There aren’t a lot of great tutorials for setting up the Grandstream HT802 (or HT801) for many VoIP providers. Specifically Telnyx.
Google Voice is getting more expensive to set up to use with a regular phone to use as a landline if you don’t already own the hardware. Google Voice is a great option for free VoIP for home phones. The only ATA (analog telephone adapter) box that supports setting up Google Voice is Obihai (now owned by Polycom). They stopped making the Obahai/Polycom 200/202/212 around Dec 2021. Officially, the software support ends in 2023, but that doesn’t mean the boxes will stop working. You use to pick one of these boxes up for $30-40 on sale. However, to buy one of these boxes, its now $75-190 on Amazon or eBay; and you don’t know how long this service will last.
Another Google Voice option is paid: with an Ooma like this one. Once you buy their hardware (usually $50-150), you need access to their $10+/mo plan to get the Ooma Google Voice Extension. If you’re already paying for the Ooma VoIP phone service, it doesn’t make a ton of sense to use free Google Voice service.
Now enter the ATA’s Grandstream HT801 (around $34 and supports 1 line) or Grandstream HT802 (around $38 and supports 2 lines). These boxes are highly configurable and should work with most VoIP providers… if you can figure out the settings.
In my search to replace Google Voice, my only requirements were a cheap ATA box that could make and receive calls on a dedicated number for temporary use with a Starlink satellite. I had already tested the Obahai 212 with Google Voice on Starlink with fantastic results. However, I needed more ATA’s for multiple locations and I’m not going to pay scalpers prices on Obahai boxes especially when the future of Google Voice integration is unknown.
If you search Google for cheap VoIP providers, there is no shortage. Most are geared towards replacing traditional landlines and cost $10-20/mo. However, if you’ll roll up your sleeves with the HT801 or HT802, you can get a landline replacement for $1/mo plus half a penny a minute. There a bunch of cheap providers like voip.ms, BulkVS, FlowRoute, Twilio, Skyetel, or Telnyx. After trying to setup accounts with all of those services, I ran into 3 problems:
- They wanted $15-25 minimum deposits to fund the account even though services were only $1/mo plus $0.01 or less a minutes
- The setup process was overly difficult and I couldn’t get it working after multiple attempts
- They wanted additional verification or business emails since most these services are for businesses and could be abused by robocallers for scams
Telnyx was the only VoIP provider that was easy to setup with minimal verification and they allowed for $1+ deposits to get the account working. And on top of that, their chat support was available at 2am! Within about 10 minutes, I was able to start making and receiving calls through my Grandstream HT802 and a $2.25 deposit.
Set Up Your Grandstream HT801/HT802
You need an open port on your internet router for the HT801 or HT802 to get internet service. Once you plug it in, wait 2-3 minutes for it to boot up. Then open your browser on a computer on the same network and navigate to the IP address assigned to your device. You can get your IP address by either opening your router settings and finding the device’s IP on the LAN list (device name on my router was * ). If you can’t figure that out, you can connect your regular telephone to one of the ports and then:
- Dial the * key 3 times
- At the menu, dial 0 2 and write down the IP address
The default username and password are Admin/Admin.
You will have some tabs across the top after logging in. The last tab(s) will be called FSX Port1 and FSX Port2 (if you have 2 port HT802). These tabs are where you’ll enter your credentials from Telnyx.
Sign Up for Telnyx
They advertise a $5 credit for signing up with a business account (think non-free email account like gmail, microsoft), but I only got that after chatting with support. You can sign up for Telnyx account here. After you verify your email, you should be able to access the dashboard.
Set Up Telnyx Voice Service
Buy a $1 Local Number
Before you can connect inbound and outbound calls, you must buy a number. Without e911 service ($1.50/mo), it only costs $1/mo, plus $1 for the next month (required to start).
- Go to the “Account Settings” menu on the left and then click “Billing“
- Add at least $2.05 to start. I couldn’t get the credit card billing to work, but I did get the payment to go through on Paypal.
- Now go to the “Numbers” menu on the left and select “My Numbers“. Use the “Search & Buy Numbers” link at the top. You can run a Search Type by Region or Area Code. Add the number to the cart and click the “Cart” button in the top right. Place the Order.
Create New SIP Trunk Connection and Outbound Voice Profile for your New Number
- Open the “Voice” menu on the left and then “Outbound Voice Profiles“. Click the “Add New Profile” button. Give it whatever name you want and Create it. This profile is already created and saved. It should default the Traffic Type setting to “Conversational”.
- Open the “Voice” menu on the left and then “SIP Trunking“. Click the “Add SIP Connection” button and give it whatever name you want. Choose “Credentials” under the “SIP Connection Type”. Copy the auto-generated Username and Password (you can also retrieve this later). Go to the “Outbound” tab on this setup screen and choose the “Outbound Voice Profile” you created in the previous step. Lastly, on this same Outbound tab setting, enter the phone number you purchased in the Caller ID Override box. Then Save.
- Go back to the “Numbers” menu on the left-hand side, then “My Numbers“. If your SIP Trunking connection isn’t already selected under “Connection or App”, choose it now.
Save Credentials to Grandstream HT801/HT802
Now you can save your credentials to your Grandstream ATA.
- Go back to the Grandstream IP address and choose your FXS phone port tab (1 or 2 depending on the box you purchased).
- Enter the “Primary SIP Server” as sip.telnyx.com
- Enter the “SIP User ID” and “Authenticate ID” as the Username from the Telnyx website (Voice > SIP Trunking > edit SIP Connection and it will be listed under “SIP Connection Type: Credentails”)
- Enter the “Authenticate Password” as the password from the Telenyx website (Voice > SIP Trunking > edit SIP Connection and it will be listed under “SIP Connection Type: Credentails”)
- Leave all the other Grandstream settings as the default and scroll to the bottom of the page and click “Apply”
You may not be able to make or receive calls for a few minutes. My Verizon cell phone gave me the message “Welcome to Verizon Wireless. Please check the number as dialed” error. After about 10-15 minutes, the new number was working for both outbound and inbound calls. If you go to the “Status” tab of the Grandstream HT801/HT802, you can see if your FXS port is “Registered” to the User ID you saved from Telnyx. It took about 60 seconds of refreshing to see my status change to Registered. You can also see this registration of the Grandstream in Telnyx under Voice > SIP Trunking > and then choose your SIP connection. Click the Edit button and click the “Check Registration Status”. You should see your Grandstream ATA listed after a few seconds if it is registered correctly.
Moving Forward with Telnyx and the HT801 or HT802
If you are planning on using this number permanently and getting similar features to Google Voice, you may consider the additional features (for additional costs) they offer like e911 service for emergency calls, faxing, voicemail, SIM cards for IoT, call recording, caller-ID, texting (SMS and MMS), etc… You can even port your number over. The beauty of this system is that you can manage multiple numbers, destinations, and calling rules. Of course, if you’re planning on developing telephony apps, Telnyx appears to have some amazing features.
Let me know in the comments if I missed a step or if everything is working for you.