question: Skype?

[winterbadger]

What can my helpful and well informed friendslist tell me about Skype beyond what's on Wikipedia? Have any of you used it? Is it difficult to set up? How well does it work?

Enquiring badgers want to know (more)...

Comments

[janewilliams20.livejournal.com]

I've used it on my laptop, including from the foyer of a hotel in France. Given a decent headset, it's easy enough to set up. Beware of letting it integrate itself into any web browser, there seem to be bugs there.

It works fine on a one-to-one voice call. There's also text chat available. Conference calls with four or five speakers got messy, it was hard to hear what everyone was saying, though at least you could tell who was speaking by their icon flashing.

In theory I could use the Internet capability of my PDA/mobile phone to run Skype through that: in fact, it comes pre-installed. In practice, I've never yet had a fast enough connection for this to be feasible.

[winterbadger]

Cool, thanks!

[zoefruitcake.livejournal.com]

I've never used it for phone calls, but my boyfriend and I use the video all the time, and most of the time it's great. I found it easy to set up, but my macbook has a built in camera, my boyfriend has more problems with his as he has to use an external webcam

[winterbadger]

Yeah, I might need to look into one of those (well, I'd need to look into it if I'm going to look into one... :-)

[idahoswede.livejournal.com]

I'm 58 years old and not particularly sharp when it comes to installing stuff and using it, and I managed to do it and use it, no problems. The only real problem is that sometimes you're in the middle of a conversation and you get disconnected - so re-dial, it's free.

[winterbadger]

Indeed. Thank you!

[angusabranson.livejournal.com]

I use it so it can't be all that hard to set-up :p

Seriously though, once you've downloaded the software it's all very straight forward. The hardest choice is do you get a headset, a mic or a fake phone handset to use for it?

Decisions... decisions...

[winterbadger]

I use it so it can't be all that hard to set-up :p

LOL! Good. I might just be able to manage it, then. :-) Cheers!

[aitkendrum.livejournal.com]

Dead easy. Just install, pick a reasonably unique username and your off. You can set the security settings so only friends can call you rather than just anyone.

The online chat works well and voice system is excellent. Video calling can be fun providing both users have decent connections

You have the option of putting credit on it if you wish to make calls to "real" phones which are comparatively cheap.

I recommend buying a decent headset ($20?) if you intend to use regularly as using with a mic dampens the experience as feedback from your speakers can cause disruption.

You can buy Skype handsets that link to the PC but only get one if you plan to do so seriously.

If you want a test call sometime let me know

[winterbadger]

Thanks! I'll take you up on that, in fact.

Sounds like the biggest issue will be my remembering that it is *later* in Britain, not earlier. You would think that was pretty obvious, but I remember one muddled phone call when I was at uni to a friend who was studying in Dublin. Her landlady really didn't appreciate strange men calling in the middle of the night, and my friend was very confused...

[rolypolypony.livejournal.com]

We've used it for gaming, actually - both w/ just one person absent and calling him on it, and w/ 3 people not at the table and playing from home. It woks fairly well!

But agree w/ others - get a good headset, as there's WAY too much interference otherwise.

[winterbadger]

Fortunately, there was one left over from a class N had to take. I tried it on the Skype 'test your connection' line, and it seemed OK.

Gaming...now there's a good idea. john_arundel and I could use it, and he could miss out all the awful Beltway traffic! :-)

Is it Xmas horse and goat time already? We've not had Turkey Day yet! :-)

[janewilliams20.livejournal.com]

I've had a go at using it for gaming, too: that was the "conference call" setup I referred to. Well worth a try.

SNOWY BADGER!!!

[rolypolypony.livejournal.com]

There you go! :)

I figure since DH makes me wait until like 2 weeks before Christmas to get the tree, I am allowed to break out the Christmas LJ early ;)

[keethrax.livejournal.com]

Mostly all been said already, but...

I use it when playing games via VASSAL all the time.

I also second the don't use a microphone + speakers. It's just asking for feedback. even if you don't get squealing nasty feedback the person on the other end will be hearing an echo of themselves when what they just said comes out of your speakers and hits your mike. I'ts pretty disorienting to be on the receiving end of that.

[soshesays.livejournal.com]

I used it to talk to a bunch of people back in the States when I was in the UAE in 2006. It was awful and laggy, and then eventually the UAE government shut it down (supposedly because it interferes with their monopoly on telephone services within the country, or something).

We tried it again to talk to my grandparents-in-law in 2007, when we were in Korea and they were in Ohio, and it was fantastic. They're 80-something and not the most computer literate people in the world -- we were sending step-by-step instructions to their AOL e-mail on their ancient computer -- but they got it up without any major problems. And it was fast, all things considered. I also liked how you had the choice to get a number and pay some money for calls, or you could just keep the webcam service and it would be free (this may have changed, don't know).

[kathygnome.livejournal.com]

I've used it quite a bit, including networking our town meeting to a remote typist for hearing impaired. It works really well.

I find that USB headsets, which have their own built in "sound card" are the easiest to deal with. That way you keep all the normal stuff on your normal speakers and just use the headset for voice communication.