Slightly off-topic, but you might look into Keepgo for your cellular data. I’ve had good experiences both in the US and UK.
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Keepgo<
Thank you for this good suggestion. I might be able to answer irvinewade’s question more cogently when the Keepgo World SIM arrives in 5-7 business days.
In the mean time, since you sometimes use a data-only SIM, can you answer his question? Have you successfully made VoIP calls from the Librem-5 Calls application, using a data connection established over a cellular network?
It would also be interesting to hear from other users who have had the same experience that raenrfm and I have had (or for that matter the contrary experience of successful VoIP calls from the Calls app ).
I have successfully made VOIP calls from the Calls app. I just tried it again now. My SIP provider is Flowroute. I don’t remember ever doing anything special to get audio working. I got my Evergreen only a few months ago so it hasn’t been long. I had it working on my Chestnut before that as well but it’s been a while since I set that up.
My privacy page in the settings shows no applications having requested microphone access. The Calls version is 44~alpha.1. My phone has no SIM card installed so everything is over WiFi. I did just install then new SparkLAN WiFi/BT card but that shouldn’t matter and it was working on the old Redpine card as well.
Note that my audio tests consist of me calling from VoIP on my L5 to my daily driver phone using cellular. I then scratch near the microphone on either phone and listen on the other phone. So I can’t make any statement about the quality or anything, but I do know that audio is coming from the L5 to my other phone and from my other phone to my L5.
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I haven’t used it on the L5 but I hear in other threads that the Calls app doesn’t seem to be able to do it (it being SIP). I use jmp for SIP service but use xmpp for actual calls and texts. That works well if you can get Dino to run on the L5, and last I heard that is working.
I was able to get the calls app to work with sip but just the one way audio was an issue, otherwise it worked just fine in my case.
I dunno, I wouldn’t say “this elevator can’t go down, but it works just fine otherwise.”
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That’s exactly my experience. It’s interesting that FamousJameous found at least the sound of scratching to go in both directions.
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Crazy as it sounds, the receive-only audio fulfills my one essential use of the Calls app. One (maybe more) of my banking etc websites insists on sending two-factor authentication by voice call to my home phone (which happens to be my VoIP).
It doesn’t require a voice prompt from my end, it just delivers the code. Being able to receive that voice call, I can log in to the site anywhere I have internet access.
I tried another test in the interest of being complete. I played some audio in one room, initiated a call between the two phones, then left one in the room and walked into another room with the other.
When the call was initiated by the L5 (VoIP), I could hear audio both directions (leave L5, go to another room and listen to other phone then go back and leave the other phone and take the L5 to another room and listen).
When I tried initiating the call from my other phone, I got some pretty bad audio artifacts but only on the other phone, not the L5. I still tried the same test. When listening on the other phone, I could definitely hear the playing audio between the artifacts. Listening on the L5 was fine, the playing audio was clear enough.
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There is a coax cable DHCP connection, 5 mbps down and 1 mbps up, to a cable modem Technicolor TC4300.E.
Today I have separately tried two wireless routers connected directly to the modem (in our normal operation we have a wired-only router in between the modem and wireless router, with various devices plugged into the wired-only router). Other than the previously mentioned GL router, I tried with an Asus RT-AC1200_V2.
The GL is better than the Asus at connecting and delivering audio from the server.
Wifi connections to the L-5 were tried on both 2.4GHz and 5.2GHz bands.
There was no outgoing* audio.
The one and only user who reports outgoing audio, albeit of poor quality, is FamousJameous. One difference between his setup and mine is that, while I usually have my cellular modem switched off, he doesn’t have a SIM in his L-5 at all.
I will try tomorrow with the SIM drawer empty, making attempts with the cellular modem switch turned off and turned on.
I further note that the Sofia SIP client in Calls is a devel version.
*This should be rephrased as “no outgoing audio delivered to the other end”. I am becoming convinced that the VoIP server’s noise filtration is blocking the whole audio transmission in that direction, because of excessive endogenous noise from the L5’s VoIP client. This point is explained and expanded later in the thread.
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Two facts taken together might provide an explanation for the disappearance of audio originating from the users of many Librem-5 phones:
(1) FamousJameous reports
I got some pretty bad audio artifacts but only on the other phone, not the L5. I still tried the same test. When listening on the other phone, I could definitely hear the playing audio between the artifacts
That sounds like an extremely poor signal-to-noise ratio.
(2) Audio delivered from my VoIP provider’s server is outstandingly clear regardless of where it originated. This implies highly effective noise suppression filtration.
Hypothetical conclusion: There is so much noise coming from L-5 Calls app that the server’s noise suppression filtration wipes out the whole lot.
CORRECTED TERMINOLOGY: Sorry. I should have referred to noise filtration. Suppression is something else. Although, if the whole waveform gets filtered out it might as well be called suppression.
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Does the L5 do its own noise suppression? I seem to recall there being an issue with the 2nd microphone some time ago. Turning it down seemed to help with calls.
FamousJameous tells us that the L5 makes a lot of noise rather than suppressing it. I was suggesting that the server’s noise suppression filtration could be so overwhelmed by the mess being fed to it that it suppresses the whole thing.
Luckily for us, FamousJameous’s VoIP provider is less fussy about noisy transmission. This way, we get to know how much noise the L5 makes. Otherwise, we wouldn’t know, because our servers have suppressed eliminated the noise along with everything else.
EDIT: I used the wrong terminology, writing suppression when I meant filtration. Also, when I refer to noise apparently being made by the L5, I mean noise apparently being made by the Calls app, or perhaps specifically the SIP client.
ANECDOTE: We have had a situation during calls (VoIP at our end but non-Librem) with a family member whose voice is particularly shaky, raspy and wheezy. She can be talking and suddenly there is dead silence coming to us, although the line remains open and she subsequently tells us that she had been talking all along. This is a fairly frequent occurrence, and only with that person. There could be any number of causes for this, but it certainly accords with the possibility of the server’s shutting down a transmission that had become too noisy.
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Maybe its doing a horrible job of suppressing it. It wouldn’t be a stretch to imagine the software for that is buggy.
Question is, where is the noise coming from that needs suppressing? FamousJameous doesn’t tell us that he set a coffee grinder going for his audio input.
Anyway, regardless of where it comes from, the signal + noise arriving at the server seems to be mostly noise.
OK, I’ll grant that there could be something going on there. I have turned my stereo mic and the modem thing down to zero, leaving the mono mic at 100%. I’ll try that out tomorrow. Thank you.
Didn’t say the background was silent either.
He referred to the noise as “pretty bad audio artifacts”. Are you suggesting that he didn’t know what noise was going on where he set up the test? Maybe he will come in to this conversation himself some time. Until then, I’ll take him at his word previously given.
Look, I don’t know how the software suppresses noise. I also don’t know how the software behaves when it suppresses noise badly. I’m just offering a guess because it seems like something easy enough to check. It seems perfectly feasible to me that the audio suppression could be failing somehow and thus, instead of effectively suppressing the noise, it’s injecting artifacts.
Also it’s not that I’m suggesting he doesn’t know what noise was going on where he set up the test, I’m suggesting that there was noise going on when he set up the test. I’m not sure why you presume it was silent at the time, but you and I are both operating on the same amount of evidence. If I’m to accept your presumption that it was silent, it’s fair for you to accept my hypothesis that it wasn’t.
Maybe just arecord ... followed by aplay ... will give an indication of the level of noise.