Skype

[my73charger]

Does anyone here use skype?  They loaded it on my computer at work to correspond with a consultant.

[MichaelRW]

Yes, I set it up for my wife so she can see and talk to the grandkids that live 200 miles away. It's great since it is free.

[SnoPro440]

We have been using it for over two years at our office.  We have sites in Germany, France, UK, Netherlands, Singapore, Australia and China.  If your using it within the US, it's great.  The over-seas talking can get a little bit annoying with echos.  Overall it's good and like MichaelRW said, it's free.

[kink67]

We have also used Skype at our office for the past year.   It has been working great, although we also have a bit of an echo at times.

[dodgecharger-fan]

I use our VoIP solution through work. Not Skype, but not free (well I don't pay for it.)

For personal communications, I like sightspeed. I looked into it for my brother to use to communicate with his son in Australia. His wife uses it to communicate with her family in Europe.
And sonce I'm the family technogeek, I've started using it so that I can answer their questions - but it pretty much just works...

[my73charger]

Thanks for the replies guys.

[73dodge]

yea pretty much all VoIP solutions work good , i.e Vonage, Skype etc but the phone companies are losing those voice dollars because your voice service is going though the internet and they can't charge you for long distance call and they HATE losing money.

So their solution? It is called 2-tiered internet, since they are seeing a increase in internet traffic especially a HUGE increase due to real time application like voice and video (you tube) so they are pushing for 2 layer service one level for common internet traffic like your web surfers and a higher level of service to service the heavy internet users that like to suck up the bandwidth for doing video and voice.

So guess what? the upper level internet service is going to cost you more way more, no surprise there, so once they detect voice packets coming across your internet connection they will want you pay for the higher service if you don't want to pay for the better service then they will channel your voice packets to a lower level internet service and then you will suddenly start having all sorts of voice problems with your Skype connection like really really poor voice quality and you'll get so PO'd and buy the higher level service.

The other thing the phone company wants since they are losing money to VoIP providers they will start monitoring your internet connection for VoIP packets and then they will come up with a scheme to charge you for the amount of voice packets coming across your internet connection.

[MichaelRW]

yea pretty much all VoIP solutions work good , i.e Vonage, Skype etc but the phone companies are losing those voice dollars because your voice service is going though the internet and they can't charge you for long distance call and they HATE losing money.

So their solution? It is called 2-tiered internet, since they are seeing a increase in internet traffic especially a HUGE increase due to real time application like voice and video (you tube) so they are pushing for 2 layer service one level for common internet traffic like your web surfers and a higher level of service to service the heavy internet users that like to suck up the bandwidth for doing video and voice.

So guess what? the upper level internet service is going to cost you more way more, no surprise there, so once they detect voice packets coming across your internet connection they will want you pay for the higher service if you don't want to pay for the better service then they will channel your voice packets to a lower level internet service and then you will suddenly start having all sorts of voice problems with your Skype connection like really really poor voice quality and you'll get so PO'd and buy the higher level service.

The other thing the phone company wants since they are losing money to VoIP providers they will start monitoring your internet connection for VoIP packets and then they will come up with a scheme to charge you for the amount of voice packets coming across your internet connection.

How does the phone company monitor my internet connection for VoIP packets if I am using Comcast cable? Just curious.

[mikepmcs]

I bought a welder a month ago and used skype because a couple parts were missing.   Transaction was flawless and my parts were replaced quicker than conventional.   
v/r
Mike

[73dodge]

yea pretty much all VoIP solutions work good , i.e Vonage, Skype etc but the phone companies are losing those voice dollars because your voice service is going though the internet and they can't charge you for long distance call and they HATE losing money.

So their solution? It is called 2-tiered internet, since they are seeing a increase in internet traffic especially a HUGE increase due to real time application like voice and video (you tube) so they are pushing for 2 layer service one level for common internet traffic like your web surfers and a higher level of service to service the heavy internet users that like to suck up the bandwidth for doing video and voice.

So guess what? the upper level internet service is going to cost you more way more, no surprise there, so once they detect voice packets coming across your internet connection they will want you pay for the higher service if you don't want to pay for the better service then they will channel your voice packets to a lower level internet service and then you will suddenly start having all sorts of voice problems with your Skype connection like really really poor voice quality and you'll get so PO'd and buy the higher level service.

The other thing the phone company wants since they are losing money to VoIP providers they will start monitoring your internet connection for VoIP packets and then they will come up with a scheme to charge you for the amount of voice packets coming across your internet connection.

How does the phone company monitor my internet connection for VoIP packets if I am using Comcast cable? Just curious.

where do you think the cable companies routers go through? All the major Telecoms run the internet. they know who is generating what packets and what type of packets they are. It is real easy to flag a VoIP packet and stick the packets into a bit bucket on a router or send them to a low priority queue where they get serviced last out the pipe to it's destination. Or dropped altogether. Or even better they count the VoIP packets and charge you per bit based on the codec you are using.

[MichaelRW]

yea pretty much all VoIP solutions work good , i.e Vonage, Skype etc but the phone companies are losing those voice dollars because your voice service is going though the internet and they can't charge you for long distance call and they HATE losing money.

So their solution? It is called 2-tiered internet, since they are seeing a increase in internet traffic especially a HUGE increase due to real time application like voice and video (you tube) so they are pushing for 2 layer service one level for common internet traffic like your web surfers and a higher level of service to service the heavy internet users that like to suck up the bandwidth for doing video and voice.

So guess what? the upper level internet service is going to cost you more way more, no surprise there, so once they detect voice packets coming across your internet connection they will want you pay for the higher service if you don't want to pay for the better service then they will channel your voice packets to a lower level internet service and then you will suddenly start having all sorts of voice problems with your Skype connection like really really poor voice quality and you'll get so PO'd and buy the higher level service.

The other thing the phone company wants since they are losing money to VoIP providers they will start monitoring your internet connection for VoIP packets and then they will come up with a scheme to charge you for the amount of voice packets coming across your internet connection.

How does the phone company monitor my internet connection for VoIP packets if I am using Comcast cable? Just curious.

where do you think the cable companies routers go through? All the major Telecoms run the internet. they know who is generating what packets and what type of packets they are. It is real easy to flag a VoIP packet and stick the packets into a bit bucket on a router or send them to a low priority queue where they get serviced last out the pipe to it's destination. Or dropped altogether. Or even better they count the VoIP packets and charge you per bit based on the codec you are using.

Thanks for the explanation. They've got us over a barrel.

[furbyboy]

a furbyboy1 on skype

[oldcarnut]

I use it a lot to talk with my relatives in the Uk almost everyday plus others scattered about the US  Its also on the phone but it will use up data if talking to much.