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ISSUE NO 52 DIGITAL TOOLBOX

INTERNET TELEPHONY - A USER’S EXPERIENCE

Here’s an update on a new techtoy - Internet telephony - that I’ve been trying out. On a fast, but not "screaming" PC, over a DSL line, I’ve been having reasonable success making free-in-US, and low-cost international, long-distance phone calls. The free software, Net2Phone www.net2phone.com, makes Pc-to-phone, PC-to-PC calls, and offers a more standard calling card service.

Their PC to Internet service offers low-cost international calls after the customer deposits money into a personal, online account. I deposited US$25, and only used US$4.20 for a 90+ minute call to Montreal. All international rates to and from the US are online on their site.

I also found another PC to Phone free service, Dialpad www.dialpad.com, which is connected to Sprint. This one says it offers free-to-US calling from other countries, as well as other low-cost plans. I haven’t checked out the DialPad software, though. If it works, DialPad might be useful for making calls from Africa, while travelling, etc. However, this type of telephony might be illegal in some African countries (Uganda for instance), so could be a problem and requires more investigation.

The things I’ve discovered about this type of calling are:

1.The person calling really has to have a high speed connection to make Internet calling work without serious interruptions, dropped calls, or annoying slow-downs. People who have tried Internet telephony with regular dial-up lines, have told me they just don’t bother after one try. This will probably improve as set-up improves, but for now, it seems that dial-up Internet telephony is marginal. Worth more investigation, though.

2.I tried out a number of headsets, and recommend experimenting with several to find the one that works with your sound card for making calls. The US$40 range seems good enough. I didn’t try those in the US$100+ range. Not all in the US$40 range had the same quality. I was surprised that the Plantronics in this range didn’t perform the best for my set-up (it might work for yours). I ended up with a Labtec LVA-8550.

3.Obviously, the headset plugs into the sound card, so has to match the connector type. Mine takes standard 3.5mm plugs, but some take USB connectors, etc.

4.The headset microphone seems to be the weakest link, other than overall occasional bad static. I practically have to swallow the microphone on my headset to get the gain up high enough, even with my sound card and Net2Phone software both adjusted up to highest levels.

5. Sometimes the Net2Phone calls work so well that people on the other end don’t even notice I’m on a unique type of calling system. On the other hand, a couple of times I’ve had to call back on a standard phone because the interference was so bad. Also, when we had the now-famous California blackouts last week, the PC-Internet calling system didn’t work <so> well. I wouldn’t want to rely on PC to Internet for all my calls!

Please let me know if you have any comments or information

(Carole_Roberts@faludi.com)

(source: Carole Roberts of Learning, Technology and Development via Dorothy Okello, WOUGNET)

IBM, SAP BACK LINUX ON Z-SERIES

IBM and SAP announced an agreement to deliver the my SAP e-business portal software on the zSeries of IBM’s eServers running the Linux operating system.

(Source: IDG.net http://www.idg.net/go.cgi?id=443803)

HEADACHES AHEAD FOR BLUETOOTH

Bluetooth devices made by different manufacturers already can’t communicate with each other because there are at least three different standards of the "standard." Bluetooth is supposed to be THE single standard that connects all the devices in our "personal area network" (PAN) together wirelessly, eliminating the hassle of cables and wires.

(source: Nikkei BP Asia BizTech via JIN http://www.nikkeibp.asiabiztech.com/wcs/leaf?CID=onair/asabt/fw/125958)

GHANA’S E-SOPHT TECNOLOGIES LAUNCHES MONEY AND TAX SOFTWARE

E-Sopht’s new products consist of a range of software solutions to assist government agencies, the private and banking sectors and individuals in computing and controlling tax evasion, and accessing banking information among other facilities. Some of the products are the VATNET for value added tax computation, TAXWEB to control tax evasion, e-Gold, for bank transfer management system, e-Fund for electronic fund management system and iFex, for the electronic management of foreign exchange.

(source: Ghana News Agency)

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