(-0.73%)	6		03-Sep-1997
33 (1)	streetprices.com	69906	(-0.09%)	5		16-Oct-1997

Even back then $24.99 wasn’t such a bargain and now considering this is what Vonage (a heavy lifer in VOIP world) charges for unlimited service, one can surely find a better deal, especially if they are willing to give up the ‘unlimited’ part of it. At least this is the kind of assumption I made before I went on my bounty hunt last week. A couple of days later and I am happy to report that my assumption was correct and so far it looks like I will be switching my service.

Why $24.99/mo is an overkill

• First of all, I use my cell phone more than I use my home phone these days. My home number is sort of a legacy I am carrying with me. At one point I even considered abandoning my phone number altogether but it turned out no so easy to do. Too many people and businesses have it and to make things worse some businesses still require a registered home number for verification purposes and so terminating it would be a disaster. Either way I am not ready yet to take on the challenge.
• Second, companies like Vonage and Packet8 take you by convenience. They will send a pre-configured phone adapter and absorb the equipment expense just to get you on the hook. If you have a bit of a DIY skill you can save yourself some $$ by taking the initial hit (and by exploring some less known providers). Can you do it? If you ever configured a wireless router yourself and you felt comfortable doing so then the answer is ‘yes’ because the skill set required from you is not much different.

What I am going to do about it

Here is my plan so far and I know it works because one of my friends went this route.

• Buy a VOIP Ethernet adapter (e.g. this Linksys 2102) and sign up for a Pay Per Call account at CallCentric. There is no setup or monthly fee (except $1.50 charge for 911 service). All I will be paying is 1.98 cent per minute for US domestic calls and very competitive international rates (9.35 cent per minute to Ukraine). This will give me plenty of time to test the service quality before I make the final step.
• Transfer my current phone number to CallCentric and will start receiving phone calls as well ($1.95 per month extra if you use Pay per Minute plan). Comparing this to what I currently have, $24.99 will last me over 1000 minutes per month and if I talk less (which is the exactly my case) then I will save $$.

What do you think? Will this work? Any details I am missing? Any alternative providers to consider? There is an open question I need to clarify - will two VOIP adapters (the new for CallCentric and the old I have from 8x8) work on the same network while I test the service.

This is May 2009 revision of the Popular Deal Sites list. You can find the last month revision of the list here.

The change in rating shows the difference compared to April results and includes all deal sites from my database that meet Alexa Rank < 100,000 requirement. The list has 42 sites, one more than last month

The average deal site lost 0.12% in Alexa rank this month with deals.com (-17.12%) losing most of all. The top gainers this month are froobi.com (22.6%) and dealplumber.com (17.46%).

#	Web Site	Alexa Rank		Page Rank		Online Since
1	slickdeals.net (info)	695	(0.14%)	6		10-Nov-1999
2	fatwallet.com (info)	1726	(-1.11%)	6		29-Nov-1999
3	dealnews.com (info)	3925	(3.44%)	6		20-Jan-1999
4	techbargains.com (info)	4890	(-2.75%)	6		03-May-1999
5	dealspl.us (info)	6465	(-3.16%)	5		15-May-2006
6	anandtech.com	6670	(0.04%)	6		24-Aug-1997
7	bensbargains.net	7336	(-3.6%)	5		21-Mar-2000
8	deals2buy.com (info)	7385	(7.84%)	4		15-Nov-2002
9 (1)	dealsea.com	9339	(6.52%)	5		27-Jun-2001
10 (1)	dealcatcher.com	10241	(-3%)	6		28-Jul-1999
11	dealtaker.com (info)	11080	(-0.54%)	6	(-1)	08-Feb-2004
12	cheapstingybargains.com	11908	(1.38%)	5		20-Jan-2005
13	dealigg.com (info)	13969	(-5.39%)	4	(1)	04-Sep-2006
14	resellerratings.com (info)	16638	(1.01%)	6		18-Jun-1998
15 (1)	savings.com	21864	(5.76%)	5	(1)	20-Apr-1995
16 (1)	spoofee.com	21978	(-1.64%)	5		31-Dec-2000
17	xpbargains.com	25015	(-2.39%)	4		29-Nov-2001
18	edealinfo.com	27205	(-6.08%)	4	(-1)	12-Dec-2000
19 (1)	dealofday.com	27873	(-1.89%)	5		30-Aug-1999
20 (1)	dealsofamerica.com	28471	(-4.47%)	5		06-Sep-2003
21	bradsdeals.com	28561	(1.11%)	5		29-Jun-2005
22	couponalbum.com	28614	(2.45%)	5		18-Jan-2006
23	judysbook.com	32908	(-0.89%)	5		11-Aug-2003
24	bargaineering.com	35802	(1.68%)	3		01-Dec-2004
25 (1)	bargainist.com (info)	39221	(-6.64%)	3		21-Nov-2006
26 (1)	gottadeal.com	39680	(-8.59%)	4	(-1)	27-Jan-2003
27	deals.com (info)	43572	(-17.12%)	5	(-1)	28-Feb-1995
28	buxr.com	44353	(6.67%)	4	(1)	04-Dec-2007
29	logicbuy.com	51782	(6.53%)	3	(-1)	13-Nov-2003
30 (2)	dealplumber.com	62062	(17.46%)	3	(-1)	17-Jul-2006
31 (1)	passwird.com	66859	(-4.23%)	4		28-Aug-2001
32 (1)	dailyedeals.com	73421	(-4.19%)	4		18-Feb-2000
33 (2)	gotapex.com	74521	(4.9%)	4		29-Apr-1999
34	ableshoppers.com	77509	(-0.74%)	5		08-Oct-2000
35 (2)	dealhack.com	78766	(-3.37%)	4		06-Feb-2005
36 (1)	webbyplanet.com	79211	(6.16%)	4		09-Feb-2006
37 (1)	bigbigforums.com	86107	(-2.48%)	3		07-Aug-2001
38 (6)	froobi.com	86292	(22.6%)	1	(1)	01-Jun-2008
39	shopping-bargains.com	90754	(-5.03%)	4	(-1)	20-Feb-1999
40 (2)	hot-deals.org	95629	(6.95%)	3		10-May-2000
41 (3)	a2zdeals.com	95912	(-11.3%)	4		05-Aug-1999
42 (2)	dealslist.com	96351	(-7.29%)	4		18-Jul-2000

I just called Chase customer support and the representative confirmed that changes are afoot however declined to give any details suggesting that I will receive a ‘Welcome’ package with all the information I need to know about the new program.

Reports however have been surfacing all over the web since as early as November of 2008 from card holders who received the “upgrade” package. The bits of information I have put together so far confirm a couple of important facts:

• The $250 Chase Freedom Cash Check which you could get for $200 in cash back is being phased out
• The 3% cash back spending categories will be rotating every quarter - very much like the current structure offered by Discover More

WSJ says that all Chase Freedom cardholders will be moved to the rewards program throughout the year. Chase hasn’t spared the $30 per year Freedom Plus card either, according to the customer service rep I spoke with tonight. Too bad because this has been my primary card.

What is next?

I am going to look into a couple cards that I know offer straight 2% cash back rewards: one from Schwab and one from Fidelity. I think I prefer to have to open an investment account (even if it comes with $1000 minimum balance requirement) to the tiered rewards structure of AmEx Blue Cash (another alternative consider).

Amazon keeps growing their grocery deals list. This month it is longer than ever! As usual I post them verified and sorted by the amount so it is more convenient to pick those with the best value. Most coupons below expire June 30, 2009.

There is a slight change to the format this month. The discount in parenthesis is what you will get if you use Amazon Subscribe & Save program. I kept the list sorting based on the discount without the use of the program since I myself am not a member.

If you like these Amazon coupons, I also recommend you to check out these Amazon discount codes. The best part is that these codes don’t have an expiration date!

Amazon coupon codes for June 2009