One of the things I “lost” when I shutdown my server and stopped running my Asterisk PBX was the ability to redirect calls to my phone to my computer in case I was out of town or the like. When we travelled back east last month, we stayed with my uncle who had really high speed Internet (Verizon FIOS), but had virtually no cell phone coverage (neither my Sprint PCS nor my AT&T phone could keep a connection). One day I had to take a business call, but didn’t want to hog my uncle’s phone line, so I re-directed my PBX to send my calls over SIP to my Mac (using the Gizmo Project’s SIP client). That was pretty cool, but I can no longer do that.
I’ve had a GrandCentral account for awhile and had read about forwarding to a Gizmo Project account. Today, I decided to play around and low and behold, I can still get work calls on my computer by having people call my GrandCentral number (which I’m now going to start giving out as my work number). Furthermore, I can make outgoing calls by adding people to my GrandCentral phone book and originating the call through the GrandCentral website (Gizmo Project charges for outgoing, but not incoming calls; this method makes the outgoing call actually an incoming call). So not only can I receive calls on my computer, I can now make free calls! I don’t need free calls as I have unlimited long distance on my home phone, I have 100 outgoing minutes per month on my work line, and more than enough minutes on my cell phones. I don’t even talk on the phone all that much!