Skype and iChat problems

luckat

I hope the Mac gurus here can help me.

I'm using a MacBook with Mac OS X (v10.5.4) - not a great piece of equipment generally; I'm quite disappointed in it.

I've been having bad problems with the sound breaking up on Skype, which I use professionally for interviews, and iChat, which I use privately for family chats.

Irish Broadband, my ISP, checked the line and said there were some problems, perhaps with the cable to the roof antenna, and sent out a team, who raised the antenna to clear the line-of-sight to the node I'm on, which was interrupted by trees.

They checked out Skype on their own Windows laptop, and it was clear as a bell - I heard it and can confirm that it was perfect.

I was still having breakup, though, so they told me to phone tech support again, so further changes could be made to the radio software if necessary.

I did this, and the changes were made, but I'm still having problems.

IBB then got me to send them ping and traceroute reports, and said these were perfect, so the problem must be with the Mac.

I can't really afford to put my one work computer in to Apple for them to check, though I'll do so if I have to.

Has anyone experienced this and solved it?

Huggles

Are you using a headset for Skype or using inbuilt mic?

luckat

Inbuilt mic. Sometimes the sound is ok, sometimes it's very breaky. I could post up an mp3 of the test call if that's possible, to give an idea of the breakup.

Just tried, by the way, and got an 'invalid file' message.

luckat

Hmm, tried again...

Huggles

Yeah you need to get a headset.

The inbuilt mic on the mac is too close to the speakers and you get a feedback issue.

Would be fine with headset.

Sad Professor

The sound breaks up on iChat as well?

Have you been having any other problems with your Macbook?

luckat

The sound and the picture, in iChat.

Yes, I've been thinking of getting a Jawbone.

These are the main problems. Otherwise - well, there's no de-regioning firmware for the DVD player, but that's a political decision by Apple - one that I deplore, but not a physical problem with the machine as such.

The DVD also jumps if you're using the machine on your lap and bump it accidentally.

The memory seems to fill up rather fast; I have to restart it much more often than I did with the G4 PowerBook I had before, a lovely machine.

Spotlight doesn't work well; I often can't find things even though I know they're there - for instance, I was searching for a graphic last week, a photo of my mother and uncle as babies, and couldn't find it in Spotlight. When my brother sent it to me, I went looking where he told me he'd found it (I'd given him a DVD of all my photos with the same file structure as on my machine) and there it was.

Little fiddly things. The main problem, though, is the Skype sound.

I hope you're right and it is the system microphone - it isn't always jumpy like that; sometimes it's clear.

Sad Professor

luckat wrote: »

These are the main problems. Otherwise - well, there's no de-regioning firmware for the DVD player, but that's a political decision by Apple - one that I deplore, but not a physical problem with the machine as such.

Apple don't make the dvd drives though, blame the manufacturer and the dying movie industry that's stuck in the dark ages.

The memory seems to fill up rather fast; I have to restart it much more often than I did with the G4 PowerBook I had before, a lovely machine.

Why do you have to restart? How much RAM do you have? The intel machines and Leopard are a lot more RAM hungry.

Spotlight doesn't work well; I often can't find things even though I know they're there - for instance, I was searching for a graphic last week, a photo of my mother and uncle as babies, and couldn't find it in Spotlight. When my brother sent it to me, I went looking where he told me he'd found it (I'd given him a DVD of all my photos with the same file structure as on my machine) and there it was.

Try reindexing, see here. Were the files in your user folder?

luckat

Wait, though, it's the inbuilt *mic* that's the problem? Then a headset won't help - because I tried buying a microphone from Apple (anyone want to buy a brand-new Logitech mike?) and it didn't make a difference.

Oh, and RAM - I have 4GB.

Huggles

luckat wrote: »

Wait, though, it's the inbuilt *mic* that's the problem? Then a headset won't help - because I tried buying a microphone from Apple (anyone want to buy a brand-new Logitech mike?) and it didn't make a difference.

Oh, and RAM - I have 4GB.

Have you changed your sound settings in system preferences to deal with external mic?

Not sure about Skype but aren't there mic settings in there too?

charlesD

Sad Professor wrote: »

Apple don't make the dvd drives though, blame the manufacturer and the dying movie industry that's stuck in the dark ages.

They didn't make them, but they did choose to use them. Given their investment in iTunes, I would be hard pressed to believe that their choice was unintentional. You are correct to say that the movie industry plays a role in this, but it is still a choice by apple to use the drive.

By your logic, if I build a car that, by using some sort of third-party gender detector, only works for women, I am not being discriminatory, because I did not actually build the gender detector.

NullZer0

Dear God People...

Its a latency issue if your using a fixed wireless broadband provider.

luckat

Dear God, iRock, what's a latency issue when it's at home?

And does the fact that IBB's tech support staff's own computer worked fine using Skype on my connection have any bearing?

NullZer0

http://www.speedtest.net/ - Run a speed test - Whats your ping?

It may have worked fine for them ... once off. I'd still say its latency.
http://nostalgia.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latency

Maybe try setting the Max MTU Size to about 1350.
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2532?viewlocale=en_US

J-blk

Huggles wrote: »

The inbuilt mic on the mac is too close to the speakers and you get a feedback issue..

This does not seem to be the case with the MBP - I use the inbuilt mic/speakers combo all the time with Skype - people can even hear me from across the room. No problems and feedback from the mic is different to "break up" which I'm inclined to agree with iRock, sounds a lot more like a network issue.

Luckat, it might indeed be that IBBs techies got it to work as a once off, maybe not. Have you ever used Skype/iChat from your MacBook when connected to another network (a friend's maybe)? If it's fine then you'll surely know that the issue is with the connection. I experience break ups when there's a lot of congestion on my internal network (downloading, streaming and using Skype all at once) but they're not a persistent problem. If the ISP network is very badly contended though (which UPC sometimes is), then I get break ups even if only using Skype and nohing else.

Huggles

J-blk wrote: »

This does not seem to be the case with the MBP - I use the inbuilt mic/speakers combo all the time with Skype - people can even hear me from across the room. No problems and feedback from the mic is different to "break up" which I'm inclined to agree with iRock, sounds a lot more like a network issue.

Not the case with my last MBP I'm afraid

ZENER

How is your MacBook connected to your network ? How did the techies connect to your network when trying Skype ? Could this be the difference ?

The file you posted is an Alias of a file located here:

/Users/lucil/Music/Audio Hijack/Skype 20080904 0917.mp3

on your computer, so not accessible to us so we can't really hear the effect you're getting.

I use my MacBook Pro regularly on Skype with video and it's perfect, IOL Broadband 7.6Mb connection. A also use a bluetooth earpiece or a Logitech USB headset - again all perfect. The person I usually chat most with has a MacBook C2D with 4GB and uses all the built in stuff, has IBB 2Mb connection and a Netgear Wireless Router. In the early days his calls suffer bandwidth problems from time to time but disconnecting and reconnecting to Skype fixes this every time. Thankfully these don't happen anymore once IBB sorted out their problems.

I regularly have 3 or 4 hour 3 person conferences without a single problem.

ZEN

luckat

My computer's Skype works much the same whether it's plugged into the antenna with Ethernet or through an AirPort Express. But the IBB techs' PC laptop worked fine with Skype on the same Ethernet.

Surely that's roughly the same as setting my own computer to work on another network (only the other way around) - it proves that the problem is with the computer, not the network.

iRock, I'm sorry, your instructions are not simple enough for me.

Ah, sorry about the mp3 problem - I tried to work it by making a .zip of an .mp3 file, but it obviously didn't work.

J-blk

luckat wrote: »

Surely that's roughly the same as setting my own computer to work on another network (only the other way around) - it proves that the problem is with the computer, not the network.

But you said that other times it's worked for you, others it doesn't. So why are you convinced that it was not a once-off for IBB when it worked for them? If you record a voice clip or anything really using an application that does not depend on your network connection (e.g Audacity or WireTap) does this always come through clearly? If yes, then at least you know that the problem is not with the mic/audio settings but something to do with the network settings or the network itself.

luckat

It seems unlikely that it was a once-off for the IBB techs because we were using Skype within seconds of each other, and theirs was clear and mine wasn't.

Voice clips record clearly. It's only when using Skype (or sometimes iChat) that there's breakup.

Last time I tried iChat, the visuals were breaking up completely, both at my end, and at the other end in Japan.

cabrwab

Have a macbook, with 2gb ram, using clearwire BB 2mb line(yeah right). Use skype all the time crystal clear. I can also be surfing the net while on skype no problems what so ever.
You must have every program on the laptop running at the same time as my macbook runs so smoothly!
Still putting any other laptop ive used on it to shame.

Very strange. If it was me i would be testing the macbook on different networks to be honest. I seems like a network issue. Or perhaps the video setting/sound setting in both skype and Ichat need adjusting as they are up too high. Just an idea?

luckat

I uninstalled Skype totally and reinstalled it (including the plist preferences in both the Library and the (tilde)Library (where the heck is a tilde on a MacBook keyboard?))

On reinstalling it I changed the sound preferences in Skype to use the internal microphone and the internal speakers.

It seems to be working ok now, though it'll take a few days to be sure. But test calls are now clear.

Thanks for all the help, lads. And if you find that tilde, do tell.

ZENER

Is that not it to the left of the #1 key ?

ZEN

luckat

D~oh!