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Do any of you by any chance have microphones for your computers?

I was pondering this while sitting outside in the sunny 60+ degree Fahrenheit weather today. There are some programs online where you can have a "conference" and people talk over the microphone. Reasons for this madness of mine...

1) Good way to talk outside of posts/or emails in real time.
2) We could talk in Polish or write in Polish and at the same time improve our abilities.

This would work mainly for people with a broadband connection. I have encountered problems where I've tried to talk with people over the microphone and they have dial up. They could hear me, but because of their connection the transfer of their voice was pretty bad.

Just an idea <img src="/images/graemlins/computer.gif" alt="" />

[color:"purple"]i use a microphone when i'm online in a game...never used it for real-time chat on a forum. have no idea how to set that up to work - there'd probably be a need for additional software to be running, tho.[/color]

Used to use a mike a whille back as I did a lot of network engineering and conversed with the people involved all the time.

Never did like the quality of any of them. Possible they have improved. Yes, you generally have to have additional software.

You do need broadband to effectively use voice over IP. A process of TDM or Time Division Multiplexing is used and it allocates bits of time in the bitstream to your voice. Prioritization is very important and accessible bandwidth.

I use Skype to talk to my family in Poland and have no problem. When you use a dial up line you may expierience a delay but after a short time it seems to decrease. You only have one way communications but it is usually clear. I also use it here and it works fine. Go to www.skype.com.

I do not use the microphone but you are right. We could sometimes communicate this way. I need to ask my husband how to make it working. I could probably use it also to communicate to my friends in Poland sometimes, although the telephone connection which I have right now is also very cheap.

Jaga, As long as they have a computer with microphone and speakers it is free for as long as you want to talk. You can also call a telephone number anywhere but for a small fee.

I was going to suggest Skype also, but good 'ole unclejon beat me to it.

Yeah, what JustJohn said.

Joclyn, what game do you play online?

John,

this is really amazing how the progress go. But the person who I call the most frequently in Poland is my dad - and he would be never computer-savvy...

It seems much of the world does not yet have quick connections. Poland does better than Slovakia and the US is not to far toward the front of the pack. I do not help the statistics with my dial-up modem. From a forum:

According to the data released by Point Topic, Scandinavia and South-East Asia have the highest ratios of fast internet connections (DSL, cable broadband). Slovakia lags behind, and so does the US.

South Korea has the highest number of fast connections per 100 people in the world: 14.2. Taiwan and Japan are high up, too.

In Europe, Norway has 12.3, and the rest of the Nordic countries, as well as the Netherlands and Switzerland are close. Canada with 8.4 is not far behind Finland.

The US, on the other hand, has merely 4.8 fast internet connections per 100 people, which is behind Spain (6.3), Australia (5.7), Austria and even post-communist Estonia (5.2). Slovakia has only 0.95 fast connections per 100 people, not far behind the Czech R. with 1.2. Other Central European post-communist countries -- Poland, and even more so Hungary and Slovenia -- are ahead of them, and so are the Baltics.