Atlanta server is overloaded (maybe other servers too)

[nld09]

I have been having my MJ for over 2 months and the choppy have started since the beginning. It worked great sometime and other times it was very choppy that I couldn't it use it at all. Other problem was I can hear them good but they can hear me with a choppy quality. I went to Radio Shack for an exchange and it didn't help. I spent hours and hours on it try to figure out what could be the problem.

Here is the list:

1)Upgrade MJ software (didn't work)
2)Move to another USB port(didn't work)
3)DDWRT firmware QOS (didn't work, i switched back to Linksys firmware - Tomato won't work with my linksys router version)
4)Tried cord/cordless phones(no different)
5)Did the Registry thing(no different)
6)MJ tech support is useless
7)Tried on another PC (no different)
8)Set MagicJack.exe to highpriority in task manager (no different)
9)Got a new DSL modem (no different)

I did a continuing ping comparison like ping MJ atlanta server 216.234.78.8 -t and another website like google.com. The response time on the MJ was good (like 10-12ms constantly), so I knew it was not my DSL connection. I use the Comodo firewall 2.4 to see which server MJ connects too (I think WireShark would work too).

Yesterday, I tried out the reroute to a near by MJ server beside Atlanta server and WOW the result was amazing. The quality is just like a land line. I tried the test echo # 909 390 0003 and it was a huge different before/after reroute. I called some people and the quality was just like a land line.

Here is how I did the reroute:
Atlanta server IP: 216.234.78.8 and 216.234.78.12

route add 216.234.78.8 mask 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.xx metric 1
route add 216.234.78.12 mask 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.xx metric 1

It means that you block (outbound) the above ip addresses and metric 1 means the network adapter that connects to the Internet. The IP address 192.168.1.xxx is the LAN ip address.

To remove the block, you can restart pc or do this:

route delete 216.234.78.8
route delete 216.234.78.12

I ran into some problems with the reroute. When I did the "route add", MJ didn't work (make call, MJ tried then dial tone - probably other servers refused to accept it). I tried it again and it pointed to another closest server and got it work fine .

I run my MJ on a HP slim pc 1.5ghz celeron 512 mb ram. Also, I run two wireless security cameras together with MJ, so it's on 24/7. The wireless security cameras have no affects on MJ.

I hope this info will be useful for many people who got the choppy quality voice issue.

List of the MJ servers:

216.234.78.8 proxy1.atlanta.talk4free.com
67.107.82.70 proxy1.austin.talk4free.com
67.111.250.134 proxy1.baltimore.talk4free.com
67.91.233.134 proxy1.boston.talk4free.com
216.234.69.8 proxy1.chicago.talk4free.com
67.88.10.198 proxy1.cleveland.talk4free.com
66.104.96.198 proxy1.columbus.talk4free.com
67.107.71.134 proxy1.dallas.talk4free.com
207.155.164.198 proxy1.denver.talk4free.com
67.91.177.70 proxy1.detroit.talk4free.com
67.88.84.6 proxy1.houston.talk4free.com
67.90.80.134 proxy1.lasvegas.talk4free.com
216.234.70.8 proxy1.losangeles.talk4free.com
67.91.96.134 proxy1.memphis.talk4free.com
216.234.79.8 proxy1.miami.talk4free.com
67.88.183.70 proxy1.minneapolis.talk4free.com
67.90.152.70 proxy1.nashville.talk4free.com
67.106.133.198 proxy1.newark.talk4free.com
216.234.64.8 proxy1.newyork.talk4free.com
216.234.67.8 proxy1.philadelphia.talk4free.com
66.104.81.70 proxy1.phoenix.talk4free.com
67.88.11.6 proxy1.pittsburgh.talk4free.com
67.88.208.198 proxy1.portland.talk4free.com
67.109.32.70 proxy1.sacramento.talk4free.com
67.108.236.70 proxy1.saltlakecity.talk4free.com
67.111.81.6 proxy1.sandiego.talk4free.com
64.1.213.70 proxy1.sanfrancisco.talk4free.com
67.88.218.6 proxy1.seattle.talk4free.com
67.110.56.198 proxy1.stlouis.talk4free.com
67.90.16.6 proxy1.tampa.talk4free.com
67.90.177.70 proxy1.washington.talk4free.com

NLD

[hsweiss]

Yep - thanks for the post but this issue has been covered in lots of other posts and on the Wiki. I find that NY, LA, Miami, and Atlanta suck. Chicago, Phoenix, San Diego, Washington all work well (but as they say in the stock market world, past performance is not an indicator of future performance).

[gtburgin]

Do any of you have a problem with the last digit of a phone # you are dialing not showing up on the softphone when you are connecting to Proxies other than your primary? I can only get the full phone# dialed when attached to my Atlanta proxy (which SUCKS!!!!!). All other proxies kill the last digit.

[tony]

I use the Comodo firewall 2.4 to see which server MJ connects too (I think WireShark would work too).

Here is how I did the reroute:
Atlanta server IP: 216.234.78.8 and 216.234.78.12

route add 216.234.78.8 mask 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.xx metric 1
route add 216.234.78.12 mask 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.xx metric 1

It means that you block (outbound) the above ip addresses and metric 1 means the network adapter that connects to the Internet. The IP address 192.168.1.xxx is the LAN ip address.

To remove the block, you can restart pc or do this:

route delete 216.234.78.8
route delete 216.234.78.12

I ran into some problems with the reroute. When I did the "route add", MJ didn't work (make call, MJ tried then dial tone - probably other servers refused to accept it). I tried it again and it pointed to another closest server and got it work fine .

Hi, thanks for posting. While similar info is on the Wiki and posted elsewhere in these forums, there are some new wrinkles in your post.

1. Can you describe which area of Comodo firewall you check/view to see where MJ is calling. I've used pmdump and Wireshark (consumes a lot of disk space, something like 89 MB!).

2. You mention you "pointed to another closest server...", so do you actively point to the desired server? Or do you keep blocking until the only recourse for MJ is your desired server?

3. You mentioned you dialed and got sent back to a dial tone (at least that's what happens when I try to block a server by routing to 192.168.1.253 (a blackhole IP address). How did you resolve blocking a server, then dialing on the MJ, and not just get returned to a dialtone?

4. In your address 192.168.1.xxx, what did you put in the place of xxx? An IP address where you have a device such as another computer or a printer? Or is it a dummy IP address with no device attached?

On my laptop which I take on trips, I have tried:
a) route command to both 192.168.1.253 (dummy IP) and an address where I have another computer.

b) Using Comodo to block the IP address of overloaded servers (NY and LA). But when I dial I just get a dialtone again, the number doesn't connect.

What has worked is at home, on my WRT150N router, I block the NY and LA server IP addresses. I thin connect to the Washington DC servers. This technique should work with Comodo firewall but doesn't, when I dial, I just get the dial tone again.

thanks.

[hsweiss]

After you block access to proxy servers you might need to restart your MJ. Sometimes a "soft" restart (advanced users -> restart) will do it. But more often than not I have found that you need a full restart. I have just killed the MJ task but if you look at other posts from az2008, he thinks thats a bad practice and you should either remove the dongle or use the Safe Removal tool to remove USB devices.

I have recently put the blocks into my FiOS Actiontec router. Essentially I've done the same thing as the Windows routes to another address inside the router. So now what I've found is that when MJ first comes up after a reboot, I don't need to restart it because upon initialization it could not contact its default proxy and goes onto another one.

[az2008]

I have just killed the MJ task but if you look at other posts from az2008, he thinks thats a bad practice and you should either remove the dongle or use the Safe Removal tool to remove USB devices.

I don't think killing the process is a bad practice. I run dongleless and have no other choice. When I recommended "safely remove hardware" instead of killing the process was when someone reported that MJ continued to connect to the old (blocked) proxy.

If I were having that problem, I would go back to using the dongle, and "safely remove hardware" because just killing the process causes it *not* to inform the MJ server it's going offline (causing the MJ server to think it's still online for up to 15 minutes, causing incoming calls to ring instead of go directly to voice mail, etc.).

I don't know if it would have any impact on the softphone not "failing over." I was just observing that killing the softphone causes similar lack of awareness (of the real state). If I were experiencing anything where it wasn't detecting its real state, I'd do the "safely remove hardware" instead of killing just to eliminate the possibility that that particular confusion wasn't contributing to another confusion.

Mark

[TheUSMale2]

Your Quote:
Here is how I did the reroute:
Atlanta server IP: 216.234.78.8 and 216.234.78.12

route add 216.234.78.8 mask 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.xx metric 1
route add 216.234.78.12 mask 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.xx metric 1 etc. Tells most of us nothing. what u did is cool but How u did it would be most helpful. cmd maybe?????

[az2008]

Your Quote:
Here is how I did the reroute:
Atlanta server IP: 216.234.78.8 and 216.234.78.12

route add 216.234.78.8 mask 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.xx metric 1
route add 216.234.78.12 mask 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.xx metric 1 etc. Tells most of us nothing. what u did is cool but How u did it would be most helpful. cmd maybe?????

The wiki how-to section describes how to find and change your proxy. It describes what he did.

The primary caveat is that some people need to route to a real, working IP address in their LAN. Others can route to a fictional address in their LAN's subnet. I don't think anyone's figured out why.

Mark

[nld09]

Hey guys, I am going to answer your questions the best I can.

For Tony:----------------------------------------------------------------------

1. Can you describe which area of Comodo firewall you check/view to see where MJ is calling. I've used pmdump and Wireshark (consumes a lot of disk space, something like 89 MB!).

I use Comodo 2.4 on WinXP and you an view all applications activity under the activity tab(when you open Comodo, it has the tab Summary, Security, Activity, and Custom)

2. You mention you "pointed to another closest server...", so do you actively point to the desired server? Or do you keep blocking until the only recourse for MJ is your desired server?

The best solution this one is first block the servers that you don't want to connect to. Afterward, you open MJ and give it a minute or two to find a server. Try to make a call and see if it works. You might get "try to call then dial tone" issue. If that case happened, then you would open up task manager and end task MJ (do ipconfig /release and ipconfig /renew after it). Open up MJ again and repeat the step above until you get a working call.

3. You mentioned you dialed and got sent back to a dial tone (at least that's what happens when I try to block a server by routing to 192.168.1.253 (a blackhole IP address). How did you resolve blocking a server, then dialing on the MJ, and not just get returned to a dialtone?

Look at question #2

4. In your address 192.168.1.xxx, what did you put in the place of xxx? An IP address where you have a device such as another computer or a printer? Or is it a dummy IP address with no device attached?

The IP Address 192.168.1.xxx is my local LAN virtual ip address or actually it's the ip address on your pc.

Using Comodo Firewall to block IP address doesn't work.


For TheUSMale2:------------------------------------------------------------
route add 216.234.78.8 mask 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.100 metric 1 -is the command to type in the command prompt. 192.168.1.100 is your pc ip address.

NLD

[robatino]

I have just killed the MJ task but if you look at other posts from az2008, he thinks thats a bad practice and you should either remove the dongle or use the Safe Removal tool to remove USB devices.

I don't think killing the process is a bad practice. I run dongleless and have no other choice. When I recommended "safely remove hardware" instead of killing the process was when someone reported that MJ continued to connect to the old (blocked) proxy.

In a Unix-like OS, any external storage device (like the dongle) needs to be unmounted (equivalent of Window's "Safely Remove") before being disconnected, to ensure that any cached data that hasn't yet been physically read/written to the device is actually read/written, before it's removed. Killing a process that accesses the device generally doesn't cause the device to be unmounted. I'm not familiar with Windows internals but the same issue might apply (anyone know?).

[hsweiss]

In WinXP, write caching for removable devices is disabled by default. This holds true for just about any removable device: USB, firewire, flash, zip, etc. They tried to make removal idiot proof by not requiring the user to first "stop" (Unix equiv of umount) the drive.

When you insert a USB flash drive (I tested this with a "real" flash drive since my MJ is at home), you can see its properties by going to Control Panel -> System -> Hardware tab -> Device Manager and then click on Disk Drives to show the drives on the machine. One of them should be a USB drive - I believe MJ shows up as a TigerJet USB.

If you right click on the USB drive and click on Properties a new pop-up box will show up. Click on the Policies tab. The default will be "Optimize for quick removal" which says: "This setting disables write caching on the disk and in Windows, so you can disconnect this device without using the Safe Removal icon."

I can check later to see if MJ installs the same way but I think it does - can anyone with a MJ handy confirm?

[az2008]

The default will be "Optimize for quick removal" which says: "This setting disables write caching on the disk and in Windows, so you can disconnect this device without using the Safe Removal icon."

I wouldn't trust that. MJ opens the flash drive (on the USB device) for write every 3 seconds. I doubt Microsoft can protect you from unplugging the device while it's opened for write, or in the middle of writing something.

With as many reports of "broken storage" that we see, I would never encourage someone to just unplug the device (without using "safely remove hardware.").

Mark

[hsweiss]

I wouldn't trust that. MJ opens the flash drive (on the USB device) for write every 3 seconds. I doubt Microsoft can protect you from unplugging the device while it's opened for write, or in the middle of writing something.

With as many reports of "broken storage" that we see, I would never encourage someone to just unplug the device (without using "safely remove hardware.").

Mark

Does anyone know what it's writing to the flash drive? The call history? The contacts list? Is it writing anything "critical?" Or is it only reaching out to touch the dongle to see if its still there?

[tony]

Hey guys, I am going to answer your questions the best I can. NLD

Great, thanks for the responses. Of all the methods posted to determine which servers MJ is connecting to, the easiest method is to check the info in Comodo Firewall. I'm running version 3.8.5xxx and I get the network connection info by clicking Firewall > Active Connections and scrolling down until I see magicjack.exe. The proxy server shows and when a call is in progress, the SIP server address comes up. It's in real time and fast to access. Other firewalls may offer a similar info option.

OK, agreed blocking a MJ server address doesn't work, it has to be directed to an IP address, in some cases to a dummy address where there is no device, in other cases, where there is a real device.

Others have posted about directing to a dummy IP address where there is no device or to an IP address where there is another PC or a printer. But what about routing to the same IP address of the PC to which I have the MJ plugged in? Will try it and report back.

[Black Magick]

Can someone break all of this stuff down to where ANYONE can understand it? Im not a computer wiz or anything like that. I don't understand IPs, Proxies or any of that stuff. I just have a problem that needs to be fixed.

[bitstopjoe]

Watch out guys as he will call you an idiot if you ask him to serach

http://www.phoneservicesupport.com/chop ... t8304.html


Joe Sica

[Darkman90808]

Can someone break all of this stuff down to where ANYONE can understand it?

I don't want to sound glib, but probably not. When I first got my Magicjack, I had lots of free time to fool around with it so I had a lot of fun tweaking things. Of course that was back when you could spoof your CID and change proxies relatively easily, thanks to the programming efforts of some clever folks on the forum.

Unfortunately, those days are long gone. I don't even get into anything complicated any more 'cause MJ has a way of changing things periodically so previous hacks/tweaks/fixes no longer work.

BTW, I'll be happy to be wrong on this if someone can show otherwise.

[sabresfan]

Can someone break all of this stuff down to where ANYONE can understand it? Im not a computer wiz or anything like that. I don't understand IPs, Proxies or any of that stuff. I just have a problem that needs to be fixed.

Start with reading the MJ wiki about changing proxy servers http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/MagicJack then I would suggest reading all the topics you can find in this forum about proxy servers. You will need to go back awhile but there are some excellent threads on this topic.

[Black Magick]

Can someone break all of this stuff down to where ANYONE can understand it? Im not a computer wiz or anything like that. I don't understand IPs, Proxies or any of that stuff. I just have a problem that needs to be fixed.

Start with reading the MJ wiki about changing proxy servers http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/MagicJack then I would suggest reading all the topics you can find in this forum about proxy servers. You will need to go back awhile but there are some excellent threads on this topic.

Like I said, I don't understand that site.
I've tried it. I don't know ANYTHING about servers, proxies, IP addresses or any of that stuff.

I didn't expect to have to do all of this BS when I bought the magickjack. What a waste of money.