There used to be a time when there was only one way to make a phone call and that way was controlled by a light blue overlord called Telkom. But now, just like the Bob Dylan song says: “The Times They Are a-Changing”.

There are a few companies out there trying to grab some of Telkom’s market share and iBurst is one of them. Neotel will want you to move to their offering (whenever it arrives) and Vox Telecom wants you to use their service and handsets.

So what is different about the new iBurst offering? Well it’s a phone and a wireless modem (but it looks like a phone). The modem part works exactly the same way as the other iBurst offerings. You either buy the modem or you get a contract. To use the phone part you need to subscribe to iCall, iBurst’s voice option, available as R100 or R200 vouchers. But is it worth it? Well, we found the phone/modem to be rugged enough for office use and a good quality item all round, as well it should be for R2880. After a simple installation process we ran into a few problems. Firstly, the standard iBurst “dashboard” software could not display upload speed, download speed or whether or not we had any signal at all. All very confusing as we could make phone calls immediately after installing it. According to iBurst the new phone hardware and the older dashboard software aren’t exactly speaking the same language.

The other problem is that although you can check the amount of data you have left on your account online, you cannot, as yet, check how much call time you have left. You have to call the call ­centre and ask them. But according to iBurst, this problem will be resolved shortly.

The good bit though is the call rates. They are good: 54c/min peak (about an 18% saving on Telkom) and 30c/min off-peak (about a 10% saving on Telkom). If you wanted to use Skype to make the same call it would cost you about 77c/min.

To get your hands on one of these, contact Going Wireless on 071 375 6080 (Thinus) or visit their ­website at www.goingwireless.co.za.