I freakin' hate Skype!
By maezee
@maezee (41988)
United States
October 10, 2010 5:29pm CST
Does anyone else feel the same way as me? Am I being close minded here? Recently one of my friends moved to Ecuador for a year (see another discussion of mine for more detail...ugh) and the only real way to get ahold of him (besides Facebook, which he never goes on!) is Skype. Now, not only am I sporting a pretty old desktop computer, but I also am pretty old-school in that I don't really know how to work Skype to begin with. Back when my sister was studying abroad in Sweden (from January-June of 2010, this year), her boyfriend, who I lived with, would set it up and we would chat face-to-face. Sometimes Carla (my sister) would call me from Skype, to my cell phone, but it was always so scratchy and horrible that I could barely understand a word she was saying. Also,with the video chat on Skype - there's like a 2-second delay, between when you hear the person's voice and when you see their lips moving, and it bugs me!
I don't know why, but I just don't LIKE Skype - so this is going to be a hard 8 months or so. Ugh.
How about you? Do you share my feelings?
1 person likes this
9 responses
@stellar126 (278)
• Philippines
11 Oct 10
It's probably just you're computer. You did mention that it's a bit old, right? And your connection. I use skype in my dinky netbook sometimes with a DSL connection and it works like a dream. The video call is clear and I can hear everything perfectly without having to use a headset.
However, I did try to use it once in my old desktop back at my mom's house and the call quality became really crappy. Also, they had broadband connection in a wifi which isn't very reliable.
Skype for me is better than the other messaging services out there. No complaints from this tiny person. :)
@stellar126 (278)
• Philippines
11 Oct 10
When I said "you're computer" I meant "your computer." lol...sorry. Haven't had coffee yet.
@bounce58 (17385)
• Canada
18 Oct 10
I just responded to one discussion here where she used Skype to tell a children's story to a bunch of 4 year olds. The first story was successful, but she got disconnected as she started the second story. So not very reliable!
I used to do Skype to talk to my friends in Asia. But I too was disappointed with the quality, so I gave it up. That was about two years ago. I was hoping that the technology has gotten better. Again, disappointed that it hasn't.
@madteaparty (2748)
• Japan
11 Oct 10
Well, Skype's performance depens on the performance of the computer itself too. My family lives in a different country, so we chat using Skype a lot, and I don't see any delay between the video conference and the voice. However, it tends to lose the connection too. When they use a different computer, the video and sound quality gets better, and I don't lose the connection.
Unfortunately you need a powerful computer if you want it to work well, otherwise... but it could be worse, have you tried the video conference in MSN messenger? It's really poor...
@kodukodu84 (1569)
• Malaysia
11 Oct 10
Seems like you having a lot of connection problem there. It is not the skype but definitely an Internet connection when a lot of delay happens. By the way I love Skype. I survived 5 years long distance relationship without having to pay anything on phone cost or video calling except of our fixed Internet bill. If not because of skype, we would have had to pay thousand and thousand of dollars just for communicating to each other for the whole of that 5 years everytime we are far away.
We also use laptop though, it has its own camera accessories, mic and speaker. We make sure we get the best connection when we talk as well. So far, have not had any problem with including the live video chatting. good luck to you and hope it gets better for you soon. Have a nice day
@Bryanx54 (644)
•
11 Oct 10
Skype works for me what are the specs of your computer it might be that you either have poor internet connection, or your pc can barely run skype. Skype can be high demanding at times i have trouble with the software a few times but it is really really handy program.
@RamRes (1723)
• Argentina
11 Oct 10
Skype is the greatest of all messengers for me. I was used to use MSN all the time, then we starting using in my work, mainly for internal communication and also to call foreign clients cheaper. It worked greatly all the times, the calls were very good, and the chat is nice with no major problems.
When I compare it to other similar programs Skype is my own favorite and I would replace all other messengers, if not were because my friends are still with MSN.
Of course, for the calls and video chat to work well, you need a decent internet conection. Try the test call if you want to fix those problems.
@ElaineSpencer (152)
• United States
11 Oct 10
I like Skype, but it does have it's issues with call quality and such. Sometimes, it just doesn't want the call to connect. Lag occurs in video chat, but I don't experience this issue unless I have a crappy internet connection. It's good for it's purpose, but I wouldn't rely on it.
