Korean Job Discussion Forums

[jeffbright]

I never liked skype

[The Lemon]

Skype works well for me. But there are two alternatives if it's giving you problems:

1. Subscribe to a VPN service
These are about $50/year. It lets your computer access the Net through Europe or North America. This is slightly slower in theory than accessing it directly, but ISPs have been known to mess around with Skype/Voip services, as they'd rather you make your phone calls through a phone at long distance prices. I live in a country where this is policy.
VPNs also can route around other local weirdness with your Net connection. Therefore, VPNs are good.

2. Voipstunt
This is one of many Voip services all owned by a German company, Finerea. Here's their basic deal: You pay 10 euro and that gets you 4 months of "free calling". After the 120 days, they then start taking off the balance per minute, and their rates are pretty close to Skype. Therefore, depending on how often you call, you can get the better part of a year of calling off of 10 euro.

[eslplease]

i have the unlimited north America feature so i am constantly calling home and i have no problems at all.

my video is great and my voice is second to none, even when I call landlines...

I am using OSX, im not sure if it is more stable than its windows counterpart, but nonetheless, no problems here.

[SHANE02]

I got a new headset/mic, and now things are good on Skype for me. I think the issues I had were due to feedback.

[eslplease]

ive gone through sooooooo many headsets in the last year, and i can honestly say that this is the best wireless headset for under $150, bar NONE!

http://www.plantronics.com/north_america/en_US/products/computer/multi-use-headsets/audio-995

[emetib]

I'm considering getting Skype set-up so that people from the U.S. can call me on a U.S. phone number/call forwarding/voicemail. Anyone else out there doing this with their Skype account, and using other phone units besides a headset/mic that Skype offers?

[crossmr]

[wanderingsalsero]

I use Skype at least 2 or 3 times a week to call the US and almost invariably I have problems with my voice (send) crapping out. The person on the other side will suddenly say, "Art....I can't hear you....Art....Art....hello...are you there??!!!"

After 5-10 seconds it usually comes back.

I've changed headphones once already but I still have the problem.

I live just outside of Gumi now but I had the same problem both from school and from my apartment in Suwon last year. On my first gig, in Namyangju, I don't remember if I had that problem or not.

Is that the problem other people have?

[The Lemon]

No, with the massive bandwidth found throughout Korea, this shouldn't be happening. There may be something wrong with your own internet connection, or with your computer's audio drivers/configuration.

[buildbyflying]

no major problems here and I use it everyday. I talk through a webcam of questionable quality, and overall conversations are painless; video and voice.
In Korea you shouldn't be having major issues (with exceptions) but remember that calls depend on the bandwidth of both sender and receiver. calling the USA you're likely to run into more problems with the IP stateside.

And to the poster who posted the program, thx, even though I ahven't had many issues with video.

[Majeh]

I use skype and my experience with them has been good.

For an external microphone, I use Absolute 10 which I bought at a local computer store in Gimpo. Price: W6,000.

For the headphones, I use Philips SHP1900.

Both items work well with skype.

[toonchoon]

skype works well for me, but i find MSN comp-to-comp video calls to work better. the video quality is better, voice quality better than skype.

internet speed is good enough for both, i just think MSN does a better job, for my uses.