[arm-allstar] Best Codecs for Portable Nodes

[Travis French]

Hello to all in the group,

I am also thinking about portable operations and I too am concerned about mobile data usage. I would like to do this with a portable/mobile node and IAXRPT when the portable/mobile node it not practical.

That being said, I have started to play with IAX.conf and commenting out high data codecs. From what I gather here is that ilbc is the best way to go. Is it possible to say, have the home node to portable be ilbc or lower and for the portable to home node be ilbc or better. The ratio of talk time vs. monitor time would be greatly in favor of monitor. My thinking is that my outbound audio would remain at an acceptable quality level and I can live with the lesser quality audio coming back to me in an effort to ration data. Is this possible and practical?

As I said, I started to comment out the codecs in IAX.conf but when I refresh, the status remains at ULAW. I was expecting that to change. Are my expectations incorrect?
Lastly and a bit off topic, I have 2 nodes up and running now (47338 and 47339). 47339 is radio-less. I was thinking of experimenting with taking this one portable first but I am unable to connect to 47338 and vice versa. This might be my first hurdle before I need to contend with codecs. They both work fine independently so I am not sure where to look first. Is there something I need to change to allow them to connect?

Going back to the codec topic, might there be a "How-To" on doing what I am suggesting above. I did read some but it was not clear to me.
Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance,

Travis - K2PCB



-----Original Message-----
From: arm-allstar <arm-allstar-bounces at hamvoip.org> On Behalf Of "Doug Crompton via arm-allstar"
Sent: Monday, March 12, 2018 4:49 PM
To: ARM Allstar <arm-allstar at hamvoip.org>
Cc: Doug Crompton <wa3dsp at gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [arm-allstar] Best Codecs for Portable Nodes

The other thing you need to be aware of is that as far as I know only hamvoip code has the ilbc codec and even some hamvoip hubs and nodes may not have it "turned on".  The best thing to do is have a fixed (home) node that you connect to from your mobile hotspot node using ilbc. The fixed node would then be connected to your ultimate destination(s) using any available codec. This also allows others to connect to you on your hotspot node via your fixed node as they probably could not directly connect.


*73 Doug*

*WA3DSP*

*http://www.crompton.com/hamradio <http://www.crompton.com/hamradio>*


On Mon, Mar 12, 2018 at 4:26 PM, "David McGough via arm-allstar" < arm-allstar at hamvoip.org> wrote:

>
>
> Frank,
>
> The CODECs, as listed in the [general] stanza are for outbound 
> connections from you node.
>
> And, CODECs in the other stanza (such as [radio]) are for inbound 
> connections from other nodes, to your node.
>
>
>
> 73 David KB4FXC
>
>
> On Mon, 12 Mar 2018, "Frank McKibben via arm-allstar" wrote:
>
> > Re: etc/asterisk/iax.conf
> >
> > I have previously reads ome information regarding codec usage in 
> > AllStar
> and
> > wish to confirm the editing of the iax.conf file.
> >
> > I  wish to reduce the data usage on my portable node.  From previous 
> > conversations with members of this group I understand that the ilbc
> codec is
> > much more efficient than the default  g726aa12 codec and using it 
> > has
> little
> > impact on voice quality while substantially cutting the data usage.
> >
> > Is implementing it is simply a matter of  rearranging the order that 
> > the ilbc codec is listed in within the file?
> >
> > For example:
> > under the [ general ] heading  I changed the order
> > From:
> > disallow=all
> >
> > allow=g726aal2
> >
> > allow=ilbc
> > allow=ulaw
> >
> > allow=gsm
> > jitterbuffer=yes
> >
> >
> > TO:
> > disallow=all
> >
> > allow=ilbc
> > allow=g726aal2
> >
> > allow=ulaw
> >
> > allow=gsm
> > jitterbuffer=yes
> >
> > My confusion is that, these codecs appear several times in this file
> under
> > different headings and I am uncertain if I should be editing the 
> > order in all references to them or just certain headings.  Could you 
> > comment on
> the
> > purpose of the different headings and what they control   General,
> > radio-proxy, radio etc.
> >
> > Thank you I really appreciate the knowledge you all share in this 
> > email list.
> >
> > Frank Mckibben, N0AFO
> >
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> >
> > arm-allstar mailing list
> > arm-allstar at hamvoip.org
> > http://lists.hamvoip.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/arm-allstar
> >
> > Visit the BBB and RPi2/3 web page - http://hamvoip.org
> >
>
> _______________________________________________
>
> arm-allstar mailing list
> arm-allstar at hamvoip.org
> http://lists.hamvoip.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/arm-allstar
>
> Visit the BBB and RPi2/3 web page - http://hamvoip.org
>
_______________________________________________

arm-allstar mailing list
arm-allstar at hamvoip.org
http://lists.hamvoip.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/arm-allstar

Visit the BBB and RPi2/3 web page - http://hamvoip.org