Obi110 Outgoing Voice Quality Problem

[bsharp]

Hi-

I'm using a 2 yr old OBi110, and have received steadily increasing complaints over the last 4 mths that the outgoing voice quality is garbled and choppy.  I originally assumed this was a problem with Google Voice, so I switched to Anveo last month (which last year worked well for the same problem). Although the incoming voice quality improved slightly with Anveo, the outgoing quality problem has remained-  callers can not understand me.   The problem remains with the OBi set to half or full-duplex.

VOIP tests show that my speed is in the 4 to 6 Mbps range with no packet loss; jitter is ~3.5ms, and MOS scores are consistently 4.0 or slightly higher (last test a moment ago was 4.09).  Calls made with a lot of other devices running on the network versus those made with nothing running get identical results.

The OBi is inside a DMZ with appropriate ports open, and switching to having the OBi connected directly to the ISP with no router do not change the issue at all.

Any and all suggestions welcome!  I'm ready to toss the OBi out the window at this point- my cell phone (connected to the same network) provides much, much better quality...

[restamp]

Since VoIP voice packets use the UDP protocol, which is sessionless, it is very difficult to tell what is going on on the outbound side.  Your OBi is only reporting on the packets it receives -- the only ones it sees -- so your jitter, lost packets, and MOS values are based only on the side of the conversation you can hear.

So, the inbound side of your connections are working well, while the outbound sides are not.  Your best bet at diagnosis is to make several calls from your various service providers and note the differences:  If some work and one doesn't, the packet loss is probably occurring somewhere on that carrier's routes.  If there is a consistent loss with all carriers, the problem is likely to be on your LAN or on one of the hops through your ISP.

Are you doing anything differently today than you were four months ago?  Streaming videos?  Kids playing online games?

If you disconnect everything but the OBi from your router, does the problem go away?

If you have a friend with an OBi, does a direct OBi-to-OBi call (**9) sound better than a GV call?

Is your modem happy with the signal levels it is seeing?  (Often 192.168.100.1 will get you to the modem's internal web server that contains that information.)

Are you using QoS to give VoIP packets precedence?  If not, you should perhaps look into turning it on in your router, if that is possible.

These are some of the things you can look at to try to narrow down the scope of the problem.  Unfortunately, if it is upstream from your modem and affects all carriers, about the only thing you can do is complain to your ISP, which usually falls on deaf ears.

Good luck.

[bsharp]

Thanks for your quick reply!   

Just FYi-  No devices attached to network other than OBi makes no difference that anyone can tell (or even directly connected to modem).  Modem is happy.  All other devices, router, cell phones, etc. all happy.  ISP says their tests say all is well (and provided data consistent with my results on several test sites).

[SteveInWA]

My money is on your internet connection.  The "4-6 Mbps" figure you quoted is only for downstream bandwidth, which is why you can hear your callers fine.  I assume you're using DSL, and your upstream bandwidth is significantly lower, which is degrading your outgoing voice.

You can install a softphone client on your computer and configure it to use your Anveo account, to test whether or not the OBi has something to do with the issue.  If calls over the softphone sound as lousy to your callers as do calls on the OBi, then it's your internet connection.  Counterpath X-Lite is free and easy to setup for this purpose.

[Taoman]

What phone is connected to your OBi? Have you tried switching it out with another one to see if it makes any difference? If you're using a DECT phone have you tried plugging a corded phone directly into your OBi?

Have you tried the VoIP "Test Call?" (2533480152) If so, what were your results?

When you run a speed test what is your upload speed?

[Lavarock7]

What results do you get here?

Set the default to VOIP for the test then click on the map. Choose the location of your providers server if possible.

http://myspeed.visualware.com/index.php