OT: Phone lines to Alaska?

I'm using cell phone and Skype so heavily I'm back to thinking of tossing the land lines. ...Jim Thompson

Cell phone connections up there aren't so great, and from my cell it goes through the same links I guess (tried it, same results). Skype would in this case require Skype-out and then you'd be back on the landline anyhow.

Your clients don't have PC's connected to the Internet ?:-)

I've even used Skype for a video conference call. ...Jim Thompson

Depends on where the engineer is. Alaska is a very big place :-)

Well, I must use what my clients prefer. Unfortunately that is often Webex.

Alaska had very good phone service, when the White Alice microwave relay network was still in use. Then they replaced it with copper pairs.

Well, at least they got through to me now and we could talk about all of the stuff we needed to. Whether it would work again tomorrow, not sure.

Err...Internet access requires a landline (for modem or DSL), or cable (for "high speed") or (user) satellite - normally. Hexception mite bee cellular frequencies witch arr severely limited dew two sun-related RFI and diss-tanss.

I'm wondering if your call went via satellite, because satellite links are subject to solar transit fades and outages this time of year. Was there a delay between when you stopped talking and the other replied?

AT&T Alascom got rid of the coaxial and microwave links and depends on a few old fibers and a satellite system using lots of small dishes at villages. Steve

Possibly. Not sure because I could barely hear the ringing and then the voices at the other end.

When they called me back it was all as clear as normal (well, the normal audio quality for calls to Alaska).

That's what Michael mentioned as well. Not sure if that's the reason but when I call Europe, which I do a lot, the voice quality is mostly so crisp and clear that I think I just called our neighbors. With Alaska phone lines are often more "muffled", I have to really concentrate when tech stuff with important numbers in there is said.

But I shall not complain. By far the worst are some companies that switched to VoIP. "..e want you to ...look... to ........ former" ... "Huh?". It's like how cell phones networks were 15 years ago. "Wait ... try ...... pay phone ... call ... THWOCK".

Usually the muffled sound is from the conversion from analog to voip and voip to analog. if its done more than a few times there are echo problems. To rectify that, the gain is turned down to minimize the echo.

Cheers

Maybe that is happening along the line. The phones on either side are not directly on VoIP systems. VoIP in my office here will only happen over my dead body :-)

Well, with much trepidation, I got one VoIP line for my business, as AT&T couldn't seem to keep a copper line working at an exorbitant price. I have Charter internet, and they offered a bundled deal. The voice quality is excellent, far clearer than copper-wire POTS, and I have not noticed any sign of dropouts or network congestion. The VoIP modem is not tacked on to my internet modem/router, but has its own tap to the coax cable. I know that if we have an extended power outage this unit will quit, but our business phone system has no backup other than a big capacitor, so it only holds up for a couple seconds.

So, for a sample size of one, I'm quite satisfied with it. I have had it now for at least 6 months, and had absolutely no trouble with it at all. Our AT&T copper line was constantly requiring service, either corrosion or lightning damage, and would crackle, hum, etc.

Jon

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

That's the trick.

I also have noticed that if it's very small businesses or single-phone households then VoIP often works ok. It tends to fall apart in larger businesses or where someone offers an "all-in-one" deal and the phones plug into the same LAN as the computers. That just ain't working well.

dishes

but

when

...

This gets at the root of the "telephone heads" vs "data network heads" issues. For "telephone heads" absolutely controlled latency (circuit and circuit switched systems)is mandatory but data loss is acceptable; with cause. The they're at odds with "data network heads" (packet switched systems) who focus on data transmission reliability and have no issues with latency problems (well, short of days, because their mantra is data integrity; with cause.)

Only time will tell if this can be resolved, but SONET AALs proposed some good ideas. Of course this gets into ugly QoS issues when you try to stream video over packet systems. We still need better ideas.

?-)

I've also gone to VOIP, and added extra services and using top end phones (Polycom) yet still saving a ton of money.

No problems so far. You do need to pay a bit of attention to the network for the best quality- it's best to have a separate network for the phones if there are a number of users (I don't, but I've scheduled heavy autonomous network activity for hours when business phone calls are unlikely), and I'm using a business-class provider who uses only Level 2 routes in North America.

Keeping one only of the old analog lines around for 911 and such like, for the moment anyway. Mains power is so reliable that I don't worry about power failures, but apparently 911 isn't always set up correctly (eg. calling 911 at one site and having the response team show up 35km away at the company headquarters). That sort of thing could cost a bunch of money, or worse.

You have to factor in that business-class provider when calculating the "still saving tons of money". My business phone costs via ye olde POTS are around $20/mo.

That, plus there is nothing that compares to the reliability of POTS. All it takes is a major and fairly unprecedented weather event and the power will go out. A few hours later the cells phone will also likely show zero bars and "Outside of network area".

I just bought the new Magic Jack Plus, which can be used with either a wired netork, or a USB pot on a PC. Good and clear, for $20 a year, including 911 service, Caller ID and Voice Mail. It runs on a AC to USB power supply, and I don't neeed a computer on, once it's configured. It replaced the early USB only version I'd used for a couple years, and the latency is a lot better than the old version.