Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Stalin84]

I was wondering if you could help me with this issue I've been having.

Basically, Skype and all other voice chat services (Google Talk, MSN Messenger's phone, Steam's voice chat feature and Xfire) have been giving me a lot of trouble. This is kind of a big deal considering that I rely on Skype to talk to my friends and family back in Canada.

To give an example, on Skype, I say "Hello?" and hear nothing. 10-20 seconds later I hear: "Hello! Hello? Hello?" all from before. It isn't possible to have a conversation this way.

The problem I've been having is that all of these programs seem to have connection issues. I get 10 seconds worth of latency (I hear them 10 seconds after they speak) or nothing at all. The strange thing is that this doesn't happen all the time, there are times when these services DO work. It's like a 1 in 10 thing (lately it has been more like 1 in 20).

Its not limited to my home desktop. So far I've had this problem in two places I've lived that had different ISPs. I've also had this problem on two separate computers as there have been times when my desktop computer wasn't working so I had to bring bring home my work laptop and I STILL had the same problem. I have also used two different operating systems since this began happening (Windows XP and Windows 7) and have formatted several times (this problem has been occuring over a year). I've also gone through about three headsets since then so its not that either.

All that being said, its definitely not my hardware. Its definitely not my software. I don't use a router, in both instances I've been using my apartment building's internet service and each apartment building goes through a different ISP. I don't run anti-virus programs unless I'm scanning for viruses, my firewall is usually set to off and there should be nothing interferring with these programs.

Plus, they do work about 10% of the time.

Does anybody have any idea what this is? I can't pinpoint it.

For awhile I assumed it might be my friend's computer but this has also been occurring with more than one person. It seems limited to voice chat software as I don't have any other problems with my connection and no problems using voice chat within multiplayer games, etc.

Cheers.

[proustme]

Try a VPN. I just got an account with strongvpn.com. If your internet connection is otherwise fast with other websites, then you'll likely be able to benefit from using a VPN. Your ISP's ports for Skype maybe be throttled or have other problems (as you've experienced).

A VPN routes all your internet traffic through a separate server with completely open ports (you'll have to read the specifics of whichever VPN service you go with). It's really not that hard to setup, and I get a great connection with mine.

On VPN websites, you can choose the VPN server geographically located nearest to you. For example, I connect to San Francisco (the nearest U.S. server) so I can watch Hulu.com, a video website NBC has restricted to the states). I could connect to the Hong Kong server, but I have no use for it at the moment. I've tried Skype and have no problems going through my VPN account. Skype on my Korean ISP, KT, works just fine, though.

[Stalin84]

Wow. Thanks Proust! I'll try that as soon as I get home.

Good news about Hulu, too. I was using a hotspot program to view Hulu before until they figured out that people using it weren't in the US and I haven't been able to use Hulu since.

Sounds like it will work. I'll report back either way.

[darkjedidave]

I decided to give StrongVPN a try. I bought the 3 City Special pptp/open account for $85/year. Great connections and easy setup

[proustme]

Good to hear!