Absolute Gadget

Review: Truphone

Written by Rene Millman Tuesday, 16 October 2007 04:12

There are a lot of phones coming onto the market that feature Wi-Fi capabilities. Oddly enough a lot of these are knee-capped by mobile operators so you can't use them to make VoIP calls. The rest that have no such handicap often have no decent software that will turn your humble mobile into a VoIP handset. Luckily the guys from mobile VoIP outfit Truphone sent us a Nokia N95 to test their company's new service to make cheap (or free) phone calls without going near a GSM or 3G network.

The Truphone service is still in beta at the moment, but as we write, version 3.3 of the software is available to download and use. As mentioned earlier we were provided with a handset ready installed with the software to test, so we can't really give you any idea of how easy or difficult it is to install it.

What we can tell you is that once we put a SIM in the phone and connected to our wireless router (a BTHomeHub in limited edition Black) we could then try the service. Luckily when the software is installed and you are within range of a wireless network, calling is still just a matter of dialling the number and pressing the green call button.

Where you will notice the difference is when the phone is ringing. Over the internet you hear the ringing tone and some disembodied voicereminiscent of Sparky's Magic Piano or perhaps Kraftwerk. Anyway, from that you will deduce that the phone isn't using up your precious minutes on you mobile tariff.

Call quality is much the same as just about every other VoIP service, not as good as a land-line, but not distracting enough to make it unbearable to use.

The software is available to use on a variety of Nokia phones (mainly the N-Series and E-Series phones), no word on support for other platforms other than it is working on a version for Windows Mobile phones.

At the moment the service is free to use (i.e. calls to landlines in 40 countries are free as are calles to mobiles in USA, Canada, China, Hong Kong and Singapore - calls to EU mobiles cost around 15p per minute). More details here.

If the rates stay competitive and you don't mind a slight drop in call quality then Truphone could end up saving you a lot of money in the long run.

Rating 8/10