Voxbeam

I'm getting somewhat tired of VOIP companies whose call quality is dire (yes
Finarea/Betamax I'm looking at you). And even telcos who aren't VOIP
companies (Primus, Giffgaff) run some international calls over cheap'n'nasty
VOIP links. In some cases they just don't work.

So I'm looking around for alternative providers who might actually have
decent call quality - that probably means doing some of the routing
themselves, not endlessly salami slicing and reselling someone else's
service.

I've been pointed towards Voxbeam.com as a possible. Minimum topup is $50
which is a little on the steep side. You get $1 or something free as a
tester, but that won't last very long - wondering if anyone had any
experiences to relate?

Thanks
Theo

 

VoIPfone Theo, used them for well over a year now no duff calls at all....

 

Theo, I respect your views, but I can only speak as I find, and I cant
recall ever having a speech quality issue with
Finarea/Betamax/Dellmont Sarl despite using their service from the
time of call1899VoIP

Most calls I make are to UK landlines and mobiles, and there is no
perceivable difference in quality to my ears compared to a call made
on my BT landline.

Just as a "control" I would mention I can always tell the difference
in audio quality to a call made on a direct exchange line and one
split with a DACS, the latter always sounds awful.

 

It's very very destination dependent. For example, on occasion to Greek
mobiles I've heard 'your balance is zero. Please topup'. That's not from
Betamax, it's from whoever Betamax are using to relay the call to Greece.
Similarly, call quality to Africa is often dire (if there isn't echo,
there's long delays). Plus a month or two ago 18185 to UK started going
echoey to the point of unusability (maybe a bad week, who knows?).

The problem with a lot of call routing is that destinations simply aren't
tested. Not only are there places that few people call (ever called the
Central African Republic? neither have I) the interconnect depends on the
destination network as well as country. So, while few people call the CAR,
even fewer people call Nationlink in the CAR. There's therefore no feedback
to the operators (or punters) to know whether it works at all.

Perhaps we could have some kind of ping quality test for phone calls?

Theo