1899 offer voice over IP (VoIP) calls

Phonix

My laptop has become my mobile phone lol

ricahrd

BexTech wrote:

18866 VoIP service are still only charging 1 pence per call to UK landlines. Well they were when I tested a day or two ago.

Yep, still charging me 1p.

ultrak3wl

competitionscafe wrote:

for calls TO people overseas I don't really see any advantage of VoIP as I can call for 1 or 2 p a minute on my landline using ratebusters or similar.

Sorry if I am being a bit thick!
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It's not so much just the per-minute rate. In order to use those cheap landline services you first have to fork over ten quid a month or so for "line rental" on your landline, whereas with VOIP you don't!

mhawkshaw

I've recently signed up to ntl 1Mbps and have found that my upstream speed is only 90kbps. When I make a call, it always uses the G.711 codec which requires around 88kbps bandwidth. As this is very close to my maximum upstream speed, I end up with the person I am calling receiving garbled calls and severe latency problems. I've tried forcing the use of a lower bandwidth codec such as G729 but no success. I may have to upgrade to 2Mbps to get up to 200kbps upstream speeds... I'm paying £9.99 for 1Mbps and 2Mbps is £24.99... I've contacted both sipgate and Draytek and I'll let you know how I get on.

Tech info: Vigor 2100VG with 2.5.5.4 firmware using sipgate.

ultrak3wl

I've had my Sipura SPA-3000 working via NTL 1MB service for a few weeks now, posting summary in case it helps anyone. Using sipgate.co.uk who seem to be mostly alright, £5.90 for 1000 minutes of landline calls is OK with me. Only got through 663 minutes this month and they don't roll over but don't mind too much about that it's still good value.

Got my free number from sipgate, you can actually get more than one and point at same destination and I'm thinking of doing this so kids can have their own numbers and we can use SPA's "distinctive ring" capabilities. Also got a (Seattle) US number from ipkall.com, not sure what I'm gunna use it for but free and I thought it was cool. Still got original NTL landline and all these numbers ring on same DECT phone. Rest of family have not complained about phone working much differently after I switched it to VOIP.

Call quality is alright, mostly, but you do need QoS/bandwidth management (don't want call to go funny when kids start up some game or big download.) My NTL connection is supposed to have 1Mbs down 200Kbs up, however in reality it is more like 110kbs up. These are the values I configured into my router for QoS after doing a bit of speed testing. Does not cause a problem with calls so have not complained about lack of expected 200 upload speed.

Anyone interested in bandwidth here are figures, this represents busy family use of phone over time period stated.

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Elapsed Time: 19 days and 20:37:23
Broadcast Pkts Sent: 0 Broadcast Bytes Sent: 0
Broadcast Pkts Recv: 85407 Broadcast Bytes Recv: 10160151
Broadcast Pkts Dropped: 0 Broadcast Bytes Dropped: 0
RTP Packets Sent: 2633752 RTP Bytes Sent: 632079712
RTP Packets Recv: 3091829 RTP Bytes Recv: 630337008
SIP Messages Sent: 167903 SIP Bytes Sent: 61095408
SIP Messages Recv: 114617 SIP Bytes Recv: 57523315

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Phonix

£5.90 for 1000 minutes of landline calls is OK with me.

If you use https://www.voipbuster.com these calls will be completely free.

They use both iax and sip , so you should be able to configure your adapter to allow you to dial in using sip.voipbuster.com etc

The only problem I've experienced so far is that I'm unable to call somebody with an NTL line. I have no idea why.

And just wait till 8mb+ broadband with a good bandwidth ratio becomes the norm

Or eve 24mbit

which will put real pressure on cable suppliers.

you can actually get more than one and point at same destination and I'm thinking of doing this so kids can have their own numbers and we can use SPA's "distinctive ring" capabilities.

What would be even cooler is if they designed a dect package where specific phones rang when specfic numbers were called.

Mandles

excuse me being thick but if its through the computer how do you dial?..if i just type the phone number in does it just ring it?

BexTech

You download a software phone (Softphone), you type in the number and it rings it.

Your voice is turned into data packets, and sent through your broadband just as any other data is, it is then reassembled and turned into voice the other end.

Mandles

BexTech wrote:

You download a software phone (Softphone), you type in the number and it rings it.

Your voice is turned into data packets, and sent through your broadband just as any other data is, it is then reassembled and turned into voice the other end.

Hi,
i tried that. downloaded Firefly softphone and dialled the +44 0190blah blah blah number and nothing. said dialled but it didnt and then it hung up.tried it on 2 numbers and the same happens

BexTech

You are dialling 0 after +44.

When dialling internationally you drop the first 0, as you would when calling abroad or calling the UK from outside the UK.

Therefore you should be dialling +44 190 or +44 121 etc.