Linksys debuts cordless Skype VoIP handset

A new cordless VoIP handset using a PC running Skype as its base station will reach stores next week. According to Linksys, the CIT200 allows users to make VoIP phone calls as easily as today's cordless handsets make conventional landline calls. The device uses DECT wireless, which Linksys says eliminates interference with 2.4GHz cordless phones and other networking devices.

The CIT200 Internet Telephony Kit includes a handset, a charger, and a USB base station that plugs into a computer's USB port. The handset can read and display callers' Skype contact list on its built-in illuminated display, letting callers know which of their Skype contacts are online and ready to be called, Linksys says.

The handset also supports SkypeOut, SkypeIn, and Skype Voicemail -- Skype's premium services that let callers make and receive calls to conventional landline phones and cell phones -- and can send and receive messages up to 10 minutes long, according to Linksys.

Works with a PC

The device is used in conjunction with a PC. The DECT wireless radio (shown on the right) plugs into a USB port on the PC. Minimum requirements for the user's PC include:

* 400 MHz processor
* 128 MB RAM
* Internet connection (DSL/cable/etc.)
* One available USB port
* Skype application (included), installed on the PC
* CD-ROM drive

Currently the software requires the use of Windows XP or 2000, and a Mac OS X version is in process. Presumably, a Linux version will follow in short order.

Features and specs

CIT200 features and functions, according to LinkSys, include:

* Supports call waiting
* Mute button
* Three available ring tones
* Intercom function between multiple handsets
* Built-in speakerphone
* Color LCD panel
* Up to 120 hour standby time and 10 hour talk time
* Hold Button
* Caller ID
* Address Book that supports up 120 contacts
* Ringer -- Off/On switch
* Navigation button for screen
* Utilizes voice encryption for high security
* Headset jack for connecting a headset
* Single base station supports up to four additional DECT based phones
* Handset locater button on USB base station
* Handset is light and comfortable to use (4.23 oz/ 0.12kg)


According to DECTweb.com, "DECT is a digital wireless technology which originated in Europe, but is now being adopted increasingly worldwide, for cordless telephones, wireless offices and even wireless telephone lines to the home. The younger brother of GSM - Global System for Mobile -- it is by contrast a radio access technology, rather than a comprehensive system architecture; DECT has been designed and specified to interwork with many other types of network, such as the PSTN (conventional telephone networks), ISDN (new digital and data phone networks), GSM (mobile phone networks) and more."

Availability

The CIT200 will be available beginning October 17th from more than 3,000 online and retail outlets throughout North America, Latin America, Asia Pacific, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, according to Linksys, for around $130.

Skype and Motorola Collaborate on Wireless VoIP Package

Skype and Motorola Collaborate on Wireless VoIP Package
5:05 am on November 23, 2005

Motorola has recently released a new product called the Wireless Internet Calling Kit, which is co-branded with the Skype VoIP telephony service.

The new package includes a Motorola H500 wireless headset, along with a P850 Bluetooth hardware plugin for PCs that don’t have built-in Bluetooth capability. It comes with a copy of Skype’s free internet telephony software, along with 30 minutes of SkypeOut call time.

Combining Skype with a mobile headset from Motorola is actually quite a good business decision for both companies, as Motorola will be able to sell Bluetooth headsets outside of the mobile phone market, and Skype’s VoIP software will be exposed to a more mainstream market.

This Wireless Internet Calling Kit is being sold at RadioShack as a result of Skype’s recent deal with that company.

Reviewing Lycos Phone

Ad-supported VoIP is not new. However, when Lycos introduced its VoIP service, it got tons of media mileage. Lycos Phone also combines IM, video chat, real-time video on demand streaming content (including IPTV channels), and an MP3 player to boot.

Tom Keating over at TMCnet says that Lycos Phone may be the first VoIP client that offers free PSTN calls to U.S. numbers. However, Dialpad did offer this during its early days.

What else? Well, all users of Lycos Phone get 100 free minutes of PC to landline and PC to mobile phone calls. They can earn additional free minutes through various promotional offers. Lycos Phone users also get a free U.S. phone number that is not the case with Skype and Yahoo. Moreover, unlike Skype and Yahoo, Lycos Phone offers free FAX and free voicemail to email.

Lycos Phone Ties Free VOIP Software Into Portal

03.27.06
By Mark Hachman
Lycos announced Lycos Phone on Monday, adding free multimedia-enhanced VOIP communications as a key part of its portal infrastructure.

The Lycos Phone service will allow users free PC-to-PC communications to any other Lycos Phone user, consistent with other PC-to-PC applications, like eBay's Skype. However, Lycos has gone a step further and will also provide users with a free U.S. phone number, so that callers can dial in and talk to a Lycos customer on his desktop or laptop computer.
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The downloadable application also includes multimedia functionality, such as the ability to stream movie trailers and other content. A free voice mail-over-email service has also been included in the current offering, while a future upgrade will add a free fax number, according to Brian Kalinowski, Lycos' chief operating officer.

"I think the business model… is that it will be an entrance into Lycos products," Kalinowski said.

Integrated into the application will be a Lycos search box, and content pulled by the player application itself from other Lycos properties, Kalinowski said. The player will stream banner ads – delivered by a "traditional" banner advertisement box, and not via "adware," Kalinowski said – that will offer the "broadest to the deepest" offering to users, he said. Chatting and MP3 music services have also been integrated.

The software application was actually developed by a Lycos partner, Globe7, whose software was designed for the Microsoft Windows 2000 and XP operating systems. Future upgrades will add support for Linux, Mac OS, Palm OS and Pocket PC, Lycos said.

"PC-to-PC" VOIP, unlike services from Sunrocket or Vonage, require either a USB headset with microphone or an integrated microphone and set of speakers, such as those found on a laptop. The Lycos service does not allow the Lycos customer to use a hardware phone, although traditional landline callers and mobile handset users can dial the Lycos application using the free phone number.

Portals are increasingly adding VOIP as a value-added service; before Lycos, the latest entrant was Yahoo, which a VOIP-enhanced enhancement to its Yahoo Messenger application last week. Although Google has yet to announce its own VOIP offering, the company provides a "Google Talk" chat application, and VOIP provider VOIP Inc. has already disclosed a a material agreement that has stated that the company has now moved out of a trial period to a "direct peering relationship with Google for the transport of [VOIP] services at multiple locations," with revenue expected to be recorded in 2006.

"We've been talking about the convergence model for media and technology for the last ten years, but it's finally happening," Kalinowski said, driven in part by Intel's Viiv initiative, that has tied computing and television closer together.

"I think that to be a traditional portal you have to provide content for video-on-demand use, by your television set and your computer, not just TV and web browsing but streaming media and broadband media and a VOIP solution," Kalinowski added. "We're taking desktop applications to a whole new level."

Although the application is free, users will have to pay for international calls as well as some mobile numbers. Lycos is offering 100 free minutes when users sign up for the service. Users can also upgrade to "Gold" status, also for free, by validating their email address. The additional tier of service was provided to help cut down on users registering multiple accounts to receive more free minutes, Kalinowski added. In return, Gold members will be offered discounts that will push U.S domestic landline calls down below a penny a minute, he said.

What is VoIP Phone Service?

VoIP stands for "Voice Over Internet Protocol", which is a technology that allows you to make phone calls using your Broadband Internet connection instead of your regular phone service. It is also referred to as Voice over IP, broadband phone and Internet phone service.

You still simply pick up your regular phone, dial a number and talk. VoIP is simple and is for everyone. It doesn't matter if the person you are calling has VoIP or not, this is all taken care of by your VoIP service provider.

The only requirement for this technology is a high speed internet connection, such as DSL or cable, as the service is based on broadband Internet communication. VoIP requires a speed of up to 90Kbps depending on the voice compression algorithm chosen by the service provider. This is a higher speed than dial-up Internet so a Broadband Internet connection is a basic requirement.

And don't telcos know it
By Tim Richardson
Published Friday 23rd September 2005 13:11 GMT


VoIP is going to be massive. The effects of internet telephony are touching technology, business, culture, geographic penetration and consumer expectations in a way that is certain to turn the telecoms industry on its head.

So says Benny Last, MD of telco IDT Europe. Earlier this week he spoke about the impact of VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) on the global telecoms industry.
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He told delegates at the Carriers Conference in London that traditional voice providers "will need to make additions to their service offerings beyond voice" if they want to continue to compete in this new telco world order.

"Enhanced offerings will include Internet broadband access, media, IPTV [TV over the internet], online gaming, messaging...as well as 'next gen' services. They must enhance their service offerings because that is precisely what VoIP makes possible," he said.

With VoIP operators springing up all over the place effectively piggybacking on broadband networks, traditional telcos will have to adapt or risk losing out.

"Traditional voice providers will need to get more creative with pricing models as voice becomes one service offering among many," he said.

"Bundled pricing is likely to predominate. In addition, minutes and distance as factors in pricing will become more and more foreign to consumers accustomed to IP networks...who will expect to pay for access to services, and then pay incrementally for frills."

He went on: "VoIP is here, and it is not going away. We are in the midst of an explosive change in the way people use technology.

"While the size of VoIP traffic and underlying service provider networks may currently be modest, and the industry refers to VoIP deployment as 'evolutionary' rather than 'revolutionary', VoIP is acquiring significant mindshare all over the world," he said.

Last's assessment of the future of VoIP comes as a separate piece of research claims that the world's largest telcos are increasingly hopping on the VoIP bandwagon. The main reason is the fear of losing punters and seeing a drop in revenues, according to research from Heavy Reading.

More than 170 telcos including BT, AT&T and Verizon were quizzed as part of the research, which predicts a surge in VoIP traffic over the next two years.

"The single biggest reason for deploying VOIP is fear that traffic would otherwise migrate to competitors' networks," said Graham Finnie a senior analyst at Heavy Reading.

Skype and Vonage: thank you, and goodnight

UMA kills the VoIP dream
By Andrew Orlowski in San Francisco
Published Tuesday 14th February 2006 16:41 GMT

3GSM It's small, it's boring and won't turn any heads - but it probably spells the end of the road for Skype, Vonage and any other hopeful independent VoIP companies. It's Nokia's 6136 phone, which allows you to make calls over your home or office Wi-Fi network, as well as on a regular cellular network. UMA, or unlicensed mobile access, is the mobile operators' answer to the threat of VoIP - and now it's reality.

Many of Nokia's mid-range and high-end phones will feature Wi-Fi, and UMA allows the user to keep one phone number, one handset, and receive one bill at the end of every month.

"In three years," says Ken Kolderup of Kineto Wireless, which shepherded the technology through the standards process, "mobile minutes at home will be free".

A win for the customer, no doubt, but surely it's the death of the very utopian notion that a few guys in a garage would overcome the telecommunications incumbents - thanks to a "people powered" network.

Curiously, for a technology that was devised as a defensive weapon for the mobile carriers, it's the large former state-owned telcos who've been first to seize the UMA opportunity, with BT and France Telecom leading the way.

But Kolderup is quick to acknowledge the catalytic effect of Skype and Vonage.

"Vonage forced the cable guys to do VoIP, and both forced the service providers to do what they needed to do. If VoIP didn't occur, would they have done it? It was a kick in the pants for them."

Even Nokia acknowledges the risk of its traditional carrier customers losing revenues from home minutes going over the public internet, rather than their cellular networks.

But John Barry, who's involved in product development at Nokia for phones including the 6136, says it's an opportunity too.

"It maximizes their investment in ADSL, and allows them to bundle mobile minutes."

There are also capital expenditure savings, he says, because home Wi-Fi will mean they don't have to spend so much improving indoor call quality - notoriously poor in the United States, and on the higher frequencies used by 3G networks.

Kolderup agrees there are opportunities for mobile networks with free voice minutes at home.

"The number of minutes being used will go up - even as the revenue per minute will go down. So the deployment of UMA means you'll do revenue retention or revenue increase. If you don't do something these minutes will go someplace else. Do nothing, and you'll lose the indoor minutes too."

So what would Kolderup advise Skype and Vonage to do next?

"If you'd asked me a year ago I'd have advised Vonage to go public - which they have - and Skype to get bought - which they have too."

How about the VoIP guys bypassing their incumbents by building their own network?

"The cost is phenomenal," he points out. "And in any developed market I can't see it. It means acquiring the sites, building the towers, and providing the backhaul. In developing markets perhaps."

"The VoIP guys tend to be 10 guys in a garage. Owning and managing and operating an outdoor network is a different deal. It's hard and very expensive."

Even with WiMax or OFDM, which Kolderup describes as great "fill-in" technology, the incumbents have all the advantages.

"VoIP will never go mobile without the co-operation of the mobile operators."

Doubtless, there will be some people who don't mind having two handsets or phone numbers, but it isn't a market likely to excite the capital investment people.

So long then VoIP, and thanks for the free calls.

Skype 2.0 Lets Users Talk Face to Face

An 8MB download, it installs itself as simply as any previous version of Skype and interrogates for a webcam. If one is present, it allows the option of video on any call to another Skype 2.0 user - in which case a 4x4 inch video image appears within the tabbed Skype window for that conversation. The video can be blown up to the full screen, if the user has a good enough quality web-cam.

The overall Skype interface is slightly simplified but much as before - and the Skype icon on screen changes colour to blue.

The company has set up with Logitech and Crative to certify headsets and webcams for use with Skype 2.0, and also has partnerships with Weblog software and services company Six Apart.

“At Skype we want to make talking over the Internet the most natural, simple thing for people to do all over the world,” said Niklas Zennstr"m, chief executive of Skype, now a senior executive at eBay since that company bought Skype in September.

The new features in Skype - including video - are mostly commonplace in instant messaging systems such as Yahoo, AOL and MSN Messenger, which have had video for some time. Skype is banking on their inclusion adding to the attraction of a product that majors on telephony, not chat.

Among the other tweaks well known to IM users, are avatars and a better set of presence functions, that let the user tell other Skypers his mood - or his time zone, to avoid being woken in the middle of the night.

Users can now group contacts, and start conference calls to a whole group with one click.

Skype is also capitalising on its 67 million users, by improving the ability to search for contacts by name and email address in the Skype database. An update of the beta Google Toolbar for Microsoft Outlook is also included, to let users dial from e-mails, and the company is promoting the ability to put Skype dialling buttons on blogs and web pages.

Although the software is still beta, Logitech will be selling Skype-certified webcams immediately through the Skype web store and Creative will sell them in the shops. Logitech has two certified 1.3 megapixel webcams, which include a headset and face tracking technology.

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