Has anyone tried their services before?

Which one is the best?

You've actually got a little mixed up there Louise. Skype is a provider of VOIP, essentially it uses VOIP to offer it's services. VOIP, or voice over internet protocol is a generic term given to the ability to talk via the internet. Much like DVD is independent of the companies that manufacture players, so is VOIP independent of companies which offer services over it(such as Skype).

My experience of Skype is a little limited but from what I do have I can say that it's very impressive; crystal clear conversation with anybody in the world with a broadband connection for free, you can't really go wrong!

The only disadvantage is that if you call non internet phones you have to pay. Services like Vonage aim to replace the home phone by adding a router to the bottom of your existing home phone which will make all your calls run over VOIP, rather than standard telecom systems. The difference with Vonage though, is that their service is not provided for free. For this reason I'd recommend Skype, download it for free and give it a go for free and I'm sure you'll be impressed.

Ooops! I think I got Voip mixed up with Vonage! I knew Skype had another competitor, but I couldn't remember their name.

Hey, we all make mistakes!

What's the difference between skype than chatting on MSN, Yahoo, etc using a mic? Maybe that's why not many people use it yet, because they prefer to stay on MSN, etc, where their friends are.

Good question and to be honest I'm not compltely sure. However, in my experience chatting over msn with a microphone quality has been grainy and suffered quite badly from delay. When I've used Skype the quality is crystal clear, better infact than most normal phones I've used, and there has been no delay at all.

It is used alot more in the US where there's a higher saturation point of houses with broadband and as broadband becomes more popular in the U.K. I think we can expect the user base to increase. Probably the biggest problem in trying to attract users is through lack of advertising. I do believe though that this will become the way all telephone calls are made(via voip not necessarily Skype) and that this too will spread to mobile phones once nationwide wi fi exists. Infact Skype already has a beta version working on wi fi enabled mobiles in wi fi hotspots.

The question is what will become of service providers like orange and o2? My guess is they will have to concentrate even more on multimedia services to adapt to the market which is on the brink of being revolutionised.

Yeah, I saw a documentary about them a few weeks ago and they said they only rely heavily on word of mouth marketing. If someone downloads it and really like the quality, then they are more likely to tell their friends about Skype so they can chat to each other for free.

They said they can make money by charging customers cheap phone calls if they are dialing to a landmind phone instead of pc, but I'm sure their friends are more likely to download the software as well.

I bet 02 is going to be the first one in the market. I think they were one of the first competitors to offer online text services via Talk21 and Genie. Then Orange started it later.

Hi Everyone
I use Skype to phone France (landlines)
It used to be £0.40p/min with British Telecom, then I used One-Tel and it was £0.04p/min, now with Skype it is only £0.01p/min.

Friends of mine are saving fortunes using it.

Go on give it a try.
:-)

Wow that is impressive Bob I had heard the rates from Skype to landlines were cheap but not that cheap!

And whats more you can have the video on MSN and Skype for the voice

That's definately very cheap!!!

Have you got a Skype phone as well?

I'm not familiar with Skype, how much does it cost to buy?

It's free to download from the net, just pay for the phone bills. I have also seen some of their phones costing around £80 so that's quite average compare to the other phones.

It's free!!

http://www.skype.com/products/

Skype is completely free and so are calls to other skype users (they have to be online though, obviously) the only charges are when calling landlines or mobiles and even then they're cheaper than standard tariffs.

Give it a go, there's nothing to lose

Does the clarity of Skype improve greatly from dial up to broadband? I use Skype on dial up and it can sometimes have patchy sound at my end of the connection.

I've never used it on dial up but on my broadband it is absolutely crystal clear so I assume it must be the connection that makes the difference.

Why are you still on dial up? Are you a caveman?

No just can't get AOL to drop their prices for broadband!

These days broadband can work out nearly as cheap as dial up. You should look into the prices. What's your average bill per month (including line rental) for your current dial up?

£15 per month plus standard BT line rental
@ about £10/month.