VoIP Help Center

Thu Oct 20, 2005 4:34 am      

Babble's VoIP softphone is free to download and use and in fact their website stresses the word "free" throughout. One very nice feature is that Babble members can call fixed line numbers in the UK, USA Mainland, Australia, New Zealand and Europe for free. To start Babbling simply fill out a form and download their software. When you get your confirmation email click on the link to enable your Babble account for calls to Fixed Line or Mobile destinations.

As with many SIP phones and soft phones all calls to other Babble users are free. Similar to in-network calls among cell phone users we recommend that your VoIP phone has this feature. Of course Babble has it and it's "free." Babble says "If you talk to a particular friend frequently, why not recommend Babble to them – you can then talk for free, whenever you like, for as long as you like." Live Phone Networks wrote an interesting article called "Family Plan Without the Cell Phone" which describes the importance of free calls such as Babble to Babble calls. For families with students away at college, those travelling abroad, and business travellers these free in-network Voip calls do save money.

Babble for Windows is approximately 7.6 Meg in size and they also have USB phone drivers available from their download section. Babble installed quickly on Windows XP. Immediately after telling the softphone our username and password the firewall asked if we wanted to unblock. The Windows XP firewall also asked us if we wanted to unblock a USB Phone Server. We were not clear about this function and did not have a USB phone attached.

Babble's port range was from 5100 to 6100. Since we had an ATA adapter running on port 5060 this was important to us. The Babble softphone is attractive and easy to use. We forgot to check our email for Babble's activation confirmation. A soon as we replied to it we were greated with a screen that said "congratulations, your account has been configured for outbound calls to fixed lines and mobiles." Babble is user friendly and did not place itself in the start-up folder as many VoIP softphones do.

Babble VoIp services are from Bon.net, a UK based operator of international phone services. You can visit the Babble website here