What’s That Echo?

May 5, 2008

I am a huge fan of Skype. I use it for most of my everyday business calling. I’m not talking about just PC to PC, but from PC to landline/cellphone. Since I’m connected to my PC pretty much all day every day, it’s so convenient to make calls from there. I also save my cellphone minutes because I happen to live in an area where it’s long distance to call 8 miles away. Yes, I did pay a whopping yearly fee of $24.95 for PC to landline calls within in the US and Canada last year. That’s good until July 12, then I’ll have to pay the whopping fee of $2.95/month ($35.40/year) when that subscription expires. Check out their plans and choose the one that’s right for you. If you’re like me and tied to your PC most of the day, you can’t beat the convenience OR the price! But that’s not really why  I’m writing this post…

What prompted me to create this post is an annoyance (and we know how I love to post about annoyances). It seems that everytime I make a call to a landline, I hear myself echo in the background. The person I call doesn’t hear it…just me. It’s been driving me crazy. FINALLY, I did a Google search to see if I could find the cause/solution to the problem. It took me awhile because in most cases, the solutions had to do with the call recipient’s sound card and my call recipients are on telephones. After scrolling down in frustration over the same answer I’d found on multiple blog sites, I finally found the solution! I found a Skype forum post from a guy named Rob (his username is eccentrica) that gave me my solution. All I had to do was turn down the volume on my microphone! Is that simple, or what? It seems that excessive volume translates into feedback (I’m a bass player…I should know that) and the feedback (echo) is what’s been driving me nutz. Once I decreased my volume (which is a whole other Vista annoyance with my Plantronics headset…it won’t maintain the volume when I set it), the echo disappeared. I’M SO HAPPY!

So, if you’re tired of hearing yourself when you make calls to a landline from your PC with Skype, check your microphone volume. Thanks, Rob, for helping me lower my blood pressure by lowering my microphone volume! Check out Rob’s post on the Skype Forum (you have to scroll to the very end) for more sound tech details! Oh, and if you’re not using Skype, you can mosey on over to the right-hand panel of this blog and GET IT!

Posted in Annoyances