Help Atrocious Skype Quality

[Idun Box]

I recently purchased an LG Optimus V and it's been one problem after another.. Activating the phone was a huge pain and after it was activated, I've been told twice that I have to wait 4 hours for 3g to kick in. I waited overnight for the first time and the second time I waited around 5 hours, so I'm actually on the 3rd try since they reset it again.

I've been using my wifi which is really good but the Optimus V disagrees.. Neither my iPod nor PC drops skype calls, but this thing drops calls all the time and sometimes it won't even let me make a call and will give me the "called failed" notice.. This is all over wifi!

I can make regular calls from the phone just fine, but the skype call quality on my end is atrocious.. It sounds as if the phone is just barely able to handle the app and I end up getting stutter when people are talking to me.

All my other devices work well with skype.. It's just this phone that acts like it's on an awful connection.

I'm just wondering if I got a bad phone or if this is what I can expect.

This is from my computer:

 

[brotherswing]

Just to make sure there isn't a problem with your wifi chip in the phone, you ought to install the Speedtest app. Run the test from your phone while connected to wifi. That should help isolate the culprit. I don't use Skype, but I do use GrooveIP, and there was a learning curve of playing with the settings to get it just right. Calls over 3G don't sound great, but it works. On wifi, it's just dandy.

 

[MacFett]

I used to use Skype on my Optimus all the time and never had dropped call or clarity problems. Better than my iphone in fact.

 

[Idun Box]

Just to make sure there isn't a problem with your wifi chip in the phone, you ought to install the Speedtest app. Run the test from your phone while connected to wifi. That should help isolate the culprit. I don't use Skype, but I do use GrooveIP, and there was a learning curve of playing with the settings to get it just right. Calls over 3G don't sound great, but it works. On wifi, it's just dandy.

But should the quality of calls over wifi be worst than that of an iPod?

here's the speeds I got for my ipod and the phone for a comparison:

LG Optimus V
Ping: 42ms
Download: 7423kbps
upload: 2066

iPod Touch 3g
Ping: 34ms
Download: 3.09Mbps
Upload: 2.57Mbps

I used to use Skype on my Optimus all the time and never had dropped call or clarity problems. Better than my iphone in fact.

Yeah, I'm not really sure what's up, but this thing is dropping calls all the time. It's not even worth trying anymore - I've performed tests and it's been a consistent thing.. I think the longest I've been able to stay in a call was 5mins today.

edit:

I've tried having them activate the 3g twice and I've waited over 4 hours twice.. I think this phone may just be bad.

new symptom: the 3g is basically unusable now that I've finally got it active.

 

[MacFett]

On my laptop my results are:

On my Optimus V:
31ms ping|6326kbps down|3289kbps up

Your down is better than mine, but my up is more than yours.

 

[Idun Box]

On my laptop my results are:

On my Optimus V:
31ms ping|6326kbps down|3289kbps up

I'm actually trying to return it now.. It has overheating issues and has froze on me more than twice while trying to check speedtest over the 3g

 

[G19]

I'm actually trying to return it now.. It has overheating issues and has froze on me more than twice while trying to check speedtest over the 3g

Sounds like it's time for a new phone.

 

[Idun Box]

I'm being sent a replacement phone..

is this phone inherently slow when using programs like skype? the rep tried to implied that my iPod touch 3g was built for it and this phone may be too slow to handle it.. The majority of searches I've done show people having pleasant experiences with skype, so I disagreed.

Even a friend of mine uses skype over this phone.. It's a pretty essential app for me

 

[Petrah]

Those WiFi speed tests at SpeetTest.net are not indicative of the speed you would get from Skype. If you want the correct speed, then you'd need to run the test to the Skype network, not some server at SpeedTest.net.

 

[brotherswing]

Those WiFi speed tests at SpeetTest.net are not indicative of the speed you would get from Skype. If you want the correct speed, then you'd need to run the test to the Skype network, not some server at SpeedTest.net.

That is true, I only made the suggestion I did because it's an easy test to see if the wifi chip in the phone was unreliable.

 

[MacFett]

Those WiFi speed tests at SpeetTest.net are not indicative of the speed you would get from Skype. If you want the correct speed, then you'd need to run the test to the Skype network, not some server at SpeedTest.net.

Unless the network to skype is suffering terrible lag or the network to speedtest.net is performing exceptionally quick it is a pretty good gauge. Sure there may be a difference between the two, but hardly much.

Spoiler

C:\Users\navigator>ping speedtest.net

Pinging speedtest.net [74.209.160.12] with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 74.209.160.12: bytes=32 time=102ms TTL=48
Reply from 74.209.160.12: bytes=32 time=101ms TTL=48
Reply from 74.209.160.12: bytes=32 time=102ms TTL=48
Reply from 74.209.160.12: bytes=32 time=101ms TTL=48

Ping statistics for 74.209.160.12:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 101ms, Maximum = 102ms, Average = 101ms

C:\Users\navigator>

Spoiler

C:\Users\navigator>ping skype.com

Pinging skype.com [78.141.177.7] with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 78.141.177.7: bytes=32 time=108ms TTL=50
Reply from 78.141.177.7: bytes=32 time=112ms TTL=50
Reply from 78.141.177.7: bytes=32 time=105ms TTL=50
Reply from 78.141.177.7: bytes=32 time=107ms TTL=50

Ping statistics for 78.141.177.7:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 105ms, Maximum = 112ms, Average = 108ms

C:\Users\navigator>

An average difference of 7ms. (this test was done from my laptop, not my phone)

 

[Petrah]

Unless the network to skype is suffering terrible lag or the network to speedtest.net is performing exceptionally quick it is a pretty good gauge.

Respectfully disagreeing. Totally different servers in totally different locations. SpeedTest.net is designed to automatically pick the closest server to your current location. All you did was ping the websites, not the servers they use.

For future reference.. trace the route, don't ping it.

 

[brotherswing]

Respectfully disagreeing. Totally different servers in totally different locations. SpeedTest.net is designed to automatically pick the closest server to your current location. All you did was ping the websites, not the servers they use.

For future reference.. trace the route, don't ping it.

Respectfully agreeing. Ping is really only useful to test if a network path to the target exists, it's not really indicative of transfer speeds.