Skype Vs. SIPphone - VoIP Compared

JimLynch writes "There are few organizations more loathed than the telephone company. Let's face it - none of us like forking over our hard-earned cash every month just to use the phone. Well, how much would it be worth to you to be able to call your friends and family for free by using the Internet? ExtremeTech have compared the two newest ways to call friends via the Internet: The SIPphone from Lindows' Michael Robertson vs. the Skype service from the developers of Kazaa."

Comments

But...

[YanceyAI]

Let's face it - none of us like forking over our hard-earned cash every month just to use the phone. Well, how much would it be worth to you to be able to call your friends and family for free by using the Internet?

I don't know about you guys, but I pay more for my cable connection than for my my phone service (as I'm sure many of you DSL users do). It aint anywhere near free, but it'd be nice to consolidate services.

How's Skype on the spyware?

[Nijika]

Just a quick question, since I know KaZaA is rife with it. I'd like to try it out but I don't want to end up with Bonzai Buddy on my desktop eternally or something.

Phone prices too high? Phone companies loathed?

[Anonymous Coward]

I pay $20 a month for my phone line. I pay $50 a month for my internet access, and another $50 a month for my cable television. I also pay $80 a month for my cell phone.

I'd describe my land line as down right affordable!

My cable television and internet access cut out at least once a month. I can't get cell phone reception at my office, at my home, in the car, or even next to a cell phone tower... My phone line always works.

I'd hardly describe my phone company "loathed".

Both appear to have downsides

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd like to see how they compare to established services like NikoTel which is fully SIP compliant, works with a free computer app which runs on Windows and MacOS X, works with any SIP phone, and not only has a free online directory, but also has a subscription service for extremely cheap SIP-to-POTS and/or POTS-to-SIP. I'm in no way affiliated with them, other than as a happy customer of their free service.

Important inaccuracy in their review of Skype

[SteWhite]

They claim Skype has no feedback/echo cancellation and that you need to use either a headset or at least headphones - this is simply not true.

I have used Skype a lot with a 4 speaker setup around me and a free standing desk mic, and I get absolutely *no* feedback or echo, nor does the person I am chatting with. I'd consider it one of Skype's best features in fact. I can sit here and chat totally hands free, and it sounds nicer than your average speakerphone too.

No mention of sipphone with free world dialup

[Anonymous Coward]

Too bad the article doesn't mention how you can reconfigure the sip phone to use Free World Dialup.

Further discussion about the sipphone is available at

http://www.broadbandreports.com/forum/voip
http ://www.pulver.com/fwd/index.html

disclaimer: I use a Cisco ATA-186 with FWD and highly recommend it (FWD uses lines 2 and 3 on all phones in my house :-). Did I mention that it really is FREE and also has an excellent user aand developer mailing list.

And if you enjoy paying money and/or want a real PSTN number, check out Vonage, Packet 8, VoicePulse, or any of the other commercial SIP-based VoIP providers. Or install Asterisk or VOCAL yourself (open source) and become your own VoIP company (also note that http://wholesale.voicepulse.com even allows you to connect your Asterisk PBX to the PSTN)

Finally, the article glosses over the whole SIP protocol which needs special help if you use NAT or a firewall for incoming calls (and also for registering or INVITE commands).

I'd write the above there but I'm too lazy to register here or at extremetech.