"Geek Chic" for the home: IP PBX

I've been thinking about what is really cool and what is really a fad in computing. Fad = iPad.  Cool = IP PBX, especially if you have a new house.

Consider this, particularly if you have purchased a home built in the last few years.  Most low-voltage wiring companies (Guardian, for example) run only two types of wire, RG-6 and CAT-5.  I personally think it has something with the (lack of) intelligence of their hiring pool, but that's another issue altogether.  However, with all the phone lines being run as CAT-5 cable, you can easily replace the phone jacks with network jacks, and you can purchase IP phones for about $100 each.  The PBX, normally the expensive part of the equation, can be done with a halfway (only halfway by modern standards) machine running Asterisk open source IP PBX.  Heck, just about any geek has an extra computer collecting dust somewhere.

Imagine how much geek envy your friends would have when their calls are routed via an auto-attendant to the proper ring or phone, and when your spouse transfers their call to another phone.