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VoIP for Deployed Soldiers?
rickbassham asks: "With VoIP really catching on these days, I decided to look into it for keeping deployed soldiers in touch with family and friends. I am currently a soldier in Iraq, and have the ability to get satellite-based internet, thanks to a few of the locals. While individually it is prohibitively expensive, a group of soldiers can come together to purchase a decent-to-high-speed internet connection. One of my plans is to link other soldiers to Vonage or another VoIP provider, so they will be able to keep in touch. Understanding the latency issues with VoIP via satellite (not to mention the other disadvantages), what upload speed does Slashdot recommend as a minimum for a QoS enabled connection for about 15-20 soldiers? The same for a non-QoS connection? What recommendations do you have for a good VoIP provider?"
I don't know about this particular solider but I have had no problems contacting three friends that were/are deployed in Iraq via the Internet. One was on AIM for 45+ minutes a day and another is on AIM for several hours a day. The third isn't quite as Internet saavy but routinely sent emails and pictures at least weekly. Granted they aren't on 24/7 like we are here but I had no problems contacting them via the Internet.
I would like to know if I was experiencing something that is unusual for military personnel deployed overseas? I mean this guy makes it seem as if he's hanging on to a rope thrown to him by the locals. From what I understand from the one guy I know that just returned from Iraq the locals over there want absolutely NOTHING to do w/the military personnel stationed in the desert.
I also know that phone calls were routinely made to his family and to another buddy that is stationed in the States. Why would they need VoIP and why would they need to do it via satellite connection?
As this guy said, sat-based Internet SUCK HARD for VoIP being that it is so latent. That wouldn't exactly make for real-time conversations regardless of how clear the voice might be... I have run the testers that other slashdotters have linked to before (sorry don't have it on-hand right now) and my 256k upstream seems to rate just fine. I haven't actually used VoIP though so I really couldn't tell you and I certainly couldn't recommend something to handle 15-20 people simulatanously (if that's what you mean).
Skype No pesky service fees as long as all involved have accounts, or you can call for a low low rate, 1.7 Euro a minute.
I hate sigs.
Latency on sat connections can be upwards of 900ms... I don't think VoIP is going to like that very much at all.
+ G to tha Izzo, A to tha Tizee, Talking Giz-oat, Ya'll Bettah Feel Me... +
The latencies associated with a sat connection make voip over one impossible. As bad as latencies appear to be, the sat companies use a lot of tricks to reduce latency with normal web traffic. Those tricks will not work with streaming voice.
When you're talking about several thousand milliseconds of latency, all the bandwidth in the world isn't going to make your VoIP any better. If it takes 2000ms from when the packet leaves your VoIP provider until when it gets to you, no matter what you do, your conversation is going to have a 2000ms delay..
;)
unless I'm wrong, which I'm pretty sure I'm not, but if I am, please post back! I'm sure my VoIP customers would most appreciate it
Satellite Internet has horrible latency, never mind the fact that it is also traveling half way around the globe. Vonage cuts out quite a bit as your latency increases, if it were 200ms per packet, that would be quite a delay and perhaps even borderline unusable.
While I can't really comment on voice over IP as I've never used it I have read a lot about over the Broadband Reports forums. You may want to stop by and ask your question there.
http://www.dslreports.com/forum/voip
Google calculator:
(4 * radius of Earth) / the speed of light = 85.1002062 milliseconds
Don't expect shorter ping roundtrips.
Sat-Internet usually uses GEO satellites, so as you say its really not good for latency sensetive applications, ie. VoIP.
But, if you're thinking about pooling resources, what about some type of satellite phone? Most sat-phones use LEO satellites, so latency isn't a problem. Its true, they are expensive, but if you are pooling resources, it might make it affordable and provide a better quality of service.
Of course, I'm not a soldier, nor do I personally know one, so I can't speak to what's really reasonable there. Also, I'd be curious to know what regulations the military has about personal communications equipment.
CitrusTV (http://www.citrustv.net): the Nation's Oldest & Largest Entirely Student-Run Television Station
Captains are issued Sat Phones. That's how I keep in touch with my buddy.
"Want in one hand and spit in the other and see which one fills up first." - My Dad
Durn kids these days, and their conflabbed newfangled VOIP teknollergy.
Back in the day, when I was stationed overseas, the cheapest way to call home was a service that was hosted by ham radio operators. We'd call up the local ham who would transmit to a us-bound operator who would make the local call to the family. It was always weird talking to your mother to say things like "How are you doing? OVER!" all the time.
Yeah? Well I think you're overrated too.
It seems like this would be something basic the government would provide to the people who are risking their lives EVERYDAY.
Instant messengers (Yahoo!, AIM, MSN, etc.) are free and, most likely, are much easier for your contacts in US to install too.
Good luck!
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
They should post the story and its Comments link after the Comments page is ready to show on Slashdot.
The best sig ever (but I'm keeping mine, thank you).
Back on topic: This reminds me of the Videophones used mostly around these areas by news reporters et al. They look horrible and still lag from the satellites etc. I hope someone finds a way to transmit the pictures (and in this case, the VoIP voices) with optic fiber or tachyons or something, to reduce the lag and keep the quality high.
You can hold down the "B" button for continuous firing.
Half duplex with a 2 second wait in between, I just can't see any other way to do it with Sattelite ping times. I think you're better off with a Sattelite phone so that you don't have the additional bandwidth cosiderations of IP protocol (which with streaming applications is really bad- almost quadrupling the size of the packets).
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
While possible offtopic would like to warning the poster though he mentions he is getting a commerical line.
.... watch your ass, with all going on your don't need a ART15.
As a former theatre level Information Assurance Manager, VOIP works through the great DOD firewall in the sky (to include SWA). I know the current IAM and while he is a good guy, you never know when command is going to get in the mood to bust troopers for stupid shit (like non AKO IM). VIOP is against AR 25-2 and CENTCOM 25-260
De Oppresso Liber
Vonage says this about satellite internet:
Yes, our service generally works with DSL Satellite Internet connections or any Point-to-Point Protocol over Ethernet (PPPoE) device (i.e. your home router). DSL requires Point-to-Point Protocol over Ethernet (PPPoE) authentication "username & password" to access the Internet so you will have to configure your Vonage adapter or home router for this service. There may be some latency inherent on a satellite connection or line of sight issues that could affect audio quality when making calls through the Vonage service. Our calls require 90 kbps of consistent upload/download speed to make and receive calls through the Vonage network.
G.711 only works up to about 250ms each way. After that your MOS score will go down and the voice will just plain start to suck.
G.729 which is smaller in size can handle only about 125ms one way delay before it breaks down and its MOS score will drop off.
Also factor in that human speech typically assumes a pause of about 500ms a change of speaker you could have shitty voice quality with people talking over each other because they thought the other person had stopped speaking.
On Vonage's site, for best voice quality Vonage recommends 90 kbps. That's upstream traffic.
so depending on how many people you want to be able to talk at a time, you should multiply that by the number of people and come up with your upstream traffic requirement.
I'd also recommend you pad that number by 50 to 100% because other programs that try to upload at the same time don't often play nice with Vonage. The bandwidth is supposed to be dedicated while you are talking but other applications try to steal it regularly. It's also useful when you want to surf and talk at the same time to have more bandwidth than you absolutely need.
There are latency issues other people have posted on, you should look for more information on that as well, as I can only speak on the bandwidth situation.
"All great wisdom is contained in .signature files"
Reminds me of a line from Network...
I used VoIP in Iraq/Kuwait when I was there.
Worked great. As long as you only go through 1 sat hop, it really wasn't that bad. It's better than nothing. I used packet8 out there btw.
Back in the US,
ChiefArcher
I would test-drive your VoIP provider of choice over the connection before you drop the bucks, if VoIP is a make-or-break.
I've had both satellite Internet (Starband...yeeech) and Vonage (after I was able to get cable). While I love Vonage, I would not want to dream of that over satellite latency.
On top of that, a 2-directional satellite system is unlikely to have the upstream bandwidth to make this smooth. Vonage has a "bandwidth saver" that you can enable, but that might be like pissing in the ocean.
That being said, a high-speed, albeit high-latency connection is a very very good thing(tm) even without voice.
Your bandwidth is still limited, so some traffic shaping and transparent http proxying might be in order.
For the communications side of it, perhaps set up a (possibly private) IRC channel where your buddies and family can hang out. You could even setup a local IRC server on your gateway box and link it with an ircd in the states. Don't know how much bandwidth you would save, but it would be cool.
My hats off to you and all of our fighting forces. Whether the war is just or not is an issue with the government, you guys go in harm's way every day.
For 2 things:
1) Clearance to do this
2) Assuming 1) is OK, recommendations on local connections.
If you don't mind the HUGE latency, I'm sure one of the many Linux fanatic can conjure up a neat vanilla box outfitted with six PCI-based audio cards and carry up to six conversation at once.
Free phone calls may be well-received by most soilders who are desperate to hear the voice of their love ones (delayed or not).
The core technology, that being said, is the Internet connection. You say you have it already.
Just ask one of the many USA-based>/A> LUG groups for a donation of a box complete with six headsets.
Just ask! Many of them are patriotic.
ITU-T recommendations for toll-quality voice are 150ms round-trip latency which you've got Buckley's chance of getting across a Sat link. That being said, if your expectations are that you are using a Satellite phone, then much higher figures might be quite acceptable. I second the vote for Skype. The iLBC codec it uses degrades very gracefully over low-quality links.
I am putting a laptop onto Mt. Everest next month, and want to run Asterisk on it. Only problem is the latency on the channel and the Maoist Rebels. Oh, and the fact that most hard disks seem to be only rated to run up to 10000 feet. And the nasty temperature swings and the fact that most of the climbers will be too tired to bother running the lab right.
It's easy for me to empathize with the desires of these soldiers . . . they are away from home longer than I am, and they are risking their lives. I can completely understand their desire for something more than IM and cheaper than normal long distance rates for hearing the voices of their loved ones . . .
I work for a VoIP company that sells wholesale termination to customers in various coutries around the globe. Many of our customers come from locations where a landline isn't an option, and use satellite to carry their VoIP to us. From their experience we can say that on average, you're going to be able to handle about 7 simultaneous calls per 128Kbits of upstream. The calls themselves only take up about 12Kbits (each direction) per call, but there will be other data you're likely to be contending with that will eat up some of your available bandwidth.
As others have said, latency is going to be a problem, but from that part of the world, your likely already experience the joys of satellite latency in your "normal" calls. Again, our experience here is that as long as you can keep your latency below about 750ms you're going to have usable calls. A big factor here is the number of satellite hops your provider is send you through. A single hop will keep you under 750, while two hops will generally break the 1000ms barrier.
Anyway, hope those numbers help you in your considerations, and take care.
never mind the fact that it is also traveling half way around the globe.
So cable connections go through it? That would explain...
The problem with VoIP cutting out isn't latency, it's jitter and packet loss. Jitter being the delta between the difference in arrivial time between packets. For example if you have the following
Packets:
1 - 200ms
2 - 180ms
3 - 240ms
You have a maximum of 60ms of jitter between 2 and 3.
If there is consistent latency but low jitter and loss packet rate will still be smooth and the voice quality will be as well, minus the general delay from sending to receiving. Any VoIP solution accounts for jitter and decent ones have dynamic jitter buffers which can stretch out pretty good on poor quality lines. Still nothing's perfect.
I've been involved with a few VoIP deployments using INMRASAT satellite connections and have been successful. Average RTT 1.2s and over 2s if it's a double hop, say from the US to the middle east (needs to go through Germany).
To help with the original question, adding QoS to the line isn't going to change the BW requirements, what it should do is keep the packet loss and jitter down depending on the queuing mechanisms used. I wouldn't however count on your satellite provider handling QoS, or for that matter the public backbone.
Latency in this application will kill your sound quality far more than a few dropped packets. Optimally you'll want to be under 300ms for things to be manageable.
The other main thing to look for is a CODEC you can use with your chosen provider that uses as little bandwidth as possible and supports loss concealment. You need to worry about those two factors long before QOS becomes relevant to the equation.
---
Segmentation Fault ( core dumped )
One of the PCs on my home network hosts a Ventrilo http://ventrilo.com/ server (very minor overhead.) My group of friends installed the small client software and connect to a password protect "chat" room.
Push-to-talk and voice-activated modes are offered. The client software offers enough options to (possibly) intimidate new users, but once configured it is as easy as it gets.
However, a previous post mentioned the use of AIM to communicate with troops overseas. Many IM clients are now integrating voice/video communication. I believe MSN offers voice and video, and I think AIM has voice as well.
For PC voice communication, I suggest using a decent mic in a fixed location as well as a pair of headphones. The new Logitech webcam I have offers cool face-tracking features as well as an integrated mic.
Question to all: anyone aware of a Windows VOIP app that integrates strong encryption?? I believe Nero's SIPPS http://www.nero.com/us/632232585951420.html/ offers this feature, but I'm looking for an Open Source product. Free would be nice. Anyone??
Como? Cuando? Que?
I am not in Iraq, but I use a satellite based internet service called Starband (http://www.starband.com/) and I have a (claimed) 500/128kbit connection, but I usually get 50kbit/sec upstream. Using Vonage with a Motorola VT1000 VoIP terminal and the "Bandwith Saver" fuction turned down to 30kbits/sec I have no problem making and reciving one call at a time. I have the VT1000 in between the network and the satellite modem so that I don't kill my call when I download a webpage. The latency is about 1 sec, but once you get into a conversation you hardly notice it. For $24.99/month for Unlimited Incoming (to a US number that your families can call for a minimal fee - or even free) and Outgoing calls to the US and Canada, this cannot be beat. Good luck to yourself and all your fellow soliders in Iraq. Thank You, Jamie
Google would have been a lot more usefull for ths guy than the political flamewar here on /.
Bot Assisted Blogging
In this case - the speed of light (speed of the electromagnetic spectrum) is just not fast enough for VOIP - no matter how much bandwidth or QOSing you want to do.
Think of what you see when you're watching someone on the news "live" from somewhere via satelite. There is at least a full 1-2 second delay before he/she responds to a question. Thats the speed of light delay causing that, you've hit a brick wall of physics.
You may still use VOIP - and the quality will not be bad - but dont expect any kind of normal telephone experience. You (and the people you talk to) could get used to a kind of walkie-talkie VOIP experience that may be the best.
---- "Logoff! That cookie shit makes me nervous!" - A. Soprano
Not to sound like a shill for Vonage, but I thought I remembered a story about them offering free calls to troops. A quick google turned up this:
Soldiers Take Advantage Of Free Phone Service From Vonage
December 29, 2004
By Staff
More than 200,000 phone calls were made in 2004 by U.S. soldiers in Iraq to loved ones back home, thanks to the free phone service provided by Vonage Holdings Corp., a provider of broadband phone service.
Vonage plans to continue this program throughout 2005.
"Vonage has noticed an increase in calls during the holiday season and is glad we have been able to give our troops the ability to call their families to say happy holidays and tell them how much they are missed and wish them a great New Year," stated Jeffrey A. Citron, chairman and CEO of Vonage Holdings Corp.
"We recognize the sacrifices the men and women of the United States Armed Forces are making in Iraq and Afghanistan, and although we cannot do anything to get them back to their families any faster, we are doing our best to use our service to help make the loneliness of their deployment a little more bearable."
I am looking at VoIP for my home telco connection - get the IP box, place it in my DMZ, and connect the RJ11 to the telco block in the house I am renting, making all the RJ11 jacks in the house hot.
p ort/4 74598.html
1 /02/173220 30 /21 162194 /181622 8
i cePulse connect.voicepulse.com
;)
Some of my research included posting to some Live Journal communities I am a member of; which brought some interesting replies. The best thread is:
http://www.livejournal.com/community/techsup
Also Slashdot had a few VoIP articles in the first week of January:
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/0
http://ask.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/12/3
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/01/0
Going to CES this year (thanks to my employer) was a blessing, talking with a few VoIP providers. After the rumblings I received in the Live Journal post, my experience at the Vonage booth was not impressive. Considering they are the most expensive VoIP out there, and had one of the largest booths, their ignoring me and snotty attitudes did not impress me at all. Also, Vonage and CallVantage do not like the open source community and make there devices locked. So that if you buy one and don't like their service you are left with a useless brick. So, I am leaning away from them Vonage and looking at BroadVoice.
From a lovely conversation with the BroadVoice [www.broadvoice.com] sales folk at CES, they have a Unlimited World plan for $20 a month - includes quite a few European countries as well as some in South America and the Far East. Nothing like that with Vonage! I have yet to research them on broadbandreports.com yet though...
NuFone www.nufone.net comes highly recommended from several people in my local Linux User's Group
Others I have heard good things or heard about:
Nuvio
NexGenesis Telemedia
Golinx.net
Lingo.com
Packet8.com
Vo
www.voip-info.org is the place to go for all things voip and has a good index of voip providers.
YMMV - IANAL
HTH!
Recently home from the great sandbox! The way we did it was through our conractor friends. They had access to VOIP, I'm sorry I don't remember what brand however. I know they were relying on Satellite to transmit as well. Anyways, good luck over there! Oh, and join the AF, we have plenty of DSN lines.. :)
Something to consider as well. I would bet any number of local to the families HAMS would be willing to give it a try to talk to Iraq, and that leaves the soldiers there with just coming up with some comms and freqs on their end. No idea on if they could use what their radio guys already have though, or the rules, etc, but it's a time tested method for point A to B communications.
I know it's not exactly what you want to hear, but perhaps you should think about doing a "video mail" kind of thing.
With a web cam one records a little video of themselves with voice, and then attaches to an email (if it's short enough) or get some space on the interwow to hold it before someone comes online to download it. Family and friends would get a web cam and do that same thing.
For interactivity you have IM text only messages.
Is there a website that makes this easy? Should there be one?
That's only true of geostat satelites.
If you use a service like Iridium or Globalstar then you're dealing with LEO sat's which have much lower latency. They are probably only about 500km away.
Unfortunately i've never seen a data service faster than 9600 on an LEO satelite - you'd struggle to get any VoIP over that.
Given the huge per minute charges it'd make more sense just to use their phone service.
Coasting...
Jitter is definitely the kicker for VOIP, delay isn't that big of a deal.
I understand about the delay. But how does jitter effect the call? What is it exactly?
You're probably satcomming though equipment I designed. :)
Maybe Vonage or one of the others can be sweet talked into offering free service as a PR move? Casually mention the highest rated Superbowl commercial was Budweiser's tribute to the troops.
Stay safe.
A retired soldier (Col Dave Hughes)(http://www.odessaoffice.com/wireless/Himal ayas/Hughes.htm) who set up a wireless network in Nepal has used Skype to talk to the folks there from his home in Colorado, with little latency and good quality. The connection included a sat internet connection and several hops via wireless connection in Nepal.
To answer your question, you're going to need about 4-5kb/sec for a Vonage box on the Low Quality setting. For 20 soldiers, you would want to have 100kb/sec upload which is pretty big. I would suggest just having 2 or 3 boxes and share. You might want to hook up one box to a bad dialup connection and see how it works out. Packet8 devices use a different codec and supposedly handle low bandwidth/high latency better, but I havent seen this myself.
Speak Freely offers a variety of compression modes including some modes that'll squeeze your voice comms down to well under 14.4kbit. You can also enable solid crypto if you need some privacy. [if allowed]
Download at www.speakfreely.org
1 - .338 Lapua Magnum 225 grain match grade round of ammo, $1.17
1 - Blaser LRS2 Level 3 Sporting Rifle, $4500
5 years of tactical sniper training, $1 mil +
Ridding the planet of "worthless, walking turds", PRICELESS...
For everything else, there is a grenade...
--E--
fuck you all you fucking yankys from new zealand
I saw this post and felt I should reply to address some misconceptions about voip and satellite. As CTO of an Iraqi ISP http://www.tigrisnet.net/ who offer wireless broadband service throughout Baghdad and Basra, I have many customers who are like you, groups of soldiers who got together to buy a connection for their barracks.
Our wirless broadband is fed by dedicated bandwidth over C-band satellite so the latency to our NOCs in downtown Baghdad and Basra is around 550ms but absolutely constant and reliable at that rtt, unlike VSAT services which are normally heavily contended and can indeed show wildly varying ping times in the 1000-2000ms range, indeed very bad for VOIP, either SIP or skype wont like that.
Of course round trip time is twice the delay that will affect voice calls, as voice delay is only the "throw" from my phone to your phone for a RTP packet. So around 1/4 sec of one-way delay makes for very acceptable voice quality.
Aside from the latency of Sat service, unless you have a way to prioritize the VOIP traffic, you'll also be fighting for bandwidth against any other internet usage over that connection. Even on a fast, low latency connection - my VOIP suffers severely if I have a few Bittorrent downloads going.
One day somebody on the bird saw two red lights on on the PBX, but didn't see anybody talking on the phone, and needless to say this was .... disturbing.... So they went to track it down - some grunt had gotten a 16-button Autovon phone (with the extra precedence TouchTones) and had dialed the base PBX, dialed up to the bird's PBX, dialed across it to an outgoing line back to the ground, which needless to say had permission to call anywhere in the world at any priority it wanted, and was yakking with his buddies in Guam (normally something a grunt didn't have authorization to use routine scarce resources for, much less tandem-routing through Looking Glass. He was very busted.)
The Offutt PBX also had an FX line to somewhere a few hundred miles away like Des Moines - if Bad Things were happening in Omaha, you could access it remotely, and folks on the bird could use it to call out and find if people were Not Dead Yet.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Yes. And they all, without exception have beards and are of a terrorist nature.
It would appear that the insurgents have mod points today.
Anyway, as long as it is not against its duty, there is not also too much problem letting him call wherever he (the former or the new one) wants to.
Why can't
I've done it with up to two sat hops without much problem. For a geo-synch bird, expect 620-630ms latency roundtrip from one end of the connection to the other for each earth-sat-earth hop in the path.
VoIP guidelines generally say 150ms is the latency limit, but in my experience, jitter is more important to overall call quality. A stable, low jitter connection with higher latency will have a higher MOS score (sound better) than a high jitter, low average latency connection.
For reference, my config was using a Cisco 7910G ip phone, 3524XL PoE switch, 2621 router, sat netmodem (iDirect), satellite (AMC-5, I think is the bird we used to test with), groundstation, 7206VXR, Cat6509, MCS7835 with Call Manager 3.3, and AS5350 with 1 PRI as a POTS gateway.
I conducted several multiparty conference calls using this setup as part of a dog and pony show and all the executives thought the quality was at least acceptable.
Code selection is also important. G.711 will usually sound better, use less processor resources, and will have a lower inherent latency. However G.711 requires a minimum of 64K per call, just for the voice portion. Add IP overhead and you're looking around 70K per call.
G.729a is probably a better choice, but there will be a slight delay and quality penalty. Jitter may be higher as well depending what else the processor is handling at the same time. Bandwidth requirements will drop to around 14-16K per call, with overhead, however.
QoS is important if you're going to use the link for other traffic besides voice. You want to make sure that your voice packets, regardless of codec, are prioritized and handled before any other traffic crossing the link. Since you've already blown your delay budget (the 150ms I mentioned earlier), you need to try to make sure that the jitter buffers are buffering enough data to smooth out the voice traffic, also.
In conclusion, VoIPoSat isn't trivial, but it is doable. There will have to be significant performance tuning in the network to control jitter.
As always, YMMV.
Joe
Sig??? I don't need no stinkin Sig!
That was one of the more disgustingly false pieces of drivel I've had the misfortune of reading in a long time. It doesn't deserve a rebuttal, but neither can it be left unanswered.
A soldier doesn't just kill or be killed. Soldiers have objectives that span the gamut from destroying to rebuilding, and from killing to healing the sick and wounded.
A soldier doesn't give up his family or friends. For many a soldier, his family is the single most important part of his life. The desire to return home to resume a life with those same family and friends can be the single most motivating force.
A soldier doesn't give up a career. For some, the military is a career, for others the military is the first real job they've ever had. At most, a reservist will have his career put on pause during his active service.
The soldier that only understands killing is a very bad soldier indeed. Such a soldier doesn't pay attention to the many shades of gray between friend and foe, nor to the extremely important distinction between minimal and maximal force.
Yes, war changes people, in ways that are powerful and profound. And no...you will never be quite the same person afterwards. But love and friendship also change people irrevocably. Many will find mental and emotional trauma on the battlefield, and many will become stronger from the experience.
As far as the specific issue of the phone, you have no understanding of history and war if you don't recognize that communication with one's family and friends at home has been a staple of the soldier's life as long as there have been ways of sending those commmunications.
I pity the soldier who has no interest in communicating with his loved ones, for there is a lonely soul indeed.
And I pity you because your astonishing failure to understand humanity and the human condition make you a very very small-minded person indeed.
-With sorry
-Tupshin
Your point that you'll probably already be on satellite is right on. People like to quote 150ms numbers about the maximum latency they'll accept, forgetting that the world's fairly far around, and while VOIP's a little bit sensitive to latency and adds a small amount of delay, the big delays are just unavoidable physics and the human ear's willingness to work around it. As long as you've got echo suppression / cancellation, the excess latency is a bit annoying but nothing killer.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
..I currently have 2 phone numbers from WorldBand Communications It's an inexpensive service and has been extremely reliable. I should disclose that this IS my employer, but I'd like to add that while I'm loyal to my employer, I wouldn't keep a phone service that sucked, nor would I solicit that service unless it was worth while. Check it out.
A very good solution is to use TeamSpeak.
With a good hosting service you pay $5 per month for up to 10 people 24/7.
You can find more at www.goteamspeak.com.
It's free, you just need a headset. I've been speaking with my girlfriend in Venezuela for a month from the US and the quality is great.
A good TS hosting service is at teamspeakhost.com. I pay $5 per month and 10 people.
What you do is create rooms for people to talk in. You can have as many rooms as you want. The service is on all the time and the lag is not bad at all.
Isn't this exactly why this shouldn't be allowed, non-controlled open access communication lines cost lives (I expect) ...
Soldier boy: "Hi Mom, can't talk now we're about to launch a top secret raid on Mizp'hak - those Iraqi's won't know what hit them"
Iraqi General: "Don't call me Mom"
Grow up, dude. Not every problem is best solved with violence. This isn't recess.
Maybe violence doesn't solve every problem, but it is a lucrative business...
;-}
With an initial investment of $10k, you can net $25k per job.
Hay, I don't make the rules, I just live by them.
--E--
1. Roundtrip latency (ping gnd to bird to gnd, plus reply gnd to bird to gnd) runs around 520 mSec for an SCPC (Single Channel Per Carrier) satellite link with sat-optimized TCP/IP stack. Toll-quality voice is easy with Cisco gear and our trade-secret methodology.
2. You almost certainly are using a DAMA (Demand-Assigned Multiple Access) link for Internet feed via satellite. This is a demand-based TDMA-like link, whereby sometimes your packet goes out "immediately", and some other times has to wait for the next (or next...) slot to be made available. Ping times could run 600-700 mSec best-case, but can vary to 1200 - 2400 mSec between one ping and the next. This is alright for Internet access, but sucks for VoIP.
(DAMA allows far more users per satellite bandwidth, and bandwidth costs are the biggest ongoing expense of using a satellite link. For non-time-sensitive applications like web browsing it's a no-brainer choice).
3. Having said that, it'd be worth a try if you already have the sat. link in place, but I very much doubt that you'd find it acceptable on a DAMA system.
4. My location at ~49N x ~122W is ~38,694 Km from the PanAmSat G4R satellite at 99W degrees above the equator. Take speed of light over twice that distance (up + down), allow for modulation and demodulation latencies (10-40 mSec), and you'll approach the end-to-end sat. latency. Round trip times on our network are around 520 mSec, which is a small delay that phone users quickly get used to.
With SightSpeed (www.sightspeed.com) you can SEE and talk to your family back home as long as both of you have webcams and PCs/Macs. The basic service, which includes unlimited audio calling, is free, but I know the company would offer the unlimited video calling plan, which is normally $49/year, free to military folks. SightSpeed offers very good quality video at relatively low data rates (100 kbps and up) but also works (without smooth video) with dial-up connections. The service has almost no latency itself, so it would work well over satellite. In fact, I had a conversation myself with a soldier in Iraq at an "Internet Cafe" and the connection was quite good! With SightSpeed, only one person needs a subscription (free or paid) to have an audio or video call with someone else. The non-user can go to the subscriber's "My SightSpeed" page and be almost instantly connected, but that feature only works with Windows and IE. You can also send video mails to anyone with an email address. These features make it easy to connect to friends and family without them needing to download software and register. The bottom line is a better service (voice and video) for less money than most VoIP services (but it is only for computer to computer calls).
there is also nothing wrong with modding you down for being an idiot.
Or maybe you'd like that.
It depends on what's being said. "Hi mom, I'm not dead" is probably pretty safe. As would be asking about things at home, as anything going on at home is probably either family-related or broadcast over nation airwaves.
The US Army can't even manage to pay their troops, and you expect them to provide communications?
Now, how would that work with VoIP, which is usually entirely via UDP?
I tried using a GS budgetone over a sat connection in brazil last year. I couldnt get it to work to well, one side could hear at times, but not talk. Just the other day, my friend down there told me to install skpye. I did and was able to talk to him over the connection. Horrible latency, almost had to say "over" BUT, it did work and we were able to talk ok. I can speak Portuguese and he can speak English, but neither of us can type that well in the corresponding language -lol
has anyone gotten skype to work with asterisk yet???
I've lived on a compound in Kazakhstan with 85 other American and Canadian familes for the past 2 years. Since my job is communications, I get questioned about VoIP services all the time.
Many of the folks here use a low speed DSL service (metered) that traverses two satellite hops before it gets to North America. With the satellite delay and congestion the round trip delay can reach 2 seconds at times.
I'm an iConnecthere user and have a Cisco ATA that allows me to get incoming calls. Many others here are Vonage users with several variants of ATA devices. Most folks think it's pretty spooky that someone in the States can dial a US number and it rings half way around the world. I actually got a call one night from a UPS delivery person trying to get in the gate at my father-in-law's house. Wierd.
Generally, the delay is only an issue if you or the people you are calling just can't learn to shut up. You do have to wait for people to finish. The voice quality is variable, but usually amazingly good if you think about what you are doing and how far your voice is actually going.
More recently people have been using Skype. The great advantage is that since it works like an IM service, you don't have to worry about whether people are going to be home to receive your call, or set up some sort of schedule with them. Also, the voice quality of Skype is nothing less than amazing.
So, bottom line is - you pays your money (or not, in the case of Skype) and you makes your choice. There are a lot of options.
"You can't have everything. Where would you keep it?" -- Steven Wright
Yes. And they all, without exception have beards and are of a terrorist nature.
:)
This is Iraq. Everyone has a mustache and bears a striking resemblance to their ex leader.
(Joking aside there is some truth to this... if you've ever seen archived footage of old gatherings you'd get hundreds of lookalikes all together. Even today when they interview someone on TV there's an even chance they'll have the little mustache).
During my last deployment to Iraq (and surely, during my upcoming one) we had a number of communication options, ranging from cheap to pricey, crappy to great.
The first mode I was introduced to is free for most soldiers. It's called DNVT (don't ask me what it stands for, I'm not a commo guy). Basically it's a phone that connects either through hard-wired connection or via a line of sight radio connection. It's relayed through to the military's DSN network (a military-only phone system) where you can call any military facility in the world. Up to this point it's free, but notoriously spotty, mainly because of communication priorities of different units (my squadron had lower pri vs. our regiment), and that "morale" calls have low priority as well (keep in mind, these commo networks are used for operational needs primarily).
Once you contact the military base of your choice, the operator on base can connect you with any local number for free, or with a long distance operator for collect or calling card calls. (For a good example of this in reverse, watch Heartbreak Ridge.
The second option is through a satellite phone. Several providers are available out there, from AT&T to Thuraya, and they're all expensive.
The third option is through an AT&T call center, which is basically satellite as well. More expensive than the DNVT, but not too bad.
The fourth option was actually VOIP through Segovia, which was paid for through the military. Segovia provided a satellite internet connection for various FOBs (forward operating base), plus set up Cisco VOIP phones. You had to buy minutes through Segovia , but it worked out to about $.05/minute. Reliability was a bit of an issue. If bandwidth or the connection crapped out, calls either became unintelligible or just didn't go through in the first place.
Many comments have been made that communication home should be free, and in a lot of places it is, just not high quality or convenient all the time. Some units provide video tele-conferencing for their soldiers, when available, so they can talk "face to face" with their families. Commanders realize how important communication with "the rear" is, and by and large make every effort to make that happen. Plus, many organizations provide free calling cards to soldiers.
But I'd agree with most posters that every effort should be provided to maintain communication with the homefront for our soldiers.
When I was deployed to Saudi Arabia back in the Fall of '02, I used Vonage... but I left it at home. How? When I signed up for Vonage, I picked a number that was a local call from a military installation (in my case, a Boston number that's local to Hanscom Field).
Now... here's how I called home for free while deployed:
STEP 1:
I went to the Vonage web page, set my service up to forward any calls to whatever number I wanted to reach (since Vonage is free long distance, I could forward to anyone in the US or Canada).
STEP 2:
Call the Hanscom Field operator (military to military base calls are free when deployed). Ask operator to connect me to my local Vonage number, since they can't connect to a long-distance number.
STEP 3:
When the operator connected me to my Vonage number, it would ring the person I wanted to call since I entered their number as the forwarding destination for my Vonage service (through the Vonage web site).
Now, technically I didn't use VOIP for the call, but in a round about way I did make use of the Vonage service. I'd be wary of using VOIP in the field anyway, as all Internet activity goes over satcom which has extremely high latency.
Ben
It goes against the /. groupthink. Don't worry. Not all of us feel that way.
Hi Rick,
It's not all that hard and you can do it for close to free other than the sat bandwidth and terminal cost. You can use free softphones like xten.com or cheap analog adapters such as the linksys PAP2. You can connect up to some free services like FWD or iptel.org or connect to things like Vonage depending on if the loved ones back in the US have Broadband or not. The iLBC codec has been one of the best but G.729 has also worked fine. The problem is not packet loss or QoS so much on these links as it is the latency. The latency will suck but it beats not being able to talk to people at all and people will learn how to have conversation over it. (I lived on a fish boat for a long time and have some clue what it's like not to be able to talk to your family for months at a time).
I am a distinguished engineer in voice at cisco and would be glad to help you get going if you are serious about doing this. I helped deploy another voip sat based system to Nepal over vsat and 802.11. You can see some photos about it at http://www.linkingeverest.com/gallery/albums.php
Cullen
As it relates to Vonage, you might want to check out http://www.vonage-forum.com/ They have a ton of resources regarding VoIP and a cool broadband VoIP speed test.
I've been using this for 6 months to a year without a major problem. I've occassionally experienced jutter in the first 1/2 second of a connection, but other than that all is fine. You get used to the latency quickly enough.
I would point out that you want to check with your ISP that they don't have any issues with VOIP traffic, or shape it in such a way as to detrimentally affect your calls. My provider gave me the option of a refund in the first 30 days if I wasn't happy, so I could evaluate that.
As a contractor deployed to support 1st Marine Expeditionary Force working on Command and Control systems, I've had the opportunity to do some morale work in theater such as setting up numerous Internet Cafes throughout Iraq. Being well aware of bureacracy associated with the procurement of satellite connections, I encourage you to seek out authorization first as I know personally that throughout all Marine Corps bases in theater it is illegal to own one personally. Why? Operational Security. If an attack occurs, we go into a period of no communications with the outside world until the attack is investigated and next of kin is notified. If it is found that you have circumvented this by purchasing your own service, prepare to have the equipment confiscated. Operational Security is paramount. Now I can see that you're looking at Orbit. I've unfortunately had to deal with them personally and two things you need to consider. First is that the service puts you on a shared channel. Secondly, Iraqis are not bound by laws governing false advertising. It would be nice to have such bandwidth rates, but unfortunately that is not the case. You can expect about 300k down and around 20k up. Now if you can get 8 sat dishes you can argue to be put on the same channel and then it's a wonderful experience. This however is costly. Latency is around 1000 to 1200ms on a good day. VSAT is used out here quite a bit, and it's not all that bad. In fact most of the Internet Cafes use them. The advertised package for them with a 1mb down and 256kb up is 20 computer and 4 VOIP phones. Having done this for a year, I've learned you're going to require at least 22.5k per phone to get a connection. Base your implementation of this after performing some broadband tests on the satellite themself. Finally... service providers for VOIP. There are two that I've used. With them, you can get down to 4 cents a minute. You can try "http://www.segoviaip.com" or try to work with SPAWAR using "http://ipcalling.openband.net/debit/openband/" Again, I emphasize getting authorization and don't expect miracles from any ISP out here in theater. They want your business but don't deliver on promises.
I'm the CTO and of the BusinessCom Internet via Satellite (www.bcsatellite.net) which is widely deploying VSAT and VoIP links worldwide and particulary for US Soldiers in Iraq. We have more than 1500 US soldiers currently using our services in Iraq and Afghanistan to communicate back with their dear ones in US and everybody seem to be pretty happy. I can't say we offer the cheapest service in the world, more like we are insisting on the optimal balance of price and performance. First of all, to assure the adequate quality of the VoIP phone call, the customer should understand that there's a variety of VSAT technologies available on the market.
Below, I would just paste the standard text of my reply to compare several VSAT
technologies which are present on the market. In a nutshell - this is
how the broadband satellite industry looks today:
1. Hughes and Gilat are the largest players with DirecWay, PES, Starband,
Spacenet, and other services. The thing to keep in mind about these guys is
that their solutions were designed for credit card approvals and lottery
ticket sales. They were designed for transaction-oriented services -
occasional short transmissions, and they do an excellent job of this. What
you see is an attempt to shoe-horn their technology into the IP WAN business
when it was never designed for it - and it does a poor to mediocre job of
this. They have long latency (3 second transaction time was part of the
original design criteria), horrible jitter which kills VoIP or requires
large jitter buffers that store the voice for an extra second or two to
remove the jitter, and their data service is inefficient and sluggish.
This class of stations is priced approximately 2000 Euro for the standard
system.
2. DVB/RCS and similar systems from companies like Viasat Linkstar, Shiron,
Tachyon, Vipersat and others. These systems are an improvement over the
Hughes/Gilat stuff, but they have done little to improve the uplink
technology. Jitter continues to be a big problem for these products. They do
not support voice well; they take up to 10 seconds to allocate CIR bandwidth
(when they support it), pings are longer and more inconsistent, etc. The
hardware prices are usually pretty good, but the service prices tend to be
higher because of the inefficiency. Because of this many of the network
operators who sell these services tend to oversubscribe their networks too
much, which creates poor performance. The business model is designed so that
you can only make money with large oversubscribed networks, rather than
smaller customized networks like iDirect. However, DVB/RCS is still the best
system on the market for home and small office/Internet cafe access where
VoIP/VTC is not required. DVB/RCS class of stations is priced similiarly to
the traditional TDMA systems, approximately 2000 Euro for the standard system.
3. DVB/SCPC uses shared bandwidth on the download and SCPC on the upload.
This isn't a bad solution, but it is expensive, because the uplink bandwidth
is completely dedicated and is therefore very expensive. Adding to the cost
is the fact that a small amount of guard band is required between each SCPC
carrier and this wasted capacity has to be built into the cost. This
solution generally requires a mishmash of equipment. DVB receivers plus an
SCPC modem, with Cisco router, Mentat TCP Acceleration, and if you want any
QoS you have to add a Sitara or Packeteer or Allot box. The combined cost of
all these devices, and the expensive nature of the SCPC uplink make this a
costly solution with many potential points of failure and finger-pointing.
DVB/SCPC stations price is varying, depending on the particular configuration
of antenna and BUC. Usually it is within 9000-15000 Euro range for the
mid-level station suitable for up to 1 mbit/s uplink.
4. iDirect - This is the first system that was designed from the ground up
to support IP in a WAN environment. The real
Hitler, Bush, Castro, their all dictators so it makes little difference.
Here in Balad, Iraq- we have VoIP. They're all Cisco Systems phones and for $50.00 you get 20 hours of calling. Not too bad. I am up here in LSA Anaconda. W00t.
Joseph Burlas Owner/Director, USA The Braxas Corporation
In Kosovo we ran a cisco router with POTS (plain old telephone system) and an ISDN-PRI ports. This worked very well, latency of course is a problem, ping times were approximately 600ms, and echo canceling wasn't working all that well. But considering the alternative (insecure and extremeley expensive) landlines this was quite nice. For only 10-20 soldiers you will want perhaps 100k/s. The cisco router can compress the phone call down to approximately 15-16 kbps. Of course, if you want high quality or faxing you will use a full 64kbps. Good luck!
Satellite latency is not a big obstacle to VOIP, no more so than it is to traditional phone communications. Yes, it adds a lot of latency, but so do many long distance calls from less develoepd nations, or bad cellular providers. It's not an issue, just a fact you have to accept.
I use 8kbps per call, and the quality is acceptable.
Second: QoS - not as necessary as you might think. If the bandwidth is reasonable, it should work fine. As long as the latency isn't fluctuating like mad, and you aren't dropping packets, you should be good.
As a simple rule of thumb, most voice over internet connections suggest 16-32K of bandwidth. If you're going to push voice for 15 people with QoS then dedicate 480K, for 20 people get 640K.
If you will not have QoS on the connection, then beware of Xbox or other gaming terminals and other devices that suck up bandwidth. The people on those devices may become very unpopular.
Other than bandwidth sucking applications, you should generally be able to get by on 32K per device connected (computer, telephone, email reader) and provide reasonably fast web surfing and email access alongside decent VoIP.
I'd love to know how this turns out for you as I have several friends over there also interested.
If you're willing to tolerate it, you coud cram 18 or so simultaneous calls using the lpc10 codec. "Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto, Mata ah-oo hima de!"
"Avoid employing unlucky people - throw half of the pile of CVs in the bin without reading them." -- David Brent
Now most consumer-grade sat connections suck balls and have a high error rate. That is why you won't want to run VoIP over a cheap sat connection.
Now if you have the $$ for a decent connection (say, you're an ISP, or purchasing bandwidth from an ISP who has a good sat connection), you should be able to successfully route VoIP over it. Read comments like this comment for more details from people who are actually doing this.
"Avoid employing unlucky people - throw half of the pile of CVs in the bin without reading them." -- David Brent
I tried to get VOIP via Vonage in Canada, and based on my experience would stay well clear of them. Their technology worked extremely well, but they neglected to mention that while they provide service in my area code, they do not service my local calling area. So even though I was told I could keep my old phone number, I was actually assigned a number that is long distance from here.
They promised a full refund, but then tried to ding me for a cancellation fee.
So based on that experience, I'd recommend that people go with anyone other than Vonage.
--Tom
Blasphemy is a human right. Blasphemophobia kills.
Maybe you should realise that the one nation on earth that can not be reasoned with is the US... your notion of "good guys vs. bad guys" is about 180-degrees out of whack ;)
Care to name any of these "legions of people"? This is great fun.
I use a satellite Internet connection in the US and the only VoIP provider I have found that can keep a call going over my connection is http://www.crystalvoicelive.com/. The latency is still really high, but the calls sound fine.
You'd think ... but moral is a vital element on warfare and giving away to the enemey that moral is low could prompt an in-opportune attack (is) there is such thing as an oppotune attack ... hmm!?).
...
For a cunning adversary you'd also be supplying material that could be used in a fake kidnap or in an interrogation scenario.
Anyway
I'm against the Iraq war, to begin with, so let's preface with that.
Now, that being said, what you said disgusts and greatly saddens me. I know several soldiers, both former and current. My father and both grandfathers were soldiers. I have the greatest of respect for those who are willing to put their lives on the line for a cause they believe in. And you know what? Soldiers don't choose the wars they go to.
Many soldiers have families, and love them as much as anyone else would. Their families miss them greatly when they are away. If some way is available to make communication easier, let's do it. And let's not spew garbage. Some soldiers and ex-soldiers are not the greatest people, granted, but that's true of any group you pick. Most soldiers I've met are the men and women of honor you would hope to see in such positions.
What really shocks me is that this post was apparently modded up before being knocked down where it belongs. An attack against ANY group based on a stereotype is a troll, and should be modded as such.
To fight the war on terror, stop being afraid.
That would be: make sure there are as little of your civilians around as possible. Fear the day others follow that rule.
Lars T.
To the guy who modded me down from perfect to terrible Karma - Apple haters still suck