This is Sue G.  I submitted the original question.  Thanks for all who had input/suggestions.  Looks like one should probably keep the land line.  One question not addressed:  Can you use multiple phones in the house or does it only work on the one connected to the computer?  Thanks again.  gg

I disconnected the outside line from the box and tide all the extentions together, then plugged the wall jack into the Magicjack and it worked on all extentions.

Pat:

not sure why, except that landline phones are an older technology and possibly more stable. 

If the electricity goes out then there would be no phone access. A standard phone often remains operational even without power.

However, we have found that our cell phones are more stable than the landline.

 I think that you could have a magic jack and only have local calling on your landline. That could cut the cost down a lot. Babs

babs:

I think that you could have a magic jack and only have local calling on your landline. That could cut the cost down a lot

That would save me about $230 a year.

Thanks for this information and help.  All the ideas have been most helful and appreciated.

MagicJack... 

Have it. Love it. Just bought one for my mom too!

Here's a pretty detailed MagicJack Review I used in helping make my decision.

They recommend the Free 30-Day MagicJack Trial Offer which is what I did.

Hope this helps!

 kind of late to the party here, but my mom just hated this.

I'm on Vonage, and will eventually Skype, but the issues i read at forum after forum were ok  reception but NO customer service.

 Techies only, I'm afraid.

But, that technology can be improved on in the next couple years.

FWIW, Vonage saves me $28/mo.

 I'm a bit late, too, but had never seen this thread.

 About a month ago, Les saw the MagicJack commercial on television and decided to order one for me.  My family lives in Georgia and I live in northern Indiana.  We have a home phone for local calls and use cells for long distance but the reception for the cells is horrible inside the house.  He figured that would save us money in the long run and save me from sitting in the car when the weather is bad.  

 The MagicJack came in the mail a lot more quickly than we expected it.  Everything was in good working order.  He came home from work and connected it to our computer.  He got it all set up and even got a local number to my parents which would also save them money on calling me.  We decided to try it out by calling our cell phones and the reception was horrible.  I went outside to where the cell phone had full tower and still the reception was very choppy and staticky.  We have DSL for our internet connection and feel that if we'd had a cable connection, the MagicJack would have worked a lot better.

 Les performed all of the troubleshooting suggestions on the website and finally just decided we would not be able to get it to work well with our internet connection.  He printed out the form to use in sending the product back to them and I put it in the mail the next day.  Within two weeks, our account had been credited with a refund.

 While the MagicJack did not work well for us, I do think this is a good company.  At no time during the purchasing or refunding process did we have any problems.  They were very conscientious about sending emails to let us know when the product would be shipped and even an apology when it wasn't sent out on the day they originally told us.  The refund went through smoothly and quickly.  In future, I wouldn't hesitate to purchase another of these if our internet situation changed.

 maybe all the complaints about customer service got through to the man running the company.

I'd love to see this tech work well.

 Still, I recall some BBB reports that were less than stellar.