VOIP for Father's Day

[busia12]

Hello,

I'm headed off to college again this fall and my dad has recently read an article about Skype and found it interesting. I have some experience with skype and know that it would be a pretty cool thing for the two of us to use together since he travels every week and I will be away at school. I was looking at a VOIP handset that he can use with his laptop, so I can set him up with Skype and talk to him while he's away. Anyone have any suggestions that are of a good quality and still fit into a college kid's budget? His Laptop runs XP, but is no where near high-end....so bluetooth really isn't an option unless there is a way to blue-tooth-ify his laptop for cheap.

I don't really have much experience when it comes to the hardware side of internet calling, so any and all help would be appreciated. I'll answer all questions I can.. Thanks again.


Suggestions?

 

[busia12]

anyone?

 

[dilli]

Test your laptop if that has speaker and a microphone: Try recording your voice with voice recorder (this software is built in in every Windows program) without connecting anything like a microphone or a headset . If you can record and hear the sound w/o connecting anything, you are good to go. I have used skype before on my desktop (with a microphone and a regular speaker connected to it) and it works just like a hands-fre mode of a regular phone.

If the laptop does not have speaker or a microphone built-in, you can buy a headset with microphone attached to it from Best buy or any other similar place, I guess that is not so expensive. (I checket at Bestbuy's web page and prices start at 30 bucks)

So the minimum requirements are: (1) Headset/Speaker and microphone (Built-in or externally connected) (2) Internet connection (3) Need to download skype software and buy credit (need to buy a minumum of 10 bucks at a time)

I hope it helps.

 

[DeeKnow]

any laptop that runs XP should be able to take a USB bluetooth dongle. these are normally about $20 or so. then you get him a bluetooth headset (Plantronics, Jabra or Motorola - a decent one should be no more than $50). then he is good to go, and is not tethered with the headphone wire either