VOIP calling on latest gingerbread is tasty with Android!

With Vodafone's troubles yesterday, the value of my Android phone's ability to call using a wifi connection, was again demonstrated.

Essentially, my set-up is this: I signed up for a sipdiscount customer, which allows me to make cheap calls to family in South Africa and elsewhere abroad. I've got a Fritz!Box at home (an old one bought on ebay, that was originally issued by a Greek Telco) that are connected to my broadband, my TalkTalk phone line and also my normal home DECT phones. When my non-IT family place a call to 002711.... or any other international number (as I've defined in Fritz!Box rules), the call is not connected to my landline, but rather routed over broadband, via sipdiscount, and it just cost me €0.06 per minute to SA (or free to the UK).

On my Android (a Nexus S), I've configured the same sipdiscount account, and when I now dial a number - any number - it gives me the option to dial using the cellular network or the wifi/voip/sipdiscount network. Yesterday, that meant I could call as if nothing happened. :)

What was a bit annoying on the Android, was that this prompt (to select wifi or mobile network) always popped up, even when there was no wifi... which was sort of stupid. But the latest over-the-air (OTA) update for Android fixed that... I only get prompted when I'm connected via wifi too.

All goodness... love the solution!






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