Telephones over the internet

I get requests for suggestions on technical topics. A client was wanting to dump her home phoneline from the old-time provider. Here are some ideas of what she can do. The premise is that she has reliable and cost-effective cell service.

As you know, there are dozens of options to connect broadband internet and phones. If you want to ditch the phone company, here are some services I use and recommend.

Google Voice (http://voice.google.com/).
They give you a number and you can direct that number to ring one or more of your registered phones. You can apply rules including time-of-day filtering such as family goes to Sis, business to Mom, friends can be screened before picking up, unknown callers go to voicemail, etc. Receive voicemail as an email attachment or transcribed to txt. Documentation is Google-sparse.
Basic service free but lots of penny and nickel features available. No computer needed.

Skype (http://skype.com/)
Primarily a computer-to-computer service but you can buy connections in and/or out of the classical phone system. They sell tons of accessories including handsets so you’re not tethered to the computer. With decent broadband, excellent quality service – radio stations use them. Some are stant-alone and, presumably, give you a Skype connection anywhere you can get open WiFi.
Basic service free but lots of penny and nickel features available.

Vonage (http://vonage.com/)
This is the service I’ve used for 7 years, but am currently a little down on. I can’t document whether my service issues are related to Vonage or my ISP. They try to be a full function phone company replacement that you plug directly into your current house phone wiring and use all your classical equipment. They have some call management features similar to Google.
Our “$17.99” plan bills out about $25. No computer needed.

Here are some other services that I know about, but have never used.

Your ISP
All the internet providers (include the phone companies) are trying to sell you phone services. They offer the reliability you’re used to from a single source for prices you’re used to paying.

Magic Jack (http://magicjack.com/)
This is sort of a hybrid of Skype and Vonage. Plug an adapter into your computer and plug your house wiring into the adapter. Last I looked at it, they seemed a little sleazy in terms of pushing ads at you, etc.
Always-on computer required.

Packet 8 (http://www.8x8.com/)
I’ve never looked at them, but a (cheap) associate dumped his Skype dial-in/out for them. At first glance, they seem to sell full-featured phone systems to home or small businesses.

Being based in 21st century technology rather than 19th, all these services provide for free the upgrades the phone company has been making their profits off of for 30 years. Things like voicemail, voicemail notification, caller ID, conference calling, free long distance, ultra-cheap international calls, and more. Except for Vonage, most of them don’t add all the extra charges at the bottom of your classic phone bill.

Most of the services can transfer your current phone number. I always recommend letting them assign you a number until you’ve tried them for a couple months. Then you can transfer the number you’ve had for 25 years.

The downside is that, except for your ISP, they’re all separate services that you have to buy, install, and configure yourself. As far as I know, only Vonage and your ISP support 911. Support and reliability may be iffy and they are dependent on getting power out of the wall.



. This work by Bill Barnes is licensed under a Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 3.0 US License. Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at http://zaitech.com/satellite/contacts.htm.
(c) 2010 Bill Barnes - Disclaimer - Home Page - Blogs Home

eBooks

Forever (that is, 16 months) I have scraped articles off the web and downloaded them as text to my smartphone to read while I waited for carryout - or anywhere else I had minutes to kill. These are handy and comfortable to read on the 2.3" screen except the system doesn't hold my place and I have to scroll down to continue every time I get interrupted.

I recently took a trip and was anticipating 30 hours in transit and 6 plane changes. Naturally, I wanted to travel very light and not lug the stack of magazines that is my usual diversion. On my trip, since I carried a different phone (because of coverage), I downloaded a couple books to my old PDA so I could have entire novels on a 3.5" screen at 10 oz (including charger). This worked perfectly as I read one book on the way out and finished the other on the way home. I had the books I wanted, not whatever was in the airport newstand, and still have them when I got home. Incidentally, in the same pocket; I carried my contacts list, schedule, ticket and event confirmations, MP3 player, backup memory for my photos, notepad, and calculator.

Digital journalism was a natural fit for the personal computer as soon as the web was a widespread distribution medium. Music became virtual in a big hurry, followed by movies and television. Books without paper will be the next traditional medium to fall.

Actually, Project Gutenberg started to digitize books in 1971 with a goal of distributing and preserving out-of-copyright books. In 2004, Google announced it would partner with prominent libraries to digitize entire collections. Other, less prominent, projects are also working to turn literature into bits.

The market problem has never been content. Whether Gutenberg's 30,000 titles or Google's 7,000,000; the real question is who wants to drag their computer into bed with them and read off a screen. Whether the morning newspaper, or War and Peace, a computer does not have the familiarity and versatility of dead trees. Often there are also issues with the presentation be they intrusive advertising; fixed size and length of text that may not be comfortable on your screen; or scanned images that aren't text, and may not be sharp either.

For content that is expected to be read offline, resourceful people have always been able to move it to a PDA such as a Palm or Windows handheld. More recently with the introduction of E Ink ; Sony, Amazon, and now, a host of other companies offer a reader that is, not an exact replica, but competitive in feel to a paperback book. And Apple, this week, promise to up the market with their iPad which features a full-color touch screen instead of the gray-on-gray of the current generation of E Ink. (Disclaimer: I have not actually seen or held dedicated readers. My comments are hearsay.) At least as significantly, most of the device vendors include a store to buy the books. Not only can a non-geek now get a device to read books and periodicals but they can also load it up with content as easily as they load their MP3 player with music.

When Amazon introduced the Kindle in 2007, it included a revolutionary flat-rate price of $9.95 for best sellers. Naturally publishers were not happy with this 50%-60% or more discount off the usual cover price for books on paper. But consider that mass-market books rarely sell for list. Also, there is no marginal cost for each additional copy of the book sold. If a $25 book wholesales for $10 and costs $6 to produce and distribute; plus another, maybe, $2.50 for the author; the publisher will get $1.50-$4.00 clear profit per copy. They can make the same profit by sending the electronic manuscript furnished by the author or editor to Amazon or any other distributor for $5-$7 for each copy sold. Even if the sales are totally cannibalistic, the publisher has nothing to lose. (Here, Apple threatens to break the model by allowing the publishers to set their own price - which is the opposite of what the iTunes store did in 2000.)

Although each device is linked to its own bookstore, they are also multipurpose. They can display content in other, generic, formats and play MP3s. Some may have software to read a book out loud. Some may have a wireless connection for content and web browsing while others have to be linked to a computer to upload books. And using a PDA, smartphone, or netbook as a reader may offer other computer features such as a calendar, contact list, or writing and calculating tools.

Most book formats, especially paid ones, can be resized and automatically reflow according to your visual needs. For example, what might be a 325 page paperback was 411 "pages" on my PC and 1934 "pages" on my PDA. You also may want to consider features that enhance the readability. These might include placemarkers, search capability, ability to add notes, and the ability to move books to another device or share them with friends. Even the quality of how the table of contents or index links into the book can affect your experience.

If you want to dip your toe into ebooks, a web search will turn up a plethora of sources for books in a variety of formats that you can read on a laptop or smartphone you already own. Then you can decide whether you want to buy a dedicated device or go back to paper. If you read 2 books a month, you might be able to recover the cost of a Kindle within a year; plus you won't have to build another bookshelf or run to the consignment store.

One site I've gone to experience ebooks is SciFi-AZ.com where the author self-publishes his books in a variety of formats. Try it out for yourself!

. This work by Bill Barnes is licensed under a Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 3.0 US License. Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at http://zaitech.com/satellite/contacts.htm.
(c) 2010 Bill Barnes - Disclaimer - Home Page - Blogs Home

Spring cleaning

Now (even if you're reading this in November) is always a good time to do your computer housekeeping.

The two biggest enemies of electronics are bad power and heat. I covered the concerns of power surges in Storm Season. Where does heat come from and what can you do about it?

Everything you put into the computer generates heat. Every chip, spinning drive, and the power supply all add heat to the environment. And our quest for more and faster just means more heat. A faster CPU, fancier graphics adapter, bigger hard drive, more powerful sound card, even more memory each add their own increment to the heat load.

You can assume that every watt of power you put into the computer eventually ends up as heat after it is finished pushing the bits around. That means if you have a 200 watt power supply, it's the equivalent of sticking a large (incandescent) light bulb inside a metal box. In my childhood, that is how a toy stove could actually bake cookies.

Sometimes that metal box also exacerbates the issue. Open a full-size tower and you'll probably see at least 3 or 4 fans blowing on the various components. But most consumers and many businesses would rather have a compact size and quiet computer. Both of those criteria mean fewer fans and less space for air to circulate around the components. In a laptop, those issues are even compounded, although the components are somewhat more efficient with their use of electricity.

Speaking of quiet, most computers have thermostatic fans. When things inside start getting hot, the fan runs faster. If, all of a sudden, your computer starts making more noise and then quiets again; it was probably your fan putting on a burst of speed. If it always runs at high speed there may be something causing your computer to overheat. By the way, your CPU and hard drive also have thermometers in them and will shut themselves down before they dangerously overheat. There are numerous monitors of your internal temperatures available from any search engine. One that looked promising is available at http://www.almico.com/. (I have not tried it and don't vouch for it's legitimacy - always get your downloads from reputable sources and check them for malware)

Oh, that's right. The title up there is "Spring cleaning." The first thing to do to keep your computer cool is to get rid of the dust inside. Open the case and blow it out. Don't use a standard vacuum cleaner as they generate static electricity. You can buy high-quality "canned air." If you have access to a compressor, you can use that, too, at a moderate pressure. (I manage 150 devices in an industrial plant and blow them out with the building air. I have never had problems related to water or oil that may contaminate this unfiltered air.)

Be sure you have disconnected all the cables (especially the power) before you open the case. Then blow it out and the dust will go flying. I blow in both directions through all the vents and fans and even into the disc drive openings. Lift the shroud over the CPU and blow out all the heat sinks that look like vertical grids of metal.

When you reconnect the computer, check around that it has good airflow in and out of the vents. Keeping it in a closed cabinet will kill it quickly. Some serious power hobbyists have floor fans blowing at their computers to circulate even more air. Making the computer work harder also makes it use more power, so you might consider this tactic if you are into high-end gaming or video rendering that make heavy demands on the graphics system.

And don't feel guilty at all the dust you found. Even in very clean houses I find the computers full of dust. Just be sure there are no snakes or mice wrapped around the chips. (Just kidding, but you can find some scary stories on YouTube.)

Storm Season!

Here in the south, summer brings with it the almost daily threat of sudden thunderstorms. Best Buy, Circuit City, and the Asian electronics manufacturers make millions of dollars a year off equipment that is damaged or destroyed by outside electrical surges.

You should ensure that all your valuable electronics are protected by surge protectors when they are connected to outside wiring. Of course, you won't forget your entertainment system, but remember that a surge can enter one device and travel through any wire connecting it to others. This means you should protect printers, telephones, and networking devices - including the cable or phone connection that brings the internet - even if those devices themselves are not valuable.

Purchase good quality multi-mode surge protectors. A starting rule of thumb is that if it costs less than $20, you should save it for the kids' TV or other isolated low-value equipment. I prefer to use battery backups as my surge protector. Along with excellent surge protection, they'll save you from losing your current letter or having to reprogram the TV if the power is out for up to a few minutes. In addition, they protect against low or high voltage conditions (such as running a vacuum cleaner) that technically don't constitute a surge. The downside is that most UPSs will beep as long as the power is out unless you have connected them to a computer and used their management software to turn it off.

Most single-mode surge protectors will protect you once. That means, if it's saved your bacon once, it won't do so the next storm. It will still function as a plug strip and your equipment is still powered, just not protected. If it has an indicator that it's bad, believe it!

Of course, the best surge protector is 10 inches of dry air - that is, pull the plug in extreme storms.

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