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Inside the Digital Den
December 2000
Less-garbled gab
Broadband lessens the pain of Internet telephony
Matthew Miller, Managing Editor
In "Garbled gab" (August), I chronicled my often-frustrating experiences with Internet-telephony devices, which allow you to make free (or at least drastically cheaper) long-distance calls. I concluded that Internet telephony involved hassles—such as dropped connections and delays—that would probably be intolerable for all but the most determined penny-pinchers.
However, at that point, I was still accessing the Internet with a 56K dial-up modem. At the end of the article, I wondered aloud whether a broadband connection would make the experience less trying—and by extension improve the prospects for Internet-telephony in the mass market.
Happily, I have since moved to a neighborhood that enjoys cable-modem service. My wife and I signed up and quickly got hooked. But would the faster pipe improve the quality of Internet phone calls? Would the broadband link make it easier to place calls and maintain stable connections? Would my parents be able to recognize my voice?
In a word, kinda. The addition of broadband to the equation has altered my overall assessment of Internet telephony. Though I'd still caution dial-up users to think twice before investing, I'd advise broadband-equipped consumers to go for it. The faster connection boosted call quality and ease-of-use enough to make the process worthwhile in light of the money it can save. However, that doesn't mean the experience was flawless or frustration-free.
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The addition of broadband to the equation has altered my overall assessment of Internet telephony—for the better. |
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First, I gave Net2Phone's Yap Phone another try. This $50 handset-shaped device attaches to the PC's USB port and completes calls using Net2Phone as its ITSP (Internet telephony service provider). If you need a review, ITSPs carry Internet calls as far as the local-phone system at the call's destination. Most charge fees, though some claim to survive on advertising. Net2Phone charges 3.9 cents/minute for calls within the US and varying rates abroad (samples: 24 cents/minute to Uganda, 19 cents to El Salvador, 5 cents to Hong Kong).
My first Yap call resulted in a fruitful conversation with my dad halfway across the US. The quality was good enough that for a few moments, I almost forgot that I wasn't talking over the regular phone network. Then my PC's screensaver kicked in and promptly torpedoed the connection. Adjusting the PC's power-management settings saved future calls from that fate.
The wiz
Next up, Actiontec's InternetPhoneWizard. The IPW is a small modem-shaped unit that sells for $100. To set it up, you simply plug a regular phone into the IPW and then connect the IPW to both a PC (via USB) and a regular phone jack.
I hadn't given the IPW a full audition the first time around, partly because of time constraints and partly because of my then-primitive Internet setup. This time, I put the device through its paces, and came away impressed. As with the Yap Phone, the unit delivered better call quality over the cable-modem link than it had over the dial-up connection.
However, let me be clear. During these broadband trials, no device achieved the pristine clarity or delay-free response of a traditional call. However, poor quality didn't impede communication as often as it had during my dial-up tests. On the other hand, a fair percentage of attempted calls still failed to go through, and connection quality still fluctuated during some calls.
As I said in August, the IPW works with multiple ITSPs, giving it a distinct advantage over the Yap products, whose purpose in life is helping you rack up minutes with Net2Phone. Actiontec has since widened this gap by doubling the number of supported ITSPs to 12. Some of these companies even offer free calls to not only the US and Canada, but also other countries. Overall, my wife and I had mixed luck with these ITSPs—some good results and some total failures.
The IPW works well with iConnectHere (formerly deltathree). As I mentioned in August, the IPW lets you place calls through iConnectHere without even touching the PC—even from another room if you're using a cordless phone. And the IPW/iConnectHere combo usually provided excellent voice quality and stability. Calls through iConnectHere cost 1 cent/minute within the US, 8 cents to Hong Kong.
No matter which ITSP you choose, the phone that's connected to the IPW can still place and receive regular calls. More impressive still, the IPW allows you to switch—call-waiting style—between an Internet call and an incoming analog call. This feature performed flawlessly in several trials.
Other ways
In my original trials, I also tested two devices that don't require a PC: Aplio's Aplio/Phone, which my wife and I have used for more than two years, and Net2Phone's Yap Jack. Both access the Internet by dialing into an ISP account. So by definition, I couldn't try either device over broadband.
But I knew that Aplio offered the Aplio/PRO, an Ethernet version of its product. You'll recall that Aplio devices can converse with other Aplio devices and PCs worldwide for free, but can't put calls through to regular phones.
After I wrote my original article, Net2Phone actually acquired Aplio, so I obtained an Aplio/PRO from Net2Phone (see the sidebar, "Other tidbits" for more on the implications of this acquisition).
Once I got it working, the device, which lists for $299, provided excellent call stability and voice quality that surpassed its dial-up cousin. In fact, my wife and I agree that the Aplio/PRO provided the best quality of anything we tested. On calls to Hong Kong, we could almost forget that our voices were traveling more than 8000 miles.
Unfortunately, I had problems with installation. If you want the gory details, see the sidebar, "Don't assume." Suffice to say, it took me several hours and a couple of support calls to get the device working.
I suspect the average consumer would have trouble too. And that shouldn't surprise us. Cable and DSL connections are just starting to spread, and as devices that tap into those links proliferate, we're bound to see software incompatibilities, poorly written manuals, and conflicts between ISPs and end-user devices.
The companies that can iron out such problems will prevail, and those that can't will be judged appropriately in the court of mass-market opinion. Moreover, the Internet itself will evolve until it can carry voice traffic as adeptly as the phone network.
Based on my experiences, Internet-telephony holds great promise, especially when coupled with broadband. Now it's time for the would-be superstars of this arena to execute and deliver.
Please see the sidebar, "Other tidbits" for a few extra pieces of random information on this project.
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Don't assume
You know that old chestnut about how "assume" can make an ass out of "u" and "me"? Well, I don't know about "u," but it could have saved "me" several hours in this case.
Based on my PC setup, I was quite certain that my cable ISP (AT&T Broadband) uses DHCP (dynamic host control protocol). DHCP means that the server assigns a new IP address to each client device when it joins the network (as opposed to each client having a static IP address).
The Aplio/PRO prefers to work this way too, according to its setup guide. Therefore, installation should have been as simple as plugging the Aplio/PRO into the cable modem and waiting a few moments. Sorry, wrong answer.
Furthermore, the Aplio/PRO has an Ethernet Out port, which in theory should have allowed me to daisy-chain my PC to the Aplio/PRO. The Aplio/PRO would provide an IP address to the PC, and both machines would be able to access the Internet. Wrong again. But thanks for playing.
The Aplio guide suggested that if the automatic setup didn't succeed, I should ask my ISP whether it in fact uses static IP addressing. If so, I would then be able to use the phone keypad to enter my static IP address, subnet-mask address, and gateway address directly into the Aplio/PRO. But I was still certain (oh, folly!) that AT&T Broadband uses dynamic addressing. For evidence, I pointed to my PC's network settings, which showed that the PC was set up to obtain its IP address dynamically from the server.
Unable to reach Net2Phone/Aplio support because it was late at night, I flew off on a time-consuming tangent. Believing that the Aplio/PRO was just having trouble connecting with my ISP, I needed to rule out a defective Aplio/PRO. So I tried to install a router/hub/firewall—Ramp Networks' WebRamp 700s (see "Wide pipes shut")—in front of the Aplio/PRO and PC. I figured that the router would easily obtain its IP address through DHCP, then assign private IP addresses to the Aplio/PRO and the PC. I knew that I would then have to configure the router's built-in firewall in order to allow the Aplio/PRO to work. But the Aplio manual contained instructions for this procedure and I wasn't worried about that.
However, I didn't get that far, because the WebRamp also refused to work when I asked it to get its address from the server. At this point I called AT&T Broadband's tech support. The person I spoke to assured me that the company does in fact use dynamic addressing. His explanation for the router's failure to find the Internet was that AT&T had not yet associated the router's MAC (media access controller) ID with my account. Every Ethernet device has a unique MAC ID, he explained, and once he entered that information on his end—"provisioned" that MAC ID, as he put it—the server would recognize the router. However, this also failed to pan out.
Defeated, I waited until a decent hour and reported my failure to Editor-in-Chief (and networking expert) Maury Wright. Maury immediately suggested that perhaps AT&T does—contrary to its assurances—assign a static IP address to each subscriber. It's possible, he
explained,
for AT&T to give my PC the same address every time, albeit using DHCP to deliver that address. The way to check this, he explained, would be to run winipcfg in Windows. This program immediately tells you the IP, subnet-mask, and gateway addresses your PC is using. Maury gave the following instructions: Run winipcfg once, write down the results, power down and then reboot the entire system (including the cable modem), and then run winipcfg again. Sure enough, the addresses came up exactly the same. I slapped my forehead and wondered why I hadn't called Maury earlier.
Within minutes, I had taken the router/hub out of the picture and punched the addresses into the Aplio/PRO using the phone keypad. The device immediately started working. Sort of. My wife successfully received some calls from her mom's Aplio/Phone in Hong Kong, but we couldn't initiate calls in the reverse direction. Moreover, I still couldn't convince the PC to see the Internet when I daisy-chained it to the Aplio/PRO.
Calls to Net2Phone/Aplio technical support resolved these problems. The inability to place outgoing calls resulted from a simple mistake in the manual. The directions had failed to tell me to press "#" before entering the ID number of the Aplio device I was trying to call. As for my PC's inability to see the Internet through the Aplio/PRO, my technical support person admitted that the daisy-chaining scenario doesn't work well with with cable modems. DSL users have better luck, she added, because the DSL signaling scheme lends itself to the scenario. For cable-modem subscribers, Aplio recommends using a router/hub if you want to connect both a PC and an Aplio/PRO to a cable modem.
I'd already tried and failed to do that, of course, but this time I knew to use static IP addresses. I also needed to configure the firewall in the WebRamp device to allow incoming traffic to pass through certain ports and into the Aplio/PRO, while leaving the firewall completely intact for the PC. Thanks to excellent online documentation (which the WebRamp serves up as Web pages from its internal memory), this proved relatively simple, even for a neophyte like myself. Within about two hours, everything was working smoothly.
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Other tidbits
Uncertain future
As mentioned above, Net2Phone—the maker of the Yap products—acquired Aplio shortly after I finished my first article. Net2Phone apparently made the purchase more to get ahold of Aplio's underlying technologies and expertise than for its consumer products. Nevertheless, Net2Phone says it will continue to sell and support the Aplio products.
But the plot thickens. Net2Phone has also said it plans to introduce an Ethernet version of the Yap Jack. As you may recall from my first article, the Yap Jack simply connects to a phone jack and calls into an ISP account to place Internet calls. The Yap Jack can call others of its kind or connect with any telephone via the Net2Phone ITSP. Presumably, an Ethernet version would have the same capabilities. And that would seem to throw the future of the Aplio devices into doubt. They can only call other Aplio devices (and PCs). Therefore, they don't drive users to rack up minutes on Net2Phone, it's hard to see how they fit into Net2Phone's apparent strategy (racking up minutes on the Net2Phone network). Unfortunately, Net2Phone representatives didn't respond to my numerous requests for comment on this question.
My bad
A reader wrote in to tell me about an Internet-telephony device I missed. The COMPRO Ezfone (www.ezfone.com), made by Singapore-based ACS Innovations, is a PC add-in card of the ISA type. Like the Aplio products I've tested, the Ezfone can call another of its kind anywhere in the world for free. You use a regular telephone (corded or cordless) to converse.
If both parties have the card installed and configured, placing a call is as easy as picking up the phone, pressing "#," and dialing the other party's regular phone number. The vendor's Web site doesn't fully explain how the two devices find each other through the 'Net, but my correspondent assures me that it works reliably. In fact, he raved about the device's overall performance, pointing out that its onboard DSP (digital signal processor) leaves the host PC with much less of a burden and results in better voice quality. Using a cordless phone, the user can initiate and receive calls away from the PC.
I probably wouldn't have tested the Ezfone even if I had known about, because I consciously chose devices an average consumer could install and use; not many mainstream consumers are comfortable installing ISA cards. However, ACS recently introduced a USB version of the Ezfone, listed at $199. The company also now touts the fact that the Ezfones can route calls through an ITSP to any regular phone.
My bad II
I also neglected Innomedia's InfoTalk. This $249 unit that can call a twin device for free, call any phone worldwide for low rates via the company's InnoSphere ITSP, and even browse limited online information on its LCD screen. The device accesses the Internet via a dial-up ISP account.
Foreshadowing
Finally, here's a pretty clear indication of the way telephony is moving. Uniden and ZeroPlus.com recently announced an agreement to develop mass-market telephones that contain built-in VoIP capabilities. According to the companies, the phones, slated to appear in early 2001, will allow consumers to press a single button to access ZeroPlus.com's managed voice network for long-distance calls. The offering will also involve a voice portal that will provide news updates, stock quotes, and the like, as well as access to voicemail, email, and fax messages.
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Author information
Matthew Miller is the managing editor of CommVerge. You can reach him at mdmiller@cahners.com.
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