SpaceBass
Nov 8, 05, 12:51 pm
I just derailed the thread over at: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=490621 and it dawned on me that this group might be interested in a techy trip report.
Mrs. SpaceBass and I just went to Ireland for two weeks on vacation. Unfortunately the timing for work was not perfect so I wanted a way to be in touch. We are also remodeling our house and had some inspections due while we were gone, so we wanted to be in touch. With an sim card from an Irish provider, a Dublin based SIP account and my home Asterisk server I was able to make calls across the pond for free.
At home:
I run my own VoIP server using the Asterisk open source PBX. Since we never have more than 2 or 3 concurrent calls I can get away with pretty measly hardware: a 233mhz pc with 256 mb for RAM running Asterisk@home. From Ebay I found 2 x100p cards to connect my existing phone lines to the box ($10 each).I have 2 Broadvoice BYOD (bring your own device) lite plans ($7.00/month). These allow unlimited incoming calls and have something like 100 minutes of outgoing. I one for each POTS line (work and home) and have my phone company do a ‘call-forward-on-busy’ to the broadvoice accounts… long story short it makes call waiting easier. All of this is connected to my network which includes 4 Cisco phones, 2 wifi phones and some soft phones running on mac and pc.
Before leaving I got a pay-as-you go account from BlueFace, an Irish VoIP provider. I charged it with 10euro. Once connected to my Asterisk box, I set it up so that by pressing *5 followed by an Irish number it would use that account. It was great for making reservations, etc as it was like calling from Dublin.
I ordered an O2 “top up” sim card and charged it with 25euro. Since the card arrived before I left I knew the number I was going to have and was able to program Asterisk to recognize that number and provide me a dial tone rather than ringing my house like a normal incoming call. I was also able to set up my IVR (answering machine functionality) to have an option that said “press 5 to call us in Ireland” which then prompted for a password (didn’t REALLY want work calls). When callers entered the password their call would go out over the BlueFace account.
In Ireland:
As soon as I landed I dialed the number for my BlueFace account in Dublin. It rang once and I had a dial tone! I dialed a number local to Virginia like I was at home and it worked flawlessly. Then I had someone from the states call my house and press 5, then enter the password. My cell phone rang instantly.
While I really didn’t make that many calls, it was great to play around with the technology. GSM-VoIP-Analogue from country to country. I really loved knowing I was stiffing the baby bells. To save the SIM card I also used my laptop in hotels that had access along with a Bluetooth headset. That worked quite well too. I just established a VPN connection to my home network and the soft phone found my SIP server with no problems.
The neatest part was the flight back. We flew SAS which has wifi (fed via satellite). Speed tests showed that it was about 200kbs down and up, but that is more than enough for most VoIP codecs. I slapped on my Bluetooth headset (breaking the rules) and made some calls from the plane.
Anyway thought my fellow geeks might enjoy!
We also used TiVoToGo via the VPN to pull a show or two for the flight back. That was miserably slow. I need to get around to building a mythbox so I can steam shows better.
An ipod with an FM modulator worked fine for the car, but didn't sound that great. I just enjoied listening to the Cheiftons in Ireland while on the road!
We kept a blog which I use blogger.com to write and host on my own server, encapsulated in SharePoint. SharePoint works great for hosting pictures but I may need to switch to flicker or something less microsofty.
-N
Mrs. SpaceBass and I just went to Ireland for two weeks on vacation. Unfortunately the timing for work was not perfect so I wanted a way to be in touch. We are also remodeling our house and had some inspections due while we were gone, so we wanted to be in touch. With an sim card from an Irish provider, a Dublin based SIP account and my home Asterisk server I was able to make calls across the pond for free.
At home:
I run my own VoIP server using the Asterisk open source PBX. Since we never have more than 2 or 3 concurrent calls I can get away with pretty measly hardware: a 233mhz pc with 256 mb for RAM running Asterisk@home. From Ebay I found 2 x100p cards to connect my existing phone lines to the box ($10 each).I have 2 Broadvoice BYOD (bring your own device) lite plans ($7.00/month). These allow unlimited incoming calls and have something like 100 minutes of outgoing. I one for each POTS line (work and home) and have my phone company do a ‘call-forward-on-busy’ to the broadvoice accounts… long story short it makes call waiting easier. All of this is connected to my network which includes 4 Cisco phones, 2 wifi phones and some soft phones running on mac and pc.
Before leaving I got a pay-as-you go account from BlueFace, an Irish VoIP provider. I charged it with 10euro. Once connected to my Asterisk box, I set it up so that by pressing *5 followed by an Irish number it would use that account. It was great for making reservations, etc as it was like calling from Dublin.
I ordered an O2 “top up” sim card and charged it with 25euro. Since the card arrived before I left I knew the number I was going to have and was able to program Asterisk to recognize that number and provide me a dial tone rather than ringing my house like a normal incoming call. I was also able to set up my IVR (answering machine functionality) to have an option that said “press 5 to call us in Ireland” which then prompted for a password (didn’t REALLY want work calls). When callers entered the password their call would go out over the BlueFace account.
In Ireland:
As soon as I landed I dialed the number for my BlueFace account in Dublin. It rang once and I had a dial tone! I dialed a number local to Virginia like I was at home and it worked flawlessly. Then I had someone from the states call my house and press 5, then enter the password. My cell phone rang instantly.
While I really didn’t make that many calls, it was great to play around with the technology. GSM-VoIP-Analogue from country to country. I really loved knowing I was stiffing the baby bells. To save the SIM card I also used my laptop in hotels that had access along with a Bluetooth headset. That worked quite well too. I just established a VPN connection to my home network and the soft phone found my SIP server with no problems.
The neatest part was the flight back. We flew SAS which has wifi (fed via satellite). Speed tests showed that it was about 200kbs down and up, but that is more than enough for most VoIP codecs. I slapped on my Bluetooth headset (breaking the rules) and made some calls from the plane.
Anyway thought my fellow geeks might enjoy!
We also used TiVoToGo via the VPN to pull a show or two for the flight back. That was miserably slow. I need to get around to building a mythbox so I can steam shows better.
An ipod with an FM modulator worked fine for the car, but didn't sound that great. I just enjoied listening to the Cheiftons in Ireland while on the road!
We kept a blog which I use blogger.com to write and host on my own server, encapsulated in SharePoint. SharePoint works great for hosting pictures but I may need to switch to flicker or something less microsofty.
-N