3 Dongle

Cliddy

In case anyone is interested in my further exploits on this subject !
Continued using the 3 dongle with slightly improved stability. In turns out they were doing maintenance on the mast and before that probably having a problem the maintenance fixed. I got a refund on those days (big deal)
However Skype continues to be a problem. Very unreliable/unstable.
Have done lots of hunting around including speaking to Virgin. Their small print says they don't support VOIP. This came as a big suprise. What they mean is they won't support any problems you may have on it.

The reason being that Mobile Broadband inherently has a poor upload "speed" and therefore can't cope with the Skype throughput. The general concensus is that Skype Text will always work, Skype voice may do, Skype Video very seldom does. This is exactly my findings. I was lucky to get an upload speed of 53Kbs.

So...... I had reason to believe that Orange may have a better connection speed for me. Because I only had (and want) a 30 day rolling contract I have just bought an Orange dongle package.
I have just achieved 185 + 322KBS on 2 speed tests. Not exactly conclusive, but vastly better than anything on 3.
The real test will be when I make a serious phone call !

Also learnt that apparantly if you switch off "SuperNode" on Skype it helps. This came from the Orange guys.
Apparantly it compresses (or similiar) the data and makes better use of the bandwidth. I would like to believe this, as it seems to makes sense.

BUT.... I have just read that SuperNode is something to do with the way Skype operates in using customers as "nodes" I'm lost here and would welcome advice before I fiddle with registry setting !

Snakeeyes21

Maybe the problem isnt with 3 but with skype.

I use my 3 dongle to make calls via voip for calls via sipgate, freshtel and tesco voip and the quality is just as good as using a landline.

I also do video chat via msn without any problems

Cliddy

All good points, Snakeeyes, but I am already getting better results by changing to Orange. Which must prove that either the dongle quality or network is making a difference. I might try one of your VOIP suppliers to see if there is a further improvement.
I was going to say that you may be nearer a mast than me and/or your actual location in the buiding is more VOIP friendly, but then I found out this, does it make any sense ?
""On a land line the quality of the link will be effected by distance from the exchange and the quality of the wiring etc. In other words quite a varience to take into account.
BUT, that on mobile broadband if you are within the claimed excellent reception area that all recipients should get the same reception. i.e perhaps within 1 mile radius ""

Back to your VOIPs, If I was to switch to one of your suppliers, does the receiving end have to also ? (except of course if you are ring a landline)

Donnie

Some networks actively block this kind of data transfer, such as Vodafone.

I have both 3 and O2. I'll check when I have the time.

Cliddy

Yes I originaly thought they were actualy blocking it (and indeed you may still be right on certain network providers) but now I'm more thinking it's just a case of they don't "support" it, if you get problems.
I'm sure that's an easier approach by the network providers than actualy blocking the traffic ?? Just check the small print before paying !

By the way I know 3 works for Skype, but it's just useless in MY instance.

However further update to previous update, Orange is SIGNIFICANTLY better in MY scenario. No other changes to achieve it (except moving from 3 to Orange) Fortunately possible due to 30 day contract. I hate to think what I would be doing now, if I'd signed up for 18 months !

I would add that way back in this story, when I tried my Italian 3 dongle here in the UK, it was the Orange network "it" (the dongle) chose to roam on.
So 3 is available to me, but Orange must be a stronger signal ?

So a happy chappy and now get through messages like this without having to start all over again !!!