VOIP etc > Voice Over IP - VOIP > VOIP Tech Chat > Half-duplex with VoIP?

Half-duplex with VoIP?

Make sure your router is not in half duplex! If it is not then this could be a latency issue.
--
Jeffery Williams
President
Broadvox Direct, Llc
evp; Broadvox, Llc

reply to hackysak
Do you mean my ATA device? If so, I have no access to it. If you mean the ethernet router, half/full (10/100Mbps or 20/200Mbps) shouldn't matter since my DSL line (1.5Mbps/384Kbps) will always be my bottleneck..

Although I believe it to be in full duplex..

I mean your router, and if it is set to half duplex then this is your problem. It is not about a bottle neck, it is that voice is real time and you can not use it in half duplex without seeing this problem.
--
Jeffery Williams
President
Broadvox Direct, Llc
evp; Broadvox, Llc

reply to hackysak
I know what you're saying about half duplex on Vonage. I had that when I used Vonage. With 384 up you should be using the higher quality setting. I complained to Vonage many times about the problem but they never had an answer for me. I went with Packet8, but I'm not saying you should. Whatever works for you.

Scott
--
Visit »whythehell.com

It is not about half duplex on Vonage (in all fairness to them) this is about half duplex on VoIP.
--
Jeffery Williams
President
Broadvox Direct, Llc
evp; Broadvox, Llc

reply to hackysak
I've checked and my settings for the router is 100/FD.. So that doesn't appear to be the issue..

sgarrand, did you have the same problem with Packet8?? If not, I'm assuming you just switched to P8 and the problem went away, correct? (in other words, no changes to your network devices)..

Thanks..

reply to hackysak

said by hackysak:

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I've got Vonage service and have noticed there seems to be a half-duplex thing going on. I've noticed myself talking over someone and, firstly, having a hard time interrupting someone while they're talking and also cutting them off when I'm talking. It's actually quite annoying.. Do any of the other VoIP services have service that doesn't exhibit half-duplex syndrome?

As a note, I have my quality setting to the medium setting. Would it help to raise that (doesn't seem to make sense it would since each person's voice is going in a different stream, upstream for me at home, downstream for the person I'm talking to)..

Thanks in advance. I love Vonage, but I am finding this problem to be quite annoying..

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reply to jgwilliams

said by jgwilliams:

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It is not about half duplex on Vonage (in all fairness to them) this is about half duplex on VoIP.

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reply to hackysak
Well.. I didn't change anything and I don't get it anymore. This is not to say it's a problem with Vonage, but with the way we (you and I) had it set up. With the same network and equipment Packet8 hasn't done it to me. I got Vonage early in 2002 and it wasn't working well on my 1500/768 line at the time. Keep trying different phones and settings to see if you can find a setup that gets rid of it.

Scott
--
Visit »whythehell.com

reply to blohner

said by blohner:

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I noticed that the latency get's exaggerated and a 'half duplex effect' shows when using el cheapo SS digital phones that add additional delay to the conversation. Maybe that is what is happening to you? Don't know what phone you are using but try to connect a phone directly to the ATA , don't use any cordless or other digital signal processing that might cause a few extra milliseconds delay and see if it feels different...

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said by hackysak:

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... Any other suggestions?

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reply to hackysak
I've called Vonage after being directed to their 1-VONAGEHELP line from the support I emailed.. Interesting, I noticed that I didn't experience the problem when talking to them on their help line.. I was told that they're going to call me back and see if the problem persists later on (basically, unless they do something configuration-wise, no help to me)..

What I did notice, however, is that when I connect to their HELP line I get routed to a different IP address, where the latency is REAL low..

Croot@bobo> traceroute 66.147.177.219
traceroute to 66.147.177.219 (66.147.177.219), 30 hops max, 40 byte packets
1 xxx.covad.net (68.165.x.x) 3.333 ms 3.175 ms 2.509 ms
2 172.31.255.253 (172.31.255.253) 13.849 ms 17.738 ms 13.565 ms
3 192.168.13.41 (192.168.13.41) 13.116 ms 11.691 ms 26.961 ms
4 ge-5-0-146.ipcolo2.NewYork1.Level3.net (166.90.137.213) 12.673 ms 11.520 ms 18.607 ms
5 ge-5-0.core1.NewYork1.Level3.net (64.159.17.37) 13.440 ms 12.301 ms 12.079 ms
6 so-4-2.pr1.lga1.us.mfnx.net (209.244.160.158) 23.256 ms 11.735 ms 11.927 ms
7 so-4-3-0.cr2.lga1.us.above.net (64.125.30.189) 18.273 ms 11.956 ms 10.929 ms
8 pos1-0.er1a.lga1.us.above.net (216.200.127.198) 13.596 ms 26.989 ms 13.342 ms
9 available.above.net (208.185.73.229) 12.963 ms 16.839 ms 12.180 ms
10 63-121-101-212.focaldata.net (63.121.101.212) 12.824 ms 14.111 ms 23.687 ms
11 66-147-177-219.focaldata.net (66.147.177.219) 13.319 ms 12.861 ms 27.296 ms

When I dial my Dad's # in the next town over I get the following (totally DIFFEREN'T scenerio)

traceroute to 208.46.216.29 (208.46.216.29), 30 hops max, 40 byte packets
1 xxx.covad.net (68.165.x.x) 5.663 ms 2.895 ms 2.725 ms
2 172.31.255.253 (172.31.255.253) 18.126 ms 20.192 ms 14.017 ms
3 192.168.13.41 (192.168.13.41) 13.140 ms 12.860 ms 27.009 ms
4 ge-5-0-146.ipcolo2.NewYork1.Level3.net (166.90.137.213) 12.175 ms 12.552 ms 13.510 ms
5 ae-0-54.bbr2.NewYork1.Level3.net (64.159.17.98) 23.840 ms 25.240 ms 16.999 ms
6 ge-7-0-0.edge1.NewYork1.Level3.net (64.159.4.150) 12.178 ms 21.983 ms 13.093 ms
7 205.171.1.97 (205.171.1.97) 14.581 ms 12.847 ms 13.409 ms
8 205.171.17.129 (205.171.17.129) 12.328 ms 12.122 ms 12.444 ms
9 205.171.8.205 (205.171.8.205) 62.596 ms 55.160 ms 61.950 ms
10 205.171.31.2 (205.171.31.2) 55.946 ms 56.947 ms 61.235 ms
11 205.171.205.25 (205.171.205.25) 101.676 ms 92.129 ms 92.209 ms
12 205.171.13.2 (205.171.13.2) 90.634 ms 93.154 ms 91.107 ms
13 205.171.13.158 (205.171.13.158) 90.412 ms 91.661 ms 90.549 ms
14 msfc-86.buc.qwest.net (66.77.125.163) 94.484 ms 91.740 ms 91.092 ms
15 63.236.4.243 (63.236.4.243) 102.415 ms 91.343 ms 91.515 ms
16 208.46.216.29 (208.46.216.29) 92.888 ms 91.606 ms 91.289 ms

Note, that where the latency starts to make the biggest jumps is on QWESTS network..

Name: iah-core-01.inet.qwest.net
Address: 205.171.8.205

I've tracerouted another IP I was connected to (when making a phone call to a family member) and got similar results. I'm not sure what the problem may be, but the latency seems to crop up AFTER going beyond my service provider's network (I'm assuming quest is at least one of Vonage's providers)..

If they can't figure out the problem or offer a fix I'm switching to another provider (or going back to my land line).

Here's one more traceroute (different IP, although still routed over Qwest)

traceroute to 208.46.216.21 (208.46.216.21), 30 hops max, 40 byte packets
1 xxx.covad.net (68.165.x.x) 3.226 ms 2.744 ms 3.179 ms
2 172.31.255.253 (172.31.255.253) 19.002 ms 23.006 ms 21.174 ms
3 192.168.13.41 (192.168.13.41) 25.955 ms 13.781 ms 12.826 ms
4 ge-5-0-146.ipcolo2.NewYork1.Level3.net (166.90.137.213) 18.417 ms 12.620 ms 13.180 ms
5 ae-0-54.bbr2.NewYork1.Level3.net (64.159.17.98) 27.638 ms 11.854 ms 12.702 ms
6 ge-7-0-0.edge1.NewYork1.Level3.net (64.159.4.150) 18.600 ms 18.771 ms 26.206 ms
7 205.171.1.97 (205.171.1.97) 12.230 ms 16.277 ms 12.154 ms
8 205.171.17.129 (205.171.17.129) 12.772 ms 13.287 ms 20.596 ms
9 205.171.8.205 (205.171.8.205) 66.465 ms 55.086 ms 58.556 ms
10 205.171.31.2 (205.171.31.2) 63.606 ms 55.722 ms 56.054 ms
11 205.171.205.25 (205.171.205.25) 97.791 ms 91.534 ms 92.201 ms
12 205.171.13.2 (205.171.13.2) 91.404 ms 90.188 ms 91.278 ms
13 205.171.13.158 (205.171.13.158) 91.097 ms 92.385 ms 94.332 ms
14 msfc-86.buc.qwest.net (66.77.125.163) 92.851 ms 90.750 ms 91.546 ms
15 63.236.4.243 (63.236.4.243) 92.541 ms 93.476 ms 90.955 ms
16 208.46.216.21 (208.46.216.21) 90.411 ms 91.846 ms 92.207 ms

Seems to be the same spot for the slowdown..

reply to hackysak
It seems that the quality of service is uncompromised only within Vonage's network. Once the call traverses other networks and goes outside digital through POTS, additional delays and processing contributes to increased latency. I'm not commenting on Vonage's connection to other networks, but if the problem persists only with them and not other VoIP providers, perhaps Vonage can do something about it.

reply to hackysak
Does Vonage only have servers on the west coast? I believe the major latency (that I'm experiencing) is due to the packets having to travel to the West coast. If this is the case and Vonage doesn't have servers closer to the east coast, then I assume there's no work around for this problem.. I did another traceroute, and noticed that it goes through a different service and the beginning of the latency happens once it hits what appears to be the phoenix router..

traceroute to 206.165.182.34 (206.165.182.34), 30 hops max, 40 byte packets
1 xxx.covad.net (68.165.x.x) 3.131 ms 2.650 ms 2.529 ms
2 172.31.255.253 (172.31.255.253) 27.909 ms 14.380 ms 17.062 ms
3 192.168.13.41 (192.168.13.41) 17.854 ms 11.650 ms 13.286 ms
4 ge-5-0-146.ipcolo2.NewYork1.Level3.net (166.90.137.213) 12.190 ms 14.431 ms 11.478 ms
5 ge-5-0.core2.NewYork1.Level3.net (64.159.17.38) 10.328 ms 12.118 ms 13.107 ms
6 gblx-level3-oc12.NewYork1.Level3.net (63.211.54.74) 13.348 ms 17.538 ms 11.926 ms
7 pos3-0-2488M.cr2.NYC1.gblx.net (67.17.64.157) 12.486 ms 12.973 ms 12.505 ms
8 pos6-0-2488M.cr1.PHX1.gblx.net (67.17.93.206) 83.832 ms 84.812 ms 77.208 ms
9 so0-0-0-2488M.ar4.PHX1.gblx.net (67.17.68.18) 79.358 ms 78.859 ms 78.460 ms
10 Vonage-Holdings.ge-2-1-0.ar4.phx1.gblx.net (64.215.184.110) 77.873 ms 78.317 ms 78.455 ms
11 206.165.182.34 (206.165.182.34) 78.032 ms 80.431 ms 86.232 ms

And yet those numbers would be considered acceptable.

The delays discussed concerning satellite were much higher before there should be issues.

Can't seem to find links to these on a search of VoIP?
--
Jim -- USA2K
Voip on FWD & Vonage
SEE: »www.usa2k.net
[I'm a Grampa twice now! Cameron, and now Caleb!]

I understand what you're saying, however, all I know is that I didn't experience the problem with the lower latency (connected to vonage help) and I do with all other phone connections (where I see the jump in latency).. In fact, at times, when talking to my dad (next town over) I have to YELL into the phone while he's talking to get him to stop so I can say something.. Yesterday, when helping my sister with her computer (she lives in upstate NY), she had asked me if I were on my cell because I kept getting cut off when she talked and vice versa.. I've a phone call into Vonage so let's see what they come up with..

Keep in mind that Scott (sgarrand) mentioned he has the same issue and dropped service to go over to Packet8... He's on the east coast it appears (at least according to his information)..

I was in Massachusetts at the time. I specifically brought the "half duplex" issue up to Vonage in e-mail and on the phone. No fix was ever found. I went with Packet8 because at the time it was $20 to Vonage's $40 and Vonage's quality was not up to par as far as quality goes (for me).

I'm not preaching on behalf of P8, but it works just as well as a landline for me at this time with Comcast cable at 3300/256 here in FL. There may be a solution to this problem. I can't guarantee P8 would be any better for you, because it varies so much from person to person. I hope you do find the solution and I'd like to know, because it bothered me for 13 months.

Scott
--
Visit »whythehell.com

reply to hackysak
I think I agree that when it comes to choosing a VOIP provider, there is no such thing as the best provider for everyone. Location, quality of cable internet connection, and such, are all factors contributing to one provider being better than others, even when it is not the case with other users. Perhaps the most effective, though not the most economical, way to find the right solution is to try all providers, and then pick one for keepers. Hopefully, as more and more users sign up for VOIP services, more information will be available on a regional level to help some of us make the right choice. Until then, every provider is a fair game!

reply to hackysak

said by hackysak:

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Do any of the other VoIP services have service that doesn't exhibit half-duplex syndrome?

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