What's your favorite voice communication software? I've dabbled with Vent in the past but I just couldn't really get used to it, so I'm pretty much a Skype guy right now. It's got some awesome quality, looks nice and has good chat features such as file sharing, games, etc etc etc. You can also do group calls with webcam support, as well as the endless fun which can be had by adding random people into the call. I'd quite like to try out something else though, and TDR's suggestion of Teamspeak sounds pretty cool. Anyone else got any better ideas?
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Next up was TeamSpeak 2 and while it had a better interface than Ventrilo the sound quality did not measure up to that of Ventrilo. I am not sure but I think there was some sort of file sharing in TS2. ut sharing links was much easier as it had a chat pane at the bottom of the interface which which parsed the links into a click-able link right from the TS2 interface. Administration was a bit easier than early versions of Ventrilo but there were known security flaws in the TS2 server.
Then along came TeamSpeak 3 with upgraded codex, improved security on the server side with a token system to elevate client privileges. It sounds better than any solution I have used to date, has file sharing, can hold up to 32 users without a license, and has great interface with minimal resource demands. TS3's is also very easy to use even for a novice as it's interface is very straightforward with plenty of features minus useless bells and whistles.
As for Skype it does offer VOIP which none of the others can provide but the interface is cluttered and unresponsive even a fast machine with plenty of hardware resources. It also limits you to just 10 people in a voice session which must be hosted by one of the clients in the call. The voice quality is OK or about on par with the old TS2. So while Skype does hold the distinction of being the only VOIP capable solutions that I know of that is it;s only advantage over Ventrilo or TeamSpeak 3.
In conclusion, other than VOIP, TS3 is the clear winner in my mind as not only is the client free so is the server for a single seat 32 slot license and you can easily get a free non-profit 10 server license in less than 5 minutes which will allow you to run up to 10 32 slot servers and has a remote admin tool which and query the servers and manage them instantly.
http://mumble.sourceforge.net/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mumble_(software)
How many people does mumble support? Can you setup a mumble server? What intergration does mumble support? Waht makes it the best?
C'mon Slartibartfast you can do better than just tell us it is the best, tell us why it is the best. What does it offer that the rest do not?
you're right, i should have provided more detail. Was lazy and linked to wikipedia.
There is no limit on the amount of users. The only limit is your bandwidth. ~6 is the average but there is no artificial limit like in a lot of the other ones. you can try your luck based on the available bandwidth.
A mumble server can be easily set up. Under windows it's as simple as running 'murmer' from the startmenu (the server operator than connects to localhost and gives everyone the IP address of the PC, making sure the right port is open). It's all GUI based, the server is an icon in your systray.
It also comes with a lot ofa decent BG/noise filter.
The main advantage with mumble is the speex protocol: it is the lowest latency, lowest bandwidth, decent quality codec for streaming. Google uses speex in some of its mobile services.
Sounds like you're not filtering properly. Everything in the house that uses a phone line except the DSL modem must have a filter. If you already have it like this, it's possible that the filter on the phone is bad, so try replacing it, switching in a spare, or testing with another device's filter. If you have filters at the NID that are failing like this, then you should talk to the telco/ISP and get it fixed. I figure maybe you know this shit already, so I don't mean to insult your intelligence or anything, but maybe you overlooked something.
TeamSpeak 3 uses speex as well and at 32Khz stereo it only uses 7.57 KBps with a 20 ms delay. What are the figures for mumble? BTW speex is also in Ventrilo but it's interface is quite clumsy compared to TS3.