Category → VoIP
Internet Radio
This weekend I bought myself a new toy and boy do I love it. This goes right along with things that I speak about all the time and that is the Internet and Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP). This new toy is a Grace wireless Internet Radio that uses wifi, 802.11 b, or g to connect to my wireless network. It works with a web site called Reciva that lists thousands of radio stations worldwide. You can sign up for a free account and then customize this page to include your favorite stations, and podcasts. You register your radio through this site and then you can jump to your favorite stations. You do not need the web site to get to your web sites because you can search through stations by location, type, call letters, or by search. Above you can see that I was listening to the Leo Laporte, TWiT live stream. This is pretty amazing as the quality is absolutely amazing. The photo below shows that I was listening to KSFO in San Francisco. Since I am in Oklahoma City, you can see this would be impossible without the Internet.
I have tuned in BBC in England, as well as stations in many other places we have lived. As most of you know, this radio is not necessary to listen to stations online as you can go to any of their home pages and just click on the link. The benefit of the radio is that it makes it possible without using the computer at all. This radio has some amazing sound for its size though it comes with a cable so you can connect it to your home stereo. I am so satisfied with it though if you lose Internet, it takes a bit to come back online. The antenna you see above the radio is nothing but a regulare wifi antenna that is adjustable so you can move it where it is not visible from the front. This radio is very sturdy and feels like it weighs five pounds.
I have seen some streams that are as low as 16 kbps and as high as 128 kbps. Even the lower ones sound pretty good. I like the ability to add stations to Reciva’s web site. I sometimes listen to the WIN System, a ham radio linking system originating from San Diego’s K6JSI. I was able to go to the WIN System’s web site and copy the universal resource locator (URL) and then paste it into the Reciva’s page. The URL is the web site address for those of you that are unfamiliar with the term. This made it accessible from the radio’s menu. Another thing that I love is that you can go to a web site that has podcasting available and copy the RSS feed and paste it into the Reciva site and make it readily available to my new radio. I am very excited about how easy this thing works. I can listen to an FM radio station on another continent on my home stereo. How can you compete with that? The down side is that I paid $179.00 for this little radio.
Most people would not be willing to pay that much for this but once they see it in action, they are convinced. My son and I spent hours last night tuning in stations from distant lands. I could go on for hours but I just wanted to share the new toy. For those radio operators that enjoy things like this, it is worth the expense. I recommend it for sure.
MagicJack
Last week I purchased a new toy that I find very useful. My cousin Larry, KD5MAF bought a MagicJack about a year ago and kept telling me about how useful it is and though I believed him I did not see the need for buying one myself. That was before this weekend when I bought my own when I began to have problems with my own cordless phone adapter for Skype. What is this MagicJack and why is it worth the purchase? The MagicJack is a small device that plugs into your universal serial bus (USB) that allows the user to make or receive unlimited phone calls from the United States (USA) and Canada. This device is small enough to fit in one hand and has all the required software and drivers installed on the inboard flash memory. The MagicJack has an RJ-11 socket allowing the user to plug in any regular household telephone. In my case, I use a 5.8 GHz cordless phone. The MagicJack only costs $39.99 and this includes the first year of service. The service is only $19.99 per year after this. I know this sounded too good to be true but it is not. This device autoruns on both the Apple Mac, and the PC. Once it runs, it takes you through a sign up process that asks the user to choose an area code. This allows you to choose virtually any area code in the USA. Once the MagicJack is setup, it shows the following screen.
This screen allows you to add as many phone numbers to your address book as you like. It also shows a list of all calls made or received. The nice thing about this is that when you remove the MagicJack and install it on another computer, all the information is still there. The information is stored on their servers so nothing is lost. There is no chance of someone using it illegally because when you remove the MagicJack from the USB, it closes down the software. The information is not accessible without the MagicJack installed. I immediately started calling my relatives out of state and found that it allows you to dial the number right from your phone. On my cordless phone, I just dial the area code and the number and it rings on the other end. When someone calls me, my phone shows their number on my caller ID. If I have their number already programmed in, then the caller ID shows their name listed as it is stored. On the bottom of the image above, you can see the 911 information. During the registration process, it asks for your address. This address is registered with the local telephone company so that if you dial 911, the emergency personnel, will know where to go. This 911 drop down window allows you to register other locations as well so if you take the MagicJack with you, it allows you to select your 911 information for the location where you actually are. The MagicJack also allows three way calling. If two people call you, then you can just enter pound pound, (##) and it will put both calls together allowing all three parties to speak with each other. It also allows you to use call forwarding. If you know you are going to be away from home or from the computer where this device is installed, you can log into the MagicJack web site and set up a call forwarding. This way anytime someone calls your MagicJack, then it will ring on the number you forwarded your calls. The MagicJack does not even have to be hooked up for this to happen. Another unique feature is that this device runs the TigerJet driver that also works with Skype. If you kill the MagicJack software but leave the USB plugged in, you can set up Skype to use the MagicJack as an interface on your phone. This allows you to walk around your house or lawn while talking to people on Skype. I am not sure about what codec the MagicJack uses but I have found the audio quality to be amazing. I have had three hour conversations without losing a single word of the conversation. I cannot say enough good words about it. I mentioned it to a few people at work and they all said they saw the commercials on TV but they were skeptical. I can understand the skepticism after we have all been scammed on TV. I have to admit the MagicJack is well worth its money. In fact, once you join, you can see the advertisements on the software. One of them is to buy more MagicJacks to give to others for only $29.95. Another advertisement on there is to extend your service for five more years for $59.95. I plan on taking this upgrade after the New Year. Since I do not work for the company, I can say without any guilt that the MagicJack is absolutely amazing and I plan on using it as long as the company is in business. Since it only costs $39.99 to order one and this includes a whole year of service, there really is nothing to lose. I really would recommend this purchase. It took me longer to open the box than it did to get it working. I really think you should try it.
ooVoo
Wow! This weekend I was watching This Week in Tech (TWiT) online and they were talking about a communications program called ooVoo and I had never heard of it. As usual, I had to find out about this program. To be honest I was not expecting much as there are so many programs like this out there. I installed it on two of our computers so I could call each other. I was pretty amazed at the ability to call more than one person at a time with video. I could not believe how clear the video and audio was. The amazing thing was when I later connected three people and set the video quality to high while streaming an HD podcast on my wife’s computer. Another person in our conversation also connected his computer up to the same HD podcast ensuring his bandwidth was being taxed.
In addition to all this was that we were running the Internet Radio Linking Project (IRLP) streaming audio on our Linux computer. With all this going on simultaneously we maintained a three way conversation for more than an hour with out a single choppy moment in the video and audio. It was pretty impressive and I am convinced this will be a keeper. The audio quality was every bit as good as Skype and that is saying something. This ooVoo also had chat and file sending capability built in. I have decided that I will keep this program though I am sure it will be hard to get people to try it. There have been so many instant messaging programs available that it is difficult to get people to try out new programs. I even had a difficult time trying to get people to try Skype and you know how good that is. The laptop has a camera built in while my desktop has a Microsoft LifeCam VX-6000 that cost me $39.99 at Best Buy.
I heard on TWiT that the ooVoo logo is supposed to represent two sets of eyes connected by the “V” representing video. It is a cute way to symbolize the video communications. If you have not tried this program lately you would be surprised at the quality of service and it is free. You have nothing to lose when the program is free. If you do not like it you can always open the Windows control panel and run the Add/Remove programs function. I know I am always anxious to try new things but I can get tell you that this is an amazing program. Give it a try.
Back From San Antonio
We arrived back home on Thursday evening from our short trip to San Antonio. In the above photo you can see my wife and I in front of the Alamo. Between my son and I we took nearly 400 pictures. Below is a picture of my son standing in front of the Hard Rock Cafe. I think he had a good time as well and we were glad he was able to come with us.
We went on a temporary duty (TDY) for my work to work out some wrinkles with a contractor down there. We had a good time but it was a bit warm. We stayed in a hotel downtown so virtually everything was walking distance. It was a pretty good trip and not likely to be the last.
This evening my wife and I went for a three and a half mile walk and it was nice to enjoy the evening air. I love the cool air in the fall. It was nice to be able to spend some quality time with my wife. I have had a lot of people giving me advice on how to handle the family issues and I appreciate it. I think everyone is right about spending more time in prayer. I think that is good advice to follow so thank you all for.
This weekend I downloaded the new Windows Live Messenger Beta and I have really been impressed with the performance. This new version has some amazing video and audio quality. I am just amazed at how good it works. It is every bit as good as Skype and that is really saying something. I was able to do video conferencing on a full screen for more than two hours and it was incredibly clear and real time. I think I found a new toy to play with. This is great news because many of my friends and family refuse to use anything else. I think Microsoft has really come a long way with voice over internet protocol (VoIP).
Finally Skype is getting some recognition
My friends and I have used Skype for a couple of years now but have had a hard time getting others to use it. The problem is that people have so many instant messengers that no one thinks there is a need for another one. These people use either MSN, AOL, or Yahoo, or ICQ to Instant Message. To me there is no comparison. Those programs are just that… Instant Messengers with voice capability added on. I have been on the Internet for 12 or 13 years and have used them all.
Skype is designed for voice with Instant messaging as an added feature. In fact, the only reason I even use the messaging feature is to ask the person if they are available. Then I connect by voice. If it is just me and someone else, I turn the camera on as well. Those Instant Messaging clients cannot even compare with the quality of Skype. Not even close. In fact, I often listen to the TWiT podcast by Leo Laporte, and the do many podcasts using Skype. If it is good enough for a regular program, just think of what you can do with it. Best of all it is free.
I have friends that insist on MSN. I think MSN has some cool features and even looks attractive but it is not even close to Skype when it comes to voice and video. I stumbled upon a news story on the Internet where someone is using it to call their friends in China. Watch the vido below…
Technorati tags: Skype, News, MSN Messenger, Yahoo, AOL, ICQ, VoIP, video
Update for March 20, 2007
Well I am off work today because my oldest son is having his wisdom teeth removed by surgery. They are compacted and cannot be removed through traditional means. I hope everything goes well for him. We are letting him sleep in because he is not suppose to eat anything for eight hours before the surgery at 2:00 pm. That would put us at 6:00 am. We let him stay up late and eat all he wanted before going to bed so he can sleep late. This week is Spring vacation for the kids so they are off all week. So much for sleeping in this morning. He just came around the corner.
I am just aching all over. Yesterday at work we were moving my work and the entire shop from an upstairs location to a downstairs area. We have a new second level supervisor that is pretty much a control freak and he wants to keep an eye on us. His office is downstairs. I moved desks, and heavy machinery all day and I sometimes forget that I am not 20 years old anymore. In fact I will be 41 on the 28th of March.
I have too many methods of communication. I maintain this blog, and my Del City Amateur Radio Club blog, and my Facebook, and Skype. I really enjoy all of them. We are expected to get rain this week. At least they say we are suppose to get 6 inches of rain. Lets hope this is not a repeat of that 10 inches of snow forecast we had a couple of months ago where it did not snow at all. We really do need some rain. It has been really dry. I’ll update more later.
Paul
Technorati tags: Skype, Facebook, blog, Del City Amateur Radio Club
Skype conferencing
I know I have spoken of this before but I am just so impressed with Skype’s conferencing capabilities. It is such a cool program if you would like to talk one on one or as a group in complete privacy. A couple of nights ago there were a few amateur radio operators in our Del City Amateur Radio Club that joined together on Skype for several hours. You may ask why ham radio operators would talk on the computer when they could talk over the radio.
This is a good question that can be answered easily. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has certain rules about what kind of activity can be done over the radio. In some cases we want to talk about things club related that are not appropriate for broadcast over the radio. We had five of us in a conference with such amazing clarity and never once broke up. With older Voice over IP programs packet loss was almost certain.
The new Skype 3.0 has incredible video as well if you are just talking one on one. And now they have a new feature that is also pretty cool. The video can be very large with real time motion where your mouth moves right with the audio. Now you can have public chats where others can join in. You can even go to our club website and click on Skype chat and join right in any time. One thing I like about that is that I can see what others were talking about last night when I was in bed.
There were many including me that worried about the future of Skype when they were purchased by ebay last year. I guess now we can all say with a sigh of relief that those worries were unfounded. Since ebay has taken over them, they have only improved. What is amazing is that I still have family and friends that refuse to even try Skype. There is no program around that can hold a candle to Skype on voice. If people would just try it, Skype would explode in popularity. If you have not tried it, you must download it now! Stop what you are doing and download it now.
Technorati tags: Skype, Voice over IP, conferencing, ebay