Skype Beta on Windows Phone 7
Like many people, I was glad to hear in February that there was finally a WP7 app for Skype (beta version). Although I don't personally have much need to use Skype, I appreciate just how powerful it can be for both cheap international calls and video calling.
I downloaded the Skype Beta from the link provided on their blog and gave it a run on my HTC Mozart. It looked ok, I could certainly see the few contacts I had on Skype, but I didn't really give it a second thought. That was until I was in Thailand recently and again thought how great cheap (free) video calling would be for communicating with friends and family while on vacation (or living as an expat). My 4-year old son is pretty good on the phone, but I knew that if he could see daddy while talking, the conversation would be far more free-flowing.
First-things-first, most of you will know that there are no Windows Phones out there with front facing cameras, so it's a bit of guesswork figuring out if your face is actually in the frame when placing a video call. I managed to get it working ok, but eventually I just connected my laptop to the phone's Wi-Fi and used a regular webcam, which made it a whole lot easier. Perhaps the fatal flaw with the current Beta version is that it does not work in the background, so even if you have opened the app and signed in as soon as you go back to the start screen or open another app, it is game over.
Once I got home I was testing the app a little further and I was even more horrified. I started the Skype app on my Nokia Lumia 800 and logged in, making sure it had time to get all the latest info before pressing the Windows key to go back to the start screen. I then Skype called myself from my old HTC Mozart. As expected the Lumia 800 did nothing, even the Skype page on the Windows Phone Marketplace makes it clear that the app doesn't run in the background. What annoyed me the most was that my iPad2, which was being used by my wife to watch some movie trailers on YouTube, got the call!
Where is the sense in all this? Why does Skype, a company bought by Microsoft in 2011 for a bucket of cash (US$8.5 Billion), take so long to deliver what is effectively a test app for Windows Phone? I mean, how serious is their commitment to Windows Phone? Do they expect you to have the app open waiting for a call? Maybe the execs at MS and Skype thought it quite reasonable to expect users to call, text or tweet each other to let them know to open the app. Maybe a text along the lines of "Hi honey, about to Skype you to remember to buy milk, can you please start the Skype app".
By the way, I love my Windows Phone and would dearly love to see the whole ecosystem evolve. It offers so much already built-in (baked-in) in terms of email, calendar and social networking that there's not a lot more I could want. One of my favourite things (and certainly my best argument when chatting at work with the iPhone/Android mob) is that I have downloaded hardly any apps because the OS provides so much already. Skype is currently not part of that great experience and it needs to be – really, really soon – if Windows Phone is to have a chance. Skype, if you need a hand let me know (jobs at ezidata.com.au) – I would be only too happy to assist!
Sharing Your Internet Connection on a Windows Phone
We recently spent a week on vacation in Chiang Mai, Thailand. My wife had a couple of university assignments to submit and, as we wanted to use Skype as much as possible to keep in contact with family back home, having an internet connection was important.
Internet access at our hotel was charged at a ridiculous rate (80THB for 30-minutes) so as soon as we got to Chiang Mai we went to the mall, attached to the hotel and bought a DTAC ‘Happy Tourist’ SIM card. Having researched the Happy website, this looked like a good match for our needs as it had an option to get a full week of 3G internet for 199THB. The SIM comes in two varieties, 49THB or 99THB, the later with more included calls. The only problem was that the retailer sold us the 49THB SIM for 99THB, which I didn’t realise until we got back to the room and activated the card.
I put the SIM card into my old HTC Mozart, almost instantly got messages from Happy that our service was active and tried to connect to the internet. Although the phone had service, I couldn’t get on the internet so I called the service number and finally spoke to a customer service rep who advised me that I needed to restart the phone - damn why didn’t I think of that (maybe because I have never needed to restart the phone for anything else).
The Happy Tourist SIM gives you the first day’s internet connection for free, so we tested sharing the connection between my phone and laptop and it was working smoothly. We then milked our free internet for all that it was worth.
Internet Sharing was rolled out to Windows Phone as part of the Mango update and you’ll find the option in the Settings menu. I believe it must also be supported by your carrier. When you enable Internet Sharing, the phone creates a SSID for the Wi-Fi service and provides you with a password that you will need to use to connect from other devices.
Connection speeds here in Chiang Mai, even sharing the connection over Wi-Fi seem good. From the laptop tethered to my HTC www.speedtest.net said I was getting .98 Mbps down/.78Mbps up when connecting to Thailand-based servers. Connecting to servers in the USA, speedtest.adslthailand.com showed I was getting .78Mbps down/ .51Mbps up.
One disappointment with the Happy website is that you can’t top-up your account on the web using a credit card, so you need to purchase a top-up card from one of the retailers, such as 7-11.
You also appear to have to keep credit on your phone otherwise you lose your service. Even though we had already purchased the 7-day internet package, our phone balance hit 0 on the last day and no matter how hard I tried, I could not connect to the internet. As soon as I put another 100THB credit on the phone, the internet was up and running again.