Can't hear caller's voice on ooma to ooma call

This forum includes tips for maintaining the best audio quality possible with the Ooma System. If your Ooma system is having issues with dropped calls, static audio or echo, look here for assistance.
murphy
Posts:7554
Joined:Tue Jan 27, 2009 12:49 pm
Location:Pennsylvania
Re: Can't hear caller's voice on ooma to ooma call

Post by murphy » Sun Jun 05, 2011 3:56 am

trigger1937

Maximum DSL speed is controlled by your distance from the central office. To get the maximum DSL speed you have to be less than 5000 feet from the central office. DSL was never an option for me since I am 26000 feet from my central office. There used to be a web site that could calculate your distance from your central office and then indicate what the maximum usable speed would be for that distance. I thought it was http://www.dslreports.com but they don't seem to offer that capability anymore. Years ago an ISP would not offer a speed that couldn't work but it appears today they will sell you whatever speed you are willing to pay for regardless of whether it can actually work. To get the best reliability for DSL it should not be distributed to every phone jack in your house. The incoming phone line should go through a DSL splitter to separate the DSL signal from the phone signal. The DSL signal should then be run directly to the phone jack that will be used for the DSL modem. Having a lot of unterminated wire going to other unused wall jacks can only serve to corrupt the DSL signal. The same is true if you have "naked" DSL except that you don't need the DSL splitter.
Customer since January 2009
Telo with 2 Handsets, a Linx, and a Safety Phone
Telo2 with 2 Handsets and a Linx

trigger1937
Posts:20
Joined:Thu Jun 02, 2011 7:08 am

Re: Can't hear caller's voice on ooma to ooma call

Post by trigger1937 » Sun Jun 05, 2011 11:13 am

Murphy,..& T'Bird,...Thank you both for you consistent help. Yes I have my system and phone working OK at the reduced speed. I've done so many tests at various sites it is now clear that the problem in packet loss or out of order is due to the download and upload speed. When my limit was set to 3.0mbs DN and 450kbs UP I noticed that I would have excessive packet loss whenever the download was above 2.25mbs or the upload was above 400kbs. When ATT reduced my internet speed to 1.5mbs max and 350kbs up all of the packet loss went away and now there is no loss whatsoever.

So my question is, if I ask ATT to put me back at 3.0mbs speed can I use the QoS in Ooma to control the speed and limit the download rate to something like 2.0mbs (I assume I do this with a % number like 80%), as well as limit the Upload speed?????

I also have a new modem that I can try at the high speed and see what performance I get with it. Being an Electrical Engineer, it is clear to me that the signals digitally transmitted from the ISP have to be decoded in the modem and converted to either net packets. It has been awhile but I believe the new ADSL signals are some form of Phase Modulation and any of this technology transmitter over OLD telephone wires is subject to signal distortion and noise,...especially at the higher data rates. The first thing I would expect to go wrong would be the OLDer modems. With all the packet loss and dropped packets and packets out of order, I would not believe that anyone of the hops from my ISP to me have bad hardware that would create these problems. I would just naturally suspect the modem can not keep up with the higher data rate and therefore drops the packets,...especially when I slow the data rate down and nothing fails anymore. What are your thoughts.

thunderbird
Posts:6388
Joined:Mon Nov 08, 2010 4:41 pm

Re: Can't hear caller's voice on ooma to ooma call

Post by thunderbird » Sun Jun 05, 2011 1:09 pm

trigger1937 wrote:Murphy,..& T'Bird,...Thank you both for you consistent help. Yes I have my system and phone working OK at the reduced speed. I've done so many tests at various sites it is now clear that the problem in packet loss or out of order is due to the download and upload speed. When my limit was set to 3.0mbs DN and 450kbs UP I noticed that I would have excessive packet loss whenever the download was above 2.25mbs or the upload was above 400kbs. When ATT reduced my internet speed to 1.5mbs max and 350kbs up all of the packet loss went away and now there is no loss whatsoever.

So my question is, if I ask ATT to put me back at 3.0mbs speed can I use the QoS in Ooma to control the speed and limit the download rate to something like 2.0mbs (I assume I do this with a % number like 80%), as well as limit the Upload speed?????
trigger1937:
Quality of Service. Go the following addresses to get a basic understanding of Ooma Quality of Service.

http://ooma.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/100
https://ooma.custhelp.com/app/answers/d ... %20Service

In reality it doesn't seem to work quite the same way that Ooma explains Ooma Quality of Service.

You can see that you still get the same bandwidth; Ooma just divides it between the Ooma device and the rest of you LAN, when a phone call is in place. But since the last firmware update, Ooma sometimes seems to "Hog" all of the bandwidth, even if not on a call.

Since the last firmware update, people have found that using approximately 90% of the Upload and Download speeds as measured by http://www.speedtest.net/ is satisfactory. (It used to be 80% that was suggested).

Some people find that just shutting off Ooma Quality of Service by Selecting Zero for both Upstream and Down Stream Internet speeds in the Ooma Setup Advanced pages works for them.

Others have found that adjusting the Ooma Setup Advanced page Quality of Service settings to Zero doesn’t work, and they will set their Upstream and Downstream Internet Speeds to a value higher than the Upload and Download speed as measured by http://www.speedtest.net/. Usually this correct metal sounding voice or garbled voice, especially if you have lower bandwidths.
trigger1937 wrote: I also have a new modem that I can try at the high speed and see what performance I get with it. Being an Electrical Engineer, it is clear to me that the signals digitally transmitted from the ISP have to be decoded in the modem and converted to either net packets. It has been awhile but I believe the new ADSL signals are some form of Phase Modulation and any of this technology transmitter over OLD telephone wires is subject to signal distortion and noise,...especially at the higher data rates. The first thing I would expect to go wrong would be the OLDer modems. With all the packet loss and dropped packets and packets out of order, I would not believe that anyone of the hops from my ISP to me have bad hardware that would create these problems. I would just naturally suspect the modem can not keep up with the higher data rate and therefore drops the packets,...especially when I slow the data rate down and nothing fails anymore. What are your thoughts.
I think Murphy is more experienced in this area, and probably can help you with this second part better than I. But if it were me, and I had a new modem installed, I'd wait a few days to make sure that everything has stabilized and no surprises pop up, then I'd have AT&T reset to the higher speeds. You can always get them to set the speeds back if they are too high. I'd have to know!

murphy
Posts:7554
Joined:Tue Jan 27, 2009 12:49 pm
Location:Pennsylvania

Re: Can't hear caller's voice on ooma to ooma call

Post by murphy » Sun Jun 05, 2011 1:45 pm

I also recommend testing with the new modem. Since the modem is connected to a very long phone line that goes all of the way back to the central office (essentially an antenna) it is subject to near field coupling from nearby lightning strikes. There can be voltage spikes induced that are not high enough to destroy the modem but may be high enough to compromise the integrity of one or more of the integrated circuits in the modem. There is nothing harder to isolate than an integrated circuit that works most of the time.
Customer since January 2009
Telo with 2 Handsets, a Linx, and a Safety Phone
Telo2 with 2 Handsets and a Linx

trigger1937
Posts:20
Joined:Thu Jun 02, 2011 7:08 am

Re: Can't hear caller's voice on ooma to ooma call

Post by trigger1937 » Sun Jun 05, 2011 9:06 pm

T'Bird,....Well now you really have me confused. I read the directions for setting up the QoS at the Ooma site and then read your comments about the latest version of firmware. I also remember one other earlier instruction from you to set the QoS to ZERO, which I did. If this is a % setting, then setting it to Zero implies that Ooma does not allocate any bandwidth for Ooma services, which I would assume means for telephone calls.

I am not concerned about my computer usage of the internet at all. Nothing we do on our PC's has any priority what so ever. What we really need is 99% priority to all of our telephone calls, even to the point that when we are on a call or place a call we "Certainly are not using our Computers". So I would think that we should allocate 99% of the bandwidth for ANYTHING that Ooma telo needs to do. Good audio is the most important. I never have had a problem dialing or making a call. The only problems have been that there is NO audio for the first 5+ seconds after someone answers the phone. The answer and say "Hello", but we don't here it,...it is missing. The only other problems is that early in a call there is some amount of echo,..and many times during a call the audio is dropped,..and it is dropped at both ends...they can't hear me and I can't here them. The connection is never lost,.. and it usually comes back in 10 to 15 seconds. As I have said before, once ATT lowered my max data rates, things are almost 100% better.

If there has been a change in the way QoS works in the new firmware, I would think that Ooma tech support would put out a notice of the new changes,...otherwize everyone's settings are wrong the instant the new firmware is updated,...and my understanding is that this is automatic as soon as anyone logs onto the internet.

Getting back to the change that ATT made to slow down my Internet speed,...how does their control over the bandwidth affect my modem to force it to transmit at a lower data rate. I can understand how they can control and limit the download data rate, but how do they control my upload rate.

thunderbird
Posts:6388
Joined:Mon Nov 08, 2010 4:41 pm

Re: Can't hear caller's voice on ooma to ooma call

Post by thunderbird » Sun Jun 05, 2011 11:17 pm

trigger1937 wrote:T'Bird,....Well now you really have me confused. I read the directions for setting up the QoS at the Ooma site and then read your comments about the latest version of firmware. I also remember one other earlier instruction from you to set the QoS to ZERO, which I did. If this is a % setting, then setting it to Zero implies that Ooma does not allocate any bandwidth for Ooma services, which I would assume means for telephone calls.
You can go to the site below and see where Ooma made changes to the current version of firmware and the "bug" number [8135].
viewtopic.php?f=10&t=11265
Release notes for firmware version 45073:
Properly disable QoS when upstream bandwidth is set to 0 [8135]

Ooma doesn't allocate a priority for itself when Quality of Service is disabled, but still has access to the full bandwidth. But this setting is still a little "buggy" for some users.

That's why some users have had success setting their Upstream and Downstream Internet Speeds Quality of Service settings to a value higher than the measured Upload and download values as measured with http://www.speedtest.net/.
trigger1937 wrote: I am not concerned about my computer usage of the internet at all. Nothing we do on our PC's has any priority what so ever. What we really need is 99% priority to all of our telephone calls, even to the point that when we are on a call or place a call we "Certainly are not using our Computers". So I would think that we should allocate 99% of the bandwidth for ANYTHING that Ooma telo needs to do. Good audio is the most important. I never have had a problem dialing or making a call. The only problems have been that there is NO audio for the first 5+ seconds after someone answers the phone. The answer and say "Hello", but we don't here it,...it is missing. The only other problems is that early in a call there is some amount of echo,..and many times during a call the audio is dropped,..and it is dropped at both ends...they can't hear me and I can't here them. The connection is never lost,.. and it usually comes back in 10 to 15 seconds. As I have said before, once ATT lowered my max data rates, things are almost 100% better.
If you run http://speedtest.phonepower.com/, when done, go to left side and click on "Graph". Then you can go down to "Plot" at the lower left side of the page. Pay attention the Download and Upload Speed viewing the Delay. Your should have a fairly steady nice red line near the bottom of the page, going across the page from left to right. If you have large red spikes to the top or near the top of the page, there is your problem.

Run http://speedtest.phonepower.com/ several times to get an idea of what's happening.

If you are using your new modem and are still seeing the large red spikes, there is an intermittent problem with the wiring or software at/to/from the Internet provider.

I had this problem when I first started using Ooma. I put in a service order, to my Internet provider, saying that my Internet connection surged and my computers would freeze, not mentioning VoIP or Ooma. In my case it took about three weeks of going back and forth. Finally the responsible technician called me and I was able to explain. In my case the provider reloaded, updated, and made adjustment to software at their end, and when done I didn't have any problems anymore.

If when using your new modem, you are still getting echo and audio drops, I'd use the Quality of Service setting below:
Set the Upstream and Downstream Internet Speeds Quality of Service settings to a value higher than the measured Upload and download values as measured with http://www.speedtest.net/. If you are getting delay-surges, this setting won't completely stop QoS problems, but it may help.

If you are still seeing Delay-Surges with the new modem installed, you will have to work with the Internet provider to have corrections made.
trigger1937 wrote: If there has been a change in the way QoS works in the new firmware, I would think that Ooma tech support would put out a notice of the new changes,...otherwize everyone's settings are wrong the instant the new firmware is updated,...and my understanding is that this is automatic as soon as anyone logs onto the internet..
Ooma Customer Support don't very often put out any kind of messages or notices. I think that for most people, how ever they have their Ooma adapter device setup, their Ooma device just works. It's just a relative few of us that sometimes have problems. Probably putting out a notice would cause more problems for Ooma, than it would solve for the customer.
trigger1937 wrote: Getting back to the change that ATT made to slow down my Internet speed,...how does their control over the bandwidth affect my modem to force it to transmit at a lower data rate. I can understand how they can control and limit the download data rate, but how do they control my upload rate.
I believe everything is done at the AT&T end.

trigger1937
Posts:20
Joined:Thu Jun 02, 2011 7:08 am

Re: Can't hear caller's voice on ooma to ooma call

Post by trigger1937 » Mon Jun 06, 2011 9:00 am

T'Bird,... I did the speedtest you suggested and the download chart was very good,...however the Upload test was terrible in that there were large sections where the delay was over 1000ms and the upload speed jumped all over the place. My current Qos setting is at Zero as was original suggested. When I first tested my upload and download after ATT dropped the speed, everything seemed fine, but then late sunday night both the download and upload dropped to very low numbers?
If you run http://speedtest.phonepower.com/, when done, go to left side and click on "Graph". Then you can go down to "Plot" at the lower left side of the page. Pay attention the Download and Upload Speed viewing the Delay. Your should have a fairly steady nice red line near the bottom of the page, going across the page from left to right. If you have large red spikes to the top or near the top of the page, there is your problem.
I had those large spikes and as you said,...there is your problem,....But "Exactly what is the problem" and how do I fix it.

I'm trying to gather data on what does happen to my up/Dn performance as I change my settings. I want to do this before I change out the modem, since it is not that easy since the new modem I have is an ALL IN ONE --Modem-Wireless-Router, and now I will have to place the Ooma between the router and the PC. What I have seen is that without changing anything, the performace of my system varies all over the place on Upload and the download is pretty stable.

So, if you know "what the problem is", tell me what you would do. Also,... you indicated that Ooma adapter device setup---just works,.... where do I find this software,...since I setup my Ooma using the fold out guide in the box. There was no software setup guide.

trigger1937
Posts:20
Joined:Thu Jun 02, 2011 7:08 am

Re: Can't hear caller's voice on ooma to ooma call

Post by trigger1937 » Mon Jun 06, 2011 11:06 am

T'Bird,... forgot one other key note. In the upload graph and speed test,...the first upload of 300+ packets ALWAYS HAS 100% LOSS on every test I have run. I believe this is because the test always tries to start sending upload at 650kbs which never works. When it slows the upload down to 320kbs or lower the performance is fine.

I have embedded a couple of pictures of the download speed and the upload speed test.
Download speed..JPG
Download speed test
Download speed..JPG (54.33KiB)Viewed 6076 times
Upload speed.JPG
Upload speed test
Upload speed.JPG (54.29KiB)Viewed 6076 times
Reguarless of what my DSL Bandwidth limits are,...what functions can I use to limit both the download and upload speeds such that I can get away from these errors. On another test I saw that the TCP pause was so big that all kinds of delay occurs which again disrupts audio.

thunderbird
Posts:6388
Joined:Mon Nov 08, 2010 4:41 pm

Re: Can't hear caller's voice on ooma to ooma call

Post by thunderbird » Mon Jun 06, 2011 11:49 am

trigger1937 wrote:Reguarless of what my DSL Bandwidth limits are,...what functions can I use to limit both the download and upload speeds such that I can get away from these errors. On another test I saw that the TCP pause was so big that all kinds of delay occurs which again disrupts audio.
Your Plot: Upload Speed really looks terrible. The Download Speed looks great.

I don't know of any way to control or limit both the download and uplaod speeds from the home side if the Internet connection.

Maximum TCP delay should be 100ms or less.

bohicaIL
Posts:37
Joined:Fri Jan 08, 2010 3:08 pm

Re: Can't hear caller's voice on ooma to ooma call

Post by bohicaIL » Thu Jun 09, 2011 10:38 am

bohicaIL wrote:
thunderbird wrote:
bohicaIL wrote:When called by a neighbor who is also an Ooma subscriber, the call quality is great for a while and then suddenly I can't hear his voice for around 10 seconds or so... sometimes more. He tells me he never loses my voice, and if I hang on long enough his voice usually comes back.

We both use Mediacom (cable) as our HSI provider, and both have Ooma Telo's configured behind Dlink DIR 655 routers. Neither has the IP configured in the DMZ of the router.

I've not had this issue with any other callers... he claims he has not either... I'm baffled!

Suggestions? Anyone else experience this?
To help stabilize your Ooma Internet connection, both you and your neighbor should do the following :
If your connection is Modem-Router-Ooma, temporarily connect a network cable from your Ooma device home port, to the wired LAN port of a computer. Temporarily turn off Wi-Fi in the computer, if turned on. Reboot the computer. Access your Ooma Setup pages by typing http://172.27.35.1 in your computer browser window. The Ooma Setup pages open. Click on Internet, go down to INTERNET Port MAC Address: and change setting from Automatic to Use Built In. Click on Update device. Reboot your Modem, when the Modem is done booting reboot your Router, when the Router is done booting, reboot your Ooma device. Next test this configuration.

Note: Reboot means remove power, then plug power back in for the device in the order listed above.

Next: if the problem continues reserve a static IP address for the Ooma device in your router(s) and test.

Next: if the problem continues place the static IP address for the Ooma device in your router(s)'s DMZ and test.

Please report back as to what works or don't work because we don't see this problem with Ooma to Ooma calls very much. Thanks in advance.
After I posted the above, I found your posting on setting up Ooma with the D-link DIR-655, so I followed it on my setup, including the QOS settings within the router and disabled within Ooma. I still need to do this on my neighbor's setup, but hope to get to it this week. After that, if the problem persists, I'll try DMZ for both IPs. Will post back when I've seen some results. Thanks.
I finally got to make the same changes on my neighbors Ooma/DIR-655 setup, and so far so good. We've not had any voice dropouts in calls to each other.

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