Obihai 202 voice quality issues

[kevmeist]

I have been using the 202 for about 8 months and generally like it. However, when talking to my wife in FL (I'm in WV at the moment), we both hear a lot of voice quality issues. These are:

1.  When she speaks, the volume start out low, so I miss the first few words then the volume kicks up.
2. It's almost as if I hear the line "turn around", so we trample on each others voices.
3. Sometimes, everything disappears for 5-6 seconds.

My connection in WV is Time Warner with an Arris modem and a Linksys WRT610N Gb router.
The FL equipment is Brighthouse cable with a separate modem and phone interface unit along with a WD MyNet900 Gb router. Brighthouse are due out at the house tomorrow (Saturday) to look at that end again to see if they see problems down there.

If I talk locally to people in WV...I have a small amount of "issues" like above but nowhere near as intrusive.

Are there any configurable parameters on the 202 that could help voice quality issues?

Thanks,

Kevin

[CoalMinerRetired]

There are a few different settings that could affect voice quality.  But first some run some of the tests linked below to see if they point to anything in particular:

http://www.obitalk.com/forum/index.php?topic=5803.msg37497#msg37497

Note a few points:
- You want to run the tests several times. On both ends of your situation, WV and FL.
- You want to run the tests connected to your router the same way as your Obis are connected, e.g., running the tests across a wireless connection when your Obis are wired using a 10 Mb half duplex connection will not be meaningful.  Easy way to tell 10/100 Full va. Half is the port light(s) on a switch or a router.
- That 10 Mb Half Duplex thing is usually the first point people say to check, so here's the simple method.
- Are you getting the issues: On a call across a public telephone line? Via an Obi-to-Obi (peer to peer) call? Or when using a SIP provider (Google Voice, Anveo, etc.)?

[kevmeist]

Hi CoalMiner,

I'll look at the tests you mention over the weekend.

The calls to my wife are from the 202 (with Google Voice) at the WV end to a cable phone at the FL end (the FL end point is using the direct cable phone number and using GoogleVoice number (which forwards to the cable phone number)).

If I talk to our son in FL (with him using a cell phone) I hear occasional issues but nothing like when talking to my wife.

Regards,

Kevin
Update1
Below are results from 3 executions of the "phonepower" URL that you posted. This were tests run at the WV end. I'll have to wait until the weekend to let me logon to the wife's PC in FL to run it there.

Test1
Test Type:   Voice over IP
Downstream Jitter:   0.3 ms
Downstream Loss:   0 %
Downstream Packet Order:   100 %
Upstream Jitter:   0.6 ms
Upstream Loss:   0 %
Upstream Packet Order:   100.0 %
Packet Discards:   0 %
MOS Score:   4.2

Test2
Test Type:   Voice over IP
Downstream Jitter:   0.5 ms
Downstream Loss:   0 %
Downstream Packet Order:   100 %
Upstream Jitter:   0.8 ms
Upstream Loss:   0 %
Upstream Packet Order:   100.0 %
Packet Discards:   0 %
MOS Score:   4.2

Test3
Test Type:   Voice over IP
Downstream Jitter:   1 ms
Downstream Loss:   0 %
Downstream Packet Order:   100 %
Upstream Jitter:   0.5 ms
Upstream Loss:   0 %
Upstream Packet Order:   100.0 %
Packet Discards:   0 %
MOS Score:   4.2

My mostly untrained VOIP mind would think that the figures above are OK.

[kevmeist]

Test Results from FL

Test1
Upstream jitter     2.2 ms
Downstream jitter     5.5 ms
Upstream packet loss     0.0 %
Downstream packet loss     0.0 %
Upstream packet order     100.0 %
Downstream packet order     100.0 %
Packet discards     0.0 %
MOS     4.0
REGISTER ms     621 ms
INVITE ms     598 ms
BYE ms     3 ms

Test2
Upstream jitter     2.7 ms
Downstream jitter     3.7 ms
Upstream packet loss     0.0 %
Downstream packet loss     0.0 %
Upstream packet order     100.0 %
Downstream packet order     100.0 %
Packet discards     0.0 %
MOS     4.0
REGISTER ms     585 ms
INVITE ms     605 ms
BYE ms     4 ms

Test3
Upstream jitter     1.8 ms
Downstream jitter     3.7 ms
Upstream packet loss     0.0 %
Downstream packet loss     0.0 %
Upstream packet order     100.0 %
Downstream packet order     100.0 %
Packet discards     0.0 %
MOS     4.0
REGISTER ms     703 ms
INVITE ms     567 ms
BYE ms     2 ms

[CoalMinerRetired]

The MOS (Measure of Service) scores both look ok.  And the FL tests results don't point to anything apparent.  BTW, I'd run the test in FL a few more times say right before and after a call to happens, to confirm consistency with the above results.

Since the tests are not pointing to anything directly, try this divide and conquer approach: Have the wife in FL open a browser and call you directly from within the browser using the GV number you said is forwarded to the Brighthouse cable phone. See or "From the GV Website" or "From Call Phone in GMail" here. Note that you can also call from within Gmail even if you do not have a GV account associated to the Gmail account.

This is an end-to-end test to see if you still have the issues when you eliminate the Brighthouse cable phone from the picture.

[kevmeist]

Thanks again for the reply. Yesterday, BH replaced the separate cable modem and phone unit with a combination modem/phone unit (Arris). We have not tried the phone again since then (I was out of area all day). We won't be able to try the GV call suggestion for 2 weeks. When we moved into the FL house, I had a week down there to move in and do as much as I could. We couldn't find the connecting cable for the subwoofer to the PC itself, so no sound. I go down there in 2 weeks, so I'll find that cable or buy a replacement then. I'll keep you posted when we try the new hardware in FL today.

So, I'll keep an eye on it and post later any further data.

UPDATE1
Just tried a long conversation (an hour or so) between WV and FL (with the new Arris modem, the separate modem and phone interface were removed yesterday). So far, so good. I had the speaker volume down to 2 at the WV end (used to be at 6), so did Gloria. Speech quality was good to excellent. So, it "appears" that the separate cable modem and phone interface were the problem.

UPDATE2
2nd phone call was just as good.

UPDATE3
3rd call was "iffy" part of the time, but still over the 3 phone calls today...a big improvement over before they replaced the modem and phone interface unit.


UPDATE4
I also saw that the 202 had a firmware upgrade available (Firmware upgraded to 3.0.1 (Build: 3932)), so also did that today (Sunday).

Again, thanks for your help CoalMiner.

Regards,

Kevin