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Internet Telephony© 2008 Max Lent
To successfully use Internet telephony the requirements are that your computer must have a full duplex sound card and that it have either speakers and a microphone or a headset with a microphone. A half duplex sound card (usually found only on older or very cheap computers) will prevent both people from being able to hear each other if they both talk at once. Faster computers and faster connection speeds increase the sound quality of the conversation. What is great about free Internet telephony is that it is free. What is not great about Internet telephony is that the sound quality is not as good as you would expect from high quality national long distance service. There is often a delay between a speaker talks and when they are heard. This is called latency. If you have ever had a bad telephone connection to countries like India, Mexico, or Indonesia you have experienced latency. After a few unsuccessful attempts at a rapid interchange, the latency will train you to wait until the other person stops speaking before you speak. The result is the other person hearing abnormal silence between when they stop speaking and when you start. International callers get used to this and pace their conversations to compensate. Internet telephony users also compensate and use the brief periods of silence to contemplate how much money they are saving. If you need to speak with a special client about closing a deal, use regular long distance calling. If you are going to be making a lengthy long distance call to support a customer or just chat with a colleague, use Internet telephony. In the list below you will notice that there are two kinds of calls you can make. The first is computer to telephone calls. This means that you use your computer to call someone's phone number. They do not need a computer to receive your call. The other is computer to computer calling. In this case, both parties must have computers with appropriate software and hardware installed. National service Free computer to telephone calls to anywhere in the U.S. Computer to computer calls between any two parties on the Internet. Free computer to telephone calls to the U.S. from anywhere on the Internet with a few exceptions. Owners of Internet cafes in India told me that India attempts to block these kinds of services. I would not be surprised to learn that other countries with state owned telephone companies are attempting to block these kinds of services.
International service Free computer to telephone and computer to computer calls to anywhere in the U.S. and to more than 20 countries.
Accessories The best way to use your computer as a telephone is to use a headset. A computer headset differs from a telephone headset in that it has two plugs at the end of the wire instead of one. To use a computer head set you will have unplug your computer speakers from the sound card and plug in the headset. By now you should be thinking that this process could get tedious after plugging and unplugging headsets and speakers several times a day, especially if your computer is located under your desk. There is a solution available from Andrea Electronics http://www.andreaelectronics.com. Andrea makes a controller that enables you to toggle between your computer speakers and the headset from in front of the computer. Even better news, it is inexpensive.
PostscriptSince the above article was written Dialpad.com has stopped offering free computer to telephone service and has now started charging a monthly fee. Other services such as Microsoft Messenger Service, PhoneFree.com, and Yahoo! Messenger still offer free computer to computer voice and videoconferencing services. Only Hot Telephone still offers limited computer to telephone services. These services were, at this writing available to 25 countries. If you hear of free computer to telephone services please share them with me so that I can share your information with other readers. Hot Telephone offers an excellent catalog of headsets and headset accessories . Post PostscriptPlease read VOIP Explained for updated information on Internet telephony. |
©1995- 2008 Max Lent
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