

Unlimited Free Calling with Google Voice - IsaacSchlueter
http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0Ae8glDUXDsh9ZGR2eG43cjRfMzNkOTM4ZjNjeA&hl=en&pli=1

======
tumult
A lot of the stuff described in this document requires a Gizmo5 account, which
are difficult to come by. Registrations are closed and there's no invite
system, so someone has to actually give you the credentials to an account they
already have to transfer it to you.

I have SIP set up on my Nexus One, replacing the default GSM phone functions
with SIP stuff over the data band. Here's what I use:

1\. The Android SIP client, sipdroid. <http://sipdroid.org/>

2\. An account with sipgate: <http://www.sipgate.com/> Free signup gets you a
real phone number, same calling rates as Google Voice, decent web interface.
It has some features that are more powerful than Google Voice, but no
transcription.

3\. An account with pbxes: <http://pbxes.org/> (Warning, their landing page
has Flash with very irritating sound, yuck) pbxes acts as a programmable in-
between for SIP communications, like SIP Sorcery as described in the article
posted here.

You connect sipdroid to pbxes, which connects to sipgate:

Your phone (sipdroid) <\---> pbxes.org <\---> sipgate

pbxes acts as a much more powerful wrapper around sipgate. Sipgate will
connect your SIP calls in and out of landlines, and pbxes gives you more
powerful control over the SIP-only stuff. Even if you don't want to use the
power features of pbxes, I still recommend connecting sipdroid to it instead
of directly to sipgate or another provider, as pbxes has implemented a little
trick that can save you a ton of battery life on your Android phone when
connecting to it with sipdroid. You can read about it here:
<http://code.google.com/p/sipdroid/wiki/NewStandbyTechnique>

The hardest part of setting this up will be filling in the information for
your sipgate account correctly through pbxes' web interface. It's a little
clunky and unintuitive. There's a guide here:
[http://seethisnowreadthis.com/2009/07/11/get-sipdroid-to-
wor...](http://seethisnowreadthis.com/2009/07/11/get-sipdroid-to-work-with-
any-sip-provider-on-your-android-phone/)

End result of all of this: Google Voice-priced calls, higher quality audio
than GSM phones, same latency, same drop call rate, still have E911 service
through normal GSM bands if you need it, programmable caller id, scriptable
phone routing, near-perfect phone integration on Android. Ditch your voice
plan.

~~~
lftl
I've heard a lot of complaints that call quality with VoIP on Nexus One is
awful -- tons of latency, lots of clipping -- it sounds like this isn't your
experience?

I've seriously considered trying out a data-only plan with T-Mobile, plus one
of the pay as you go plans to fill in coverage gaps, but the bad reports of
VoIP on the Nexus One have held me back.

~~~
tumult
I haven't had any problems. Keep in mind I haven't tried any of the other VoIP
clients for Android -- Skype, Nimbuzz, etc. Only sipdroid. But I've used it
over plain EDGE/GPRS on my Android dev phone (G1) and had no quality issues to
speak of, other than the occasional dropped call, which can happen on normal
GSM anyway.

As far as I know, the 'official' Skype client for Android is still 'Skype
Lite' or something, which costs you minutes on your cell phone plan to use,
and might connect over GSM as well (I'm not sure). It wouldn't surprise me if
this craptacular idea tarnishes people's perception of VoIP on Android.

~~~
ruslan
Oh really ? Sipdroid does support G.711mu only, which a) never fits into
narrow GPRS/EDGE bandwidth, b) incredibly sensitive to network fluctuations,
lags and packet loss. So I believe you are a little bit unfair in regards of
Sipdroid voice qality :-). Even Speex and G.729 hardly fit into poor
GPRS/EDGE, trust me as experienced VoIP developer.

Also Sipdroid has a bug in RTP class which introduces huge latency, somehow
they don't event want to fix it although they were pointed to it many times.

