Review: Skype

I've been using Skype on and off for years now, first for computer to computer audio, then computer to land line audio, and more recently, computer to computer video chat - now that my parents are on high speed internet, it makes sharing parts of our life much easier, and they get to "see" the kids more without having to make the long drive up to visit.  So when my husband told me that Skype is having a sale on paid subscriptions (half-price on all Premium subscriptions til end of July, or 15% off 12 month subscriptions of regular service), I did the math and realized that the cost of two months of our current long distance plan costs could pay for an entire year of unlimited calls to anywhere in Canada and the US.  We decided to give it a try.  We canceled our long distance services and signed up for 12 months of Skype.

Having Skype applications available both on our computers and our iPhones makes it easy and accessible, so I am not tethered to my computer screen to make a long distance call.  We have a wireless network in our house so I'm not using any of my data plan bandwidth when I make calls from home.  Even when making long distance calls away from home, it's still way cheaper to use Skype than it is to pay the long distance rates with the cell phone provider.

Now it's a bit early for a full review, since we just signed up yesterday, but I made two phone calls and had mixed success.  The first call was around noon, and the call quality was fantastic - my mom couldn't even tell I wasn't calling from a land line.  The next call was around 8pm, and it started out OK but about 10 minutes into the call, the audio connection failed - I could hear my dad, but he couldn't hear me.  Looking at the screen there was a message indicating my network quality was poor, but I couldn't tell why that would be, since my wifi connection had full signal strength, and my 3G connection was showing three out of four bars.  I called them back from my cell phone itself since I do have them in my "Fab Five".

I am hopeful that this was a one time issue, and honestly for the money I'm saving, a few glitches here and there are understandable.  You can use Skype free for computer to computer audio and video calls, or you can buy credits (pay-as-you-go) or a subscription to add the ability to call land lines as well.  Check out your options at http://www.skype.com/ and let me know your experiences with Skype in the comments.  Depending on how things go, I may post a follow-up review in a few months after having more time to evaluate the service.