Persistent outbound dropouts

mustang1068 · Post by **mustang1068** » Fri Jun 20, 2008 11:56 am

I really want to like this thing and get it to work, but my wife is already demanding that I disconnect it for the following reason - persistent outbound dropouts.

Inbound is perfect, sound quality is excellent. Outbound sound quality is good, but people on the end complain of intermittent audio dropouts requiring us to repeat things. This happens on every call, to every number we've tried so far. I am talking about complete silence on the other end for up to a couple seconds.

I have run every VOIP test I can find, switched USB ports, tried powered hub - no difference. I have 6Mbps+ down and 1.5Mbps up via Comcast and no apparently line quality issues.

Any help would be appreciated - running out of patience. Thanks in advance.

gary · Post by **gary** » Fri Jun 20, 2008 12:34 pm

If your PC/Laptop is connected wirelessly to the router then the zero configuration utility might be causing your problem.

Check this thread. The fix by magicFix should solve your problem:

http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r20427060-Drop-outs

mustang1068 · Post by **mustang1068** » Fri Jun 20, 2008 1:32 pm

Unfortunately not. I am using a wired connection and the dropouts are not on any regular intervals. It is completely random, and unless it is a very, very short call, will always occur at least once.

Though, I did see that link before and disabled the zero configuration utility anyway just to be sure - no difference.

teddy_b · Post by **teddy_b** » Fri Jun 20, 2008 6:30 pm

Are you using the internet during calls for anything else, especially P2P applications? If so, the router with QoS may help solving the problem...

If however, you MJ call is the only internet activity at the time, you might simply have a defective MJ or phone.

ChairMaster · Post by **ChairMaster** » Sat Mar 05, 2011 5:37 pm

Sorry for reviving an old thread but it comes up as the top link when I google "magicjack outgoing dropouts".

I've been experiencing this problem for about a year now, incoming files are crystal clear but outgoing calls have very frequent dropouts (every few seconds) which is very annoying. I got my magicjack in 2008 and renewed for 2 years and then last year decided to get the 5 year renew and maybe it's just coincidence, but that's when it appeared to start happening.

I'm running this on a XP Pentium 4 2.4Ghz and my CPU load is low (1-3% CPU usage), using a wired network connection and I have a 6Mbps down and 1Mbps up connection and little to no other internet activity. So I don't think it's due to the bandwidth and CPU requirements. And also like I said it only affects outgoing calls, so it must be something else.

It might also have to do with the fact that all my calls are to Canada. I had a look at this thread: http://www.phoneservicesupport.com/cana ... t1256.html but dialing 4* before the number doesn't work anymore it seems.

So I'm just wondering, did you ever got your problem fixed mustang?

sabresfan · Post by **sabresfan** » Sat Mar 05, 2011 6:26 pm

Here's where some troubleshooting comes into play. If only outbound calls are affected then I would look and see which proxy server your MJ is set for and try another. Easiest way is to run wireshark. Make a call and see what server your MJ is connecting to. Some servers are better than others from my experience so blocking the server your MJ is set for and having your MJ fail over to another may help this problem. Check out the MJ wiki section on finding/changing your server http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/MagicJack/ ... roxy_Find2 Good Luck

ChairMaster · Post by **ChairMaster** » Sat Mar 05, 2011 6:35 pm

Thanks I'll give it a shot and let you know.

ChairMaster · Post by **ChairMaster** » Sat Mar 05, 2011 9:33 pm

Took me a while to add all the proxy addresses to block to my router (since my router firewall rules only allow one IP per rule...), but now I get [error 3]. Looking at wireshark and filtering by sip packets it looks like it only tries 2 different proxies (cleaveland and houston) but never gets to seattle or portland, which are the only 2 proxies I didn't block according to the list on the link you sent. I'll keep looking at it.

ChairMaster · Post by **ChairMaster** » Sun Mar 06, 2011 12:07 pm

wow, after reading more threads on this forum, I'm wondering maybe if they're only trying 2 proxies to prevent people from trying to switch to a better proxy. They seem to like screwing their customers (eg, constantly changing SIP passwords, no ATA use...)

sabresfan · Post by **sabresfan** » Sun Mar 06, 2011 5:28 pm

Give it a few minutes and MJ will try again. When you get error 3 just keep wireshark running and your MJ should eventually connect to a different server. This is just some junk they did after one of the recent lucky us updates to make it a little more difficult to connect and find a different server that works better.

ChairMaster · Post by **ChairMaster** » Sun Mar 06, 2011 10:39 pm

No luck, I've run it for an hour now (just over 3600 secs as shown in my screenshot) and it only ever tries registering with Cleveland and Houston (also shown)

From the magic jack menu it shows I'm running 2.0.6

I guess I'll give their chat support a try.

ChairMaster · Post by **ChairMaster** » Mon Mar 07, 2011 12:00 am

Funny thing, I called a friend in Ontario and the quality was good using the Cleveland proxy. Then I called my cell right after to test and every ring there will be 1-3 drop outs. I live in Alberta and most of my calls are local, maybe only my local calls are bad because I'm further from Cleveland? Houston is even farther so there are many drop outs as well. But I also read on some forums that the trace route didn't seem to matter to them.

sabresfan · Post by **sabresfan** » Mon Mar 07, 2011 12:39 am

Some of MJ's servers are much better than others. I'm in NC and have had crystal clear calls using the San Diego server. From my experience Atlanta, New York, Miami, Los Angeles, Houston and Phoenix have given me choppy audio. Washington, Pittsburgh, San Diego, Cleveland and Columbus have given me great sounding calls. Glad to see your making headway. Most people give up on MJ but if properly configured it can help save a ton of cash.

ChairMaster · Post by **ChairMaster** » Thu Mar 10, 2011 12:22 am

So I went to their live chat and as soon as I said I had voice quality problems they started going through their script and had me try a whole bunch of unrelated changes and settings. The ignored the fact that I said incoming was fine so my setup is probably fine and asked to change "Internet Options" in the control panel and change my DNS servers in the networking properties, try a different port on the computer and add a whole bunch of ports on the firewall, even though I told them the magic jack app was already on the 'allowed' list. I asked them specifically on how to change proxies but they said it wasn't possible. Finally they started listening and said maybe it was affecting my area code only. I tried some test numbers in BC and Ontario and they were fine, so they said they submitted the issue to the engineering team and now I'm waiting for them to get back to me.

But since I've been doing all this forum browsing I think I'm going to get myself an ATA and just sign up for voip/did/sip services through another provider and get myself a local Canadian number. And now I'm kicking myself for getting the 5 year renew

Anyone know if I can get a prorated refund?

hsweiss · Post by **hsweiss** » Thu Mar 10, 2011 12:38 pm

ChairMaster wrote:So I went to their live chat and as soon as I said I had voice quality problems they started going through their script and had me try a whole bunch of unrelated changes and settings. The ignored the fact that I said incoming was fine so my setup is probably fine and asked to change "Internet Options" in the control panel and change my DNS servers in the networking properties, try a different port on the computer and add a whole bunch of ports on the firewall, even though I told them the magic jack app was already on the 'allowed' list. I asked them specifically on how to change proxies but they said it wasn't possible. Finally they started listening and said maybe it was affecting my area code only. I tried some test numbers in BC and Ontario and they were fine, so they said they submitted the issue to the engineering team and now I'm waiting for them to get back to me.

But since I've been doing all this forum browsing I think I'm going to get myself an ATA and just sign up for voip/did/sip services through another provider and get myself a local Canadian number. And now I'm kicking myself for getting the 5 year renew Anyone know if I can get a prorated refund?

I have a NY phone number (but I'm not in NY). Calls made to NY in my MJ number area code used to have horrendous echo. Calls to any other area code were excellent. I must have chatted with MJ support 5 times over this and they always said that they were submitting the problem to engineering and it should be cleared up in 24-48 hours. Nothing ever happened so don't hold your breath.

However, using wireshark I found that MJ defaulted to one of the NY proxy servers. When I simply blocked the route to the NY servers, the echo went away. By watching I also found that certain other proxy servers were bad (e.g., LA, Miami) but any of the other ones I landed on seemed to work fine. So to this day, I have blocks in my router and I have not had any persistent echo problems since (once in a while, but I have that even on my Verizon FiOS landline too).

Just try blocking the overburdened proxy servers (e.g., NY, LA, Miami), keep track of which servers give you good or bad sound quality, and adjust your routing table as needed.

ChairMaster · Post by **ChairMaster** » Sat Mar 12, 2011 12:42 pm

Well you were right about one thing, it's been 4 days and I haven't heard anything from them

And I just made a few test calls and they are still very choppy for "local" numbers (my MJ is 234 area code and I live in 403 area code so my local calls are 403) but fine for other area codes (vancouver & toronto are ok, crystal clear).

I don't think it is the server load since calls to other area codes on the same proxy are fine. And like I said in my earlier posts, I've tried blocking proxies on my firewall but my MJ only tries 2 servers, ever (Cleavland and Houston). I don't know why that that is since you and other seem to be able to do it.

Thanks for your suggestion though.

hsweiss · Post by **hsweiss** » Mon Mar 14, 2011 10:37 am

ChairMaster wrote:Well you were right about one thing, it's been 4 days and I haven't heard anything from them And I just made a few test calls and they are still very choppy for "local" numbers (my MJ is 234 area code and I live in 403 area code so my local calls are 403) but fine for other area codes (vancouver & toronto are ok, crystal clear).

I don't think it is the server load since calls to other area codes on the same proxy are fine. And like I said in my earlier posts, I've tried blocking proxies on my firewall but my MJ only tries 2 servers, ever (Cleavland and Houston). I don't know why that that is since you and other seem to be able to do it.

Thanks for your suggestion though.

My results were the same as yours. When I was connected to the NY proxy, calls to anywhere else other than 718 were fine. Only calls to 718 and once in a while to 516 (which is 'next door' to 718 on Long Island) had the echo problem. But when I set up the proxy blocks (first in my WinXP routing table for testing and later in my router for permanency) the problem went away entirely.

hsweiss · Post by **hsweiss** » Mon Mar 14, 2011 2:09 pm

BTW - when you tried blocking the proxy servers did you block BOTH the proxy and the associated VMS server? Here's an example of what I did (you can do this directly in Windows or set up the equiv in your router):

First, using Wireshark I found the vms and proxy I was connecting to (default was proxy1.newyork.talk4free.com and vms1.newyork.talk4free.com). So I created a .bat file that I can click on after the system reboots - or it can be put in the autoexec.bat if you want it executed automatically - which changes the routing as such:

route add 216.234.64.12 mask 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.253 metric 1

which blocks vms1.newyork.talk4free.com.

Adding

route add 216.234.64.8 mask 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.253 metric 1

blocks proxy1.newyork.talk4free.com

To block others, just do an nslookup on vms1.cityname.talk4free.com and proxy1.cityname.talk4free.com. E.g.,

nslookup proxy1.houston.talk4free.com

which results in an IP address of 67.88.84.6 and add the route to that address as above.

You can check that the routes were inserted using

"netstat -r"

and you should see the IP address you blocked.

ChairMaster · Post by **ChairMaster** » Sun Mar 20, 2011 11:18 pm

No, actually I didn't try blocking the vms servers, just the servers listed on that proxy list on the wiki.

But I just tried it and still no luck, I can't force it to try any other servers other than cleveland and houston.

I added a "deny all traffic to 67.88.10.203 and 216.234.74.12" on my router which are the cleveland and houston vms servers respectively. I enabled those rules along with the proxy blocking rules and I still get the error 3.

Thanks for your suggestions but it looks like I'll just have to wait for MJ to fix it on their end or try to cancel. I just bought an ATA and signed up for voip.ms so I'll still be saving money compared to using my local telco anyways. Plus I finally get a local Canadian number (I know MJ has Canadian numbers but they cost an extra $10/year! It's not fair, and I don't like paying extra for something that should be included in the normal cost)

sabresfan · Post by **sabresfan** » Sun Mar 20, 2011 11:37 pm

ChairMaster wrote:No, actually I didn't try blocking the vms servers, just the servers listed on that proxy list on the wiki.

But I just tried it and still no luck, I can't force it to try any other servers other than cleveland and houston.

I added a "deny all traffic to 67.88.10.203 and 216.234.74.12" on my router which are the cleveland and houston vms servers respectively. I enabled those rules along with the proxy blocking rules and I still get the error 3.

Thanks for your suggestions but it looks like I'll just have to wait for MJ to fix it on their end or try to cancel. I just bought an ATA and signed up for voip.ms so I'll still be saving money compared to using my local telco anyways. Plus I finally get a local Canadian number (I know MJ has Canadian numbers but they cost an extra $10/year! It's not fair, and I don't like paying extra for something that should be included in the normal cost)

You won't go wrong with voip.ms. They are a top notch voip provider. Now that you have an ata you could also look at http://www.freephoneline.ca/ they offer a free service but if you want the sip credentials it $50. Hopefully MJ will work for you in the future.