Notices

Hi all,

The Nokia N900 was announced as "Skype Phone" (at least I got it that way) and actually, I like that Skype is integrated into Maemo5/N900 so tightly. It's easy to use and convenient if you're used to skype-chat and skype-calls.

However, the Skype-Software on that "Skype-Phone" seems to be incomplete. Important features of Skype can't be used with N900.

I got a Skype online-number to have an inexpensive lokal phone number which is available for non-Skype users (in German: "Festnetznummer", dunno what this is called in English). Unfortunately, there are some problems with that on N900:

a) Privacy settings

Initially only contacts from your Skype contacts list can call this online-number (which is kind of stupid, because these are Skype-Users anyway and could do a skype-call to my skype-account via their computer instead of calling a real phone number).

On Skype on Linux and Skype on Windows, there's an option which allows to change the privacy settings for calls to your online-number to "anybody" and then everybody can call you on your online number.

BUT: There's no such option for Skype on N900! You can change some privacy settings which effects chat inqueries and calls from Skype accounts to your Skype account, but NOT to your online-number.

That means, you can get a skype online-number with your N900, but nobody can call you.

(P.S. If you change the privacy settings with the latest Linux client, these settings are lost as soon as you log off/ log on again. That means, you need a Windows client (or maybe a Mac client) to save these privacy settings permanently).


b) Voice Mail

There's no way on N900 to access your voice mail which comes with your online-number. Neither you can change the announcement of your voice mail that callers listen to when you're not available, nor is it possible to listen to messages that callers leave at your voice mail when you're not available.


That's pretty disappointing for a Skype Mobile Phone, but maybe I'm wrong and I just didn't found the right way to do all these things? Can anybody confirm or reject my Skype-Problems on N900?


Thanks,
nexus

Am I the only one, using Skype on N900? :-)

hm.
nexus

I suspect most of us are just using it for skype-skype calls and hence don't encounter the problems you are having.

Same here I only do skype to skype and skype-out.

Same here. Skype-Skype, but I have been contemplating on getting some Skype credit, which I might reconsider, but I'll keep an eye on this thread.

Festnetznummer is called landline if I am not mistaken.

Meanwhile, I got a response from the Skype service team.
They said (in German):

"Leider wird Skype Voicemail für das N900 noch nicht unterstützt; unsere Entwickler arbeiten derzeit an diesem Feature."

That means, Skype Voice Mail on N900 is not yet supported but the good news is, that they claim that their developers are *currently* working on that feature. Let's wait and see if that is true

regrads,
nexus

That is nice to know if there is still something new coming for the N900. That means they havent forgot us

I personally find Skype's implementation on the N900 very well done. I do notice that I have problems hearing the other party after more than 5 minutes of a call. This is landline calls, not skype to skype.

I've been impressed that even in Germany over a t-mobile I was able to have a skype call on an EDGE connection. Granted it was real quick (less than a minute), but it worked.

T-mobile is adamant about preventing skype usage over their data network so it was a pleasent suprise.

Glad to see Skype is still working on the N900 client. Although, this is probably in preparation for Meego support as well.

2d

yes, it works fine. Here in Germany on O2 network, it is even allowed to use Skype for phone calls. And yes, 2.5G (== EDGE?) is minimum for Skype calls. I tried it also on 2G but then, the upload speed is too slow, means, you can listen to what the person on the other end of the connection says, but he will not be able to understand what you're talking :-)

regards,
nexus

P.S Never tried long phone calls over Skype and G2.5/3, but on wifi I had a 30 minutes video call -- that worked amazingly well.