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Webwatch
May 2006
You may have heard on the radio or elsewhere that people have been talking to their rellies for nothing by using "the internet". Too good to be true? No, it is true and it is very easy to setup.
My first thought was, there must be a catch. How can I talk for hours to the rellies in Australia for nothing? Well of course, it is not for quite for nothing, to use these systems you need an internet connection which you pay for. If you have an internet connection that is not charged by time, then a internet phone call between computer users really is "free" as you are paying for your connection anyway. What happens is that each computer runs a little bit of software that makes connections to other people and sends voice signals over the internet using a technology called Voice over Internet Protocol or VOIP **
When I saw and heard it used, the computer used was an old model, one that used a dialup system, no broadband. What surprised me was the the quality of the speech, far higher than an ordinary phone. Several people can join in as the call can be made to come out through the speakers. To speak, you just use a standard computer microphone, an item that is very cheap. You can even setup a conference call, a posh way of saying that all the family can talk at once from several different computers. Then you could talk to your aunty in Australia, sister in Brazil and daughter in Southend, all at once!
So how do these companies make their money? Of course, not everyone wants to turn on their computer to make a call, or the person at the other end may not have one, You can make a VOIP connection to ordinary phones, but at a cost. In this respect these companies are just like an ordinary telecom companies but without having to supply the hardware.
So how do you start? A quick search with Google for free voip yielded
millions of hits, some of which were:-
www.skype.com
www.voipbuster.com
www.tech-faq.com/free-voip.shtml
www.pc-telephone.com/free-phone.htm
It is not always convenient to use the computer microphone and speakers. Products now on the market allow a device to connect to your computer that looks like an ordinary wireless phone. Calls can be made from this phone whilst walking around the house, the only thing to remember is that the computer must be running and connected to the internet. The firm Linksys make one called the CIT200 which is described on www.linksys.com (link has changed since publication)
Happy surfing
Howard
** Voice over Internet Protocol. We can safely ignore the techie aspects
of VOIP except to note that the signal is digital and it uses a clever
technique to use poor quality lines easily to provide a clear voice.