Ooma and Skype on Asus Router

[netman10]

Hi,

The Ooma phone system that I purchased early last year has been sitting unused after I found the 1/2+ second delay too distracting. I even updated my router in the hope that it would lead to a speed improvement, but didn't happen. I also find Skype can be frustrating, with video slowing and intermittently freezing after awhile.

I would deeply appreciate any suggestions for improvement. Here is my setup:

Optimum Cable Internet: 17Mbps down, 4Mbps up.

Motorola SB5100 Surfboard cable modem.

Asus Rt-n66u router.

Ooma connected to router with Ethernet line.

I'm sure QOS will come up in the discussion. Will QOS adjustments matter if I'm having these problems without any other network traffic?

I'm determined to get this fixed so I can say goodbye to phone bills. Thank you for your thoughts.

 

[stevech]

VoIP will always have that delay. Nature of the beast's buffering and the Internet delays.

Cell phones often have 1/2 sec or more delay.

I tried 4 different VoIP service providers and ATAs. These all put VoIP into the same modem streams as my LAN traffic. None were even close to satisfactory.

I now pay more than cheap-VoIP and much less than AT&T landline, for digital phone from Time Warner cable. It's quality/reliability are the same as we all had for years with class 5 switches and MaBell. It's because cable companies' digital phone create a separate RF carrier for phone, and it's not vulerable to QoS wars with the LAN traffic.

 

[sinshiva]

a lot depends on the voip service. i think skype, definitely teamspeak and ventrilo would benefit from qos. i've seen voip services that do something weird, though, like use a huge range of ports and there's simply no way to make qos accomodate such a scenario. if you use netstat -anb while skype is connected and it consistently uses the same destination port, qos would help with this. i think skype is designed to connect to port 80 or 443, to make it simple breaking out of a firewall; dunno whether it uses udp or tcp, though. i'd guess udp, at least.

for voip as a home phone replacement service, though, your guess is as good as mine. i tried it once and remember having to forward a massive range of ports for it. i don't know what it does for the outgoing/ destination port. like i said, though, if you find out that this kind of voip service does always use the same destination port(s), then qos could work for this, too.

voip really isn't all that different from an online videogame connection, though it definitely has greater problems with an unstable connection/lots of jitter. this will be what causes qos to mess it up most, with a less than ideal configuration

just, don't try and define a torrent port in qos, or you'll have no hope getting it to work with voip

 

[jlake]

Hi,

The Ooma phone system that I purchased early last year has been sitting unused after I found the 1/2+ second delay too distracting. I even updated my router in the hope that it would lead to a speed improvement, but didn't happen. I also find Skype can be frustrating, with video slowing and intermittently freezing after awhile.

I would deeply appreciate any suggestions for improvement. Here is my setup:

Optimum Cable Internet: 17Mbps down, 4Mbps up.

Motorola SB5100 Surfboard cable modem.

Asus Rt-n66u router.

Ooma connected to router with Ethernet line.

I'm sure QOS will come up in the discussion. Will QOS adjustments matter if I'm having these problems without any other network traffic?

I'm determined to get this fixed so I can say goodbye to phone bills. Thank you for your thoughts.

All you have to do is use the default Qos settings on your asus. Enter your ISP down/up speed. You can use the Ooma line quality test to see the improvement. Use google to find the Ooma line quality test.

Some people have to end up putting the Ooma ahead of the router. But first use the Ooma line quality test. Experiment with what gives you the best results.

 

[netman10]

Thank you all for taking time to answer -- much appreciated.

I tried to run the Ooma Line Quality test but it hangs after the first part (Measuring reliability). Most recent java (7/51) is installed. Anyone else get the same result?

 

[netman10]

I ran several tests at Visualware.com and my numbers seem out of whack in a couple of places.

The worst is Download Consistency of Service which, in four different tests, came in at 6%, 48%, 21%, and 7%. I understand it should be over 80%. Would that cause a problem and if so, how would I correct it?

Also, my max TCP delay was > 1,000 ms a couple of times, 120 another time, and 857 another time.

Jitter from me to server is 1.6 and 4.9 from server to me. Is that ok?

Thank you.

 

[stevech]

Other than cable modem co. digital phone, VoIP is at the mercy of the routing in the Internet to/from the VoIP service provider's host. I could not find a provider, having tried several, that could get close enough to wire-line quality and service outage times. The Internet's routing delays are issue 1; issue 2 is that the VoIP providers choose suppliers for call delivery into and from POTS connections and many of those suppliers are bad, e.g., they don't keep up with the area code changes, exchange prefix changes, and I too often got call attempt failures to only selected numbers. The service providers select suppliers to save costs.

No such issue with the Cable modem Co. digital phone which is more expensive than VoIp but less than Ma Bell.

 

[netman10]

Thank you Steve. Excellent points and I may end up going with cable phone.

For Skype, I still get a notification that my connection is too slow for good video. Could my poor Consistency of Service numbers be to blame? If so, how do I go about getting that fixed? Call my ISP?

Thanks.

 

[stevech]

Your OP said you pay for (and get?) 14/4Mbps service. That's far beyond what Skype would need. At best, Skype phone is flaky, due to the horrors of the Internet busy hour.
IMO: Skype is great for video chats. OK for international phone where cost offsets lack of reliabilty/quality for use by families.

Your ISP is most likely going to be of no help, other than probably trying to up-sell you to business class service. My cable modem from Time Warner (evil) is 10/1 and $45/mo even at that!

 

[netman10]

Optimum says it delivers 15/5 which is about what I get on speed tests. As you say, that should be plenty for decent Skype video chats, but after several minutes of video chat with various relatives/friends, I'll get a message saying the speed is too slow for good video.

There seems to be something in the chain that isn't right. I have good high-speed internet and a good router. How about my sb5100 modem -- could that be a problem? I'll try to call ISP about consistency of service.