Packet 8, Pulver Communicator and Other Experiences Continue

Published on July 20, 2004 By Teradatum In Internet

I had a long conversation with Huw Rees, the VP of Marketing and Sales for Packet8 yesterday and found our call, that was going from PSTN to my Packet8 phone to be clear and consistant, and better than Vonage in call quality, as I'm using the same cordless phone that I previously connected to the Vonage ATA.

While the quality is only slightly lower than the CallVantage service clarity, I think that largely has to do with the fact that AT&T with them owning their own network, while Packet8 has to buy it's network from Level3. Still, it's so close, it's hardly noticeable.

Overall, given the price at $19.99 a month, Packet8 is clearly a better value than Vonage, if cost is the sole decision point. If you want more features, you will have to pay more to Vonage, starting at $29.99 plus if you want the softphone and an added block of minutes, then you'll pay more on top of that.

AT&T, at $19.99 for three months, and then $34.99 has the best features, quality of service and capabilities. If you're a business, going with CallVantage for five dollars more will likely spare you the issue of a bad call which may occur with Vonage.

I also spoke at length with the folks at VoiceGlo about thier virtual PBX and GloPhone. I'll post a full recap once a few questions I posed get replied to.

On Friday I spent some time chatting with a colleague in Seattle using FWD's BETA Pulver Communicator, using a mic plugged into my laptop. The call was flawless. No rebuffering, packet loss, jitter or flutter. Considering we both were a) wireless using 802.11g,

he was using a Xyzel WiFi phone (someting that is arriving today), c) I'm on Cox, he's on Comcast and all the networks in between, this was a sensational demonstration of Jeff Pulver's newest creation. While FWD has been around, the idea of a presence based, Instant Messaging capable networking voice client is very impressive, presenting the type of call quality I'm used to when holding conference calls over a speakerphone.

If I've learned anything about VoIP and PC's, it's get the best Sound card you can find, and the most powerful processor. With a 3 ghz hyperthreading Pentium 4 on my newest Acer laptop, I'm getting awesome VoIP capabilities. With the new Logitech Notebook Pro camera, the video is equally stunning.

More on all this experimentation, but bottom line is if you invest in good equipment, have a quality connection to the net, an all IP world can really be yours.

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