STEP 3. Configure the account in Google Voice. We have step by step instructions in the article below. Remember when you configure the account in GoogleVoice to enter the DID you get from ipkall as the phone number.
http://www.acrobits.cz/hesk/knowledgebase.php?article=11
That should do it, you should now be able to place and receive GoogleVoice calls through the SIP account you have tied to an ipkall DID. Now for the drawbacks.
1. It seems like a lot of ipkall numbers are already connected to GoogleVoice accounts. We tried it with 4 different ipkall numbers and all 4 of them were already linked to googlevoice accounts. Two of them I was able to 'reclaim', the other two I was not. If you get a number you are unable to 'reclaim' in GoogleVoice, just cancel the ipkall account and create a new one. It may take a couple tries, but you should eventually get one you can at least 'reclaim'. This issue might also be related to the second drawback.
2. ipkall will reclaim unused numbers after 30 days. If we understand this correctly, this means they will cancel your account and take back the number if you don't use it for 30 days. That means this option will be not be desirable for people that only use GoogleVoice occasionally. I think this might also be the reason for the first drawback.
Please note, these are not complaints about ipkall. We think they offer a great service and they provide it for free. But we think users should be aware of these things in advance instead of being frustrated later.
3. Out of the two SIP providers we tested (voipcheap and callcentric), voipcheap seemed to be the more reliable (though I don't think either work as well as Gizmo5 did or sipgate does). Incoming calls to the callcentric account (either through GoogleVoice or directly through the ipkall number) were at best 50% reliable. We then tried calling directly from callcentric account to callcentric account and had no problems. We're not sure of the exact issue, but it may just be that callcentric has not adjusted to the increased traffic. ipkall has become extremely popular in just the last week (since Gizmo5 announced they were shutting down) and since callcentric is mentioned prominently on ipkall's website, they probably have had quite a lot of recent signups. We'll try to do more testing but that is all we know right now.
That about does it. Feel free to contact us and report your results using this set up.
Update 01/23/2012 - We have received some complaints about audio quality when using this configurations. If this is the case, you should test if recieving calls directly to the SIP Account without the ipkall DID fixes the issue.
