Ummmm, so you don't pay for text messages any more? Beejive will give you push notifications for your gvoice text messages which is also why it's better than ^^. I canceled my text messaging plan entirely and just use this now. It also makes it really easy to switch between texts and various IM clients that you have associated with a single contact.

8/26/2010 4:07:09 PM

I'm really not trying to troll you, I was just trying to understand why that was better than gvoice SMS forwarded to push gmail which worked fine for me. But I could see the multi-IM client thing being pretty cool.

8/26/2010 4:11:29 PM

i personally use googlevoice texts to gmail on a separate account. it does work well.

8/26/2010 4:15:14 PM

Nah I get you, it doesn't really give you any additional value. Just makes it easier to view and respond to text messages. Plus emailing SMS responses can be janky sometimes, with the way things get formatted.

And although I don't really use them, GVMax does have a lot of additional featuresl. You can send an SMS to a "group" and it will forward any response from a single person to everyone in that group. Lots of other little things like that.

[Edited on August 26, 2010 at 4:19 PM. Reason : :]

8/26/2010 4:16:21 PM

Yeah I have unlimited texting and too many people too tell everyone to switch my number so I just get my GV texts via text on my phone. I think it's the easiest. Don't want to deal with getting duplicate notifications via email or chat. Text is a text. If i want to text with a computer i'll use google voice. Going to http://www.google.com/voice to text is just as easy and sometimes easier than using a chat client (like at work where everything but google voice is blocked).

8/26/2010 4:18:30 PM

i have to use google voice for texts with people like shrike because they think the beejive is a damn chat room and send 3 text messages in a row

hahah
yeah
that was good

8/26/2010 4:21:02 PM

oh yeah haha that's the trouble with using a chat client for texts. you piss people off by sending multiple texts.

8/26/2010 4:23:15 PM

Hahahha yeah, that is the one problem. I forget I'm sending text messages sometimes which screws over someone who doesn't have an unlimited plan

8/26/2010 4:23:31 PM

8/26/2010 4:25:08 PM

So has the voice calling thing hit your gmail yet? I'm pretty anxious to try it out.

8/26/2010 4:25:11 PM

incoming texts are free though right? For all providers? I can't remember. They should be. Or else people could get mad at you and send you a shit ton of texts.

^it's hit mine. It's just a call box and you put in a contact and calls them. Pretty simple but handy. I guess it knew to use my GV number by default. If you don't have a GV number I guess it asks you to set one up.

8/26/2010 4:26:53 PM

yeah i wish incoming texts were free. im telling you SMS is SCAM MESSAGING SYSTEM.

8/26/2010 4:34:07 PM

What network are you on? I thought all incoming texts were free. hell all my incoming texts in europe are free when i'm roaming.

8/26/2010 4:38:05 PM

AT AND T

8/26/2010 4:39:46 PM

oooooh I guess incoming texts are only free if you have the unlimited plan. heh. i'm on a family plan with like 6 people and i think it's like $30 for unlimited texts. so i pay $5?

8/26/2010 4:42:44 PM

Its on my account now, and its pretty damn cool. The quality is as good as a voice chat with someone over google talk (tested to my cell phone), and 'Google Talk' shows up as another phone in your Google Voice Phones list.


Going to try it out on a few conference calls tomorrow instead of my cell phone. Hopefully it works well

8/27/2010 12:34:12 AM

It hit my inbox this morning. I tested it out real quick by calling Goog 411 and it seemed to work fine.

^Haha I hope it's not an important one

8/27/2010 10:30:11 AM

^ Business conference calls. I can always just drop off and call back in if needed (others do, so its not a huge thing).

I am liking it. The quality is good for the most part; some times its like bad reception on a cell phone, but usually its pretty clear. Able to call several different numbers so far today, and its worked great Saved me a few hours of cell phone minutes.

8/27/2010 1:52:52 PM

I used a Logitech USB headset all day to test out the functionality. I'm in love. Every call I made was great quality and I asked a couple of clients if they could tell I was not on a landline/cell phone and they said that I sounded perfect.

This feature is now starting to make me almost regret SERO 500 plan. But then again, I do love my EVO more. Regardless, it frees up my hands to work on a customer's PC remotely. (I never ever keep my BluAnt charged for some reason.

8/28/2010 3:32:44 AM

So how close are we to being able to use something like this to create a functional cell phone out of a non-cell phone handheld device (iPod Touch, Zune, etc) without needing a voice plan at all?

8/28/2010 4:36:02 AM

^That's assuming that Apple allows something like that in the App Store which they won't. I could definitely see Google adding this to Android though. Remember all those rumors that the Nexus One was actually going to be a data only phone? Or maybe something that could switch to voip when you get on wifi would be pretty sweet.

8/28/2010 9:28:49 AM

about a year ago, when i was due to get a new phone, i looked at smartphones and after a little research, realized that there weren't any that would allow you to (easily) use skype or gvoice (on those phones that have wifi capabilities)

i understand why the carriers would do their best to thwart the development of such an app, but i'm confused as to why there isn't already something available for the droid, or something hacked for the iphone

i'll consider a smartphone when i can take it overseas and use it to call home for free via wifi...i suppose what i want is a mini-laptop with phone capabilities

8/28/2010 9:47:58 AM

^sounds like you need a N800/810/900

900 if you want the overseas cell capability - just drop in a prepaid SIM and you're good to go. Pretty sure we got unlimited data on ours in Israel for like $30

8/28/2010 11:52:29 AM

I'm happy with paying for a voice plan, I'm not that hard up for cash yet

8/28/2010 5:45:33 PM

So are Google voice numbers still invite only? Whenever you call/text someone and they call you back the number that google assigns to them is kind of random (like my gf's is a New Orleans number). So now I can just call/text that number like it's her second number.

8/28/2010 6:08:48 PM

Quote :

"So how close are we to being able to use something like this to create a functional cell phone out of a non-cell phone handheld device (iPod Touch, Zune, etc) without needing a voice plan at all?"

Most platforms (including iphone) already have SIP softphones. There are hundreds of SIP providers out there (vonage is probably the most famous) that will provide you with a number (or port an existing one) and an account. You log your SIP device or softphone into the account to recieve and make calls.

Right now if you have a gizmo account you can hook it to your google voice for inbound calls to yuor GV number. You register your sip device/softphone to your gizmo account and GV rings you like it does your other numbers. The only problem right now is outbound calls on gizmo are only free for like 3 minutes. They got bought by google so i imagine that might change. So inbound calls work fine from GV -> SIP phone via Gizmo but outbound you'd still need to use some GV app to handle the initial call setup.

I imagine someone could bake the GV stuff into a SIP phone though and you'd effectively get free inbound and outbound calling with one sip softphone.

Hopefully google will just open up straight SIP accounts so you only need SIP phones and no PSTN/cellphones

8/29/2010 12:31:06 AM

Quote :

"http://www.craigslist.org/about/best/nhm/1629950745.html"

Yeah...something like that. What I do is text the number or have someone text me and then I usually get a 406-XXX-XXXX number which I save. I now have the google voice app on my phone, but sometimes it just doesn't connect or it sends to the wrong person.

8/31/2010 10:42:20 AM

http://www.craigslist.org/about/best/nhm/1629950745.html

wtf

8/31/2010 7:07:27 PM

^ so.. uh.. wrong thread?

8/31/2010 8:53:15 PM

Quote :

"I imagine someone could bake the GV stuff into a SIP phone though and you'd effectively get free inbound and outbound calling with one sip softphone. "

You can already do this, search for sipgate and sipsorcery. I set it up but the delay is atrocious.

8/31/2010 9:24:57 PM

If you set your Skype caller ID to be your GV# and add your SkypeOut # as a GV phone, that would sorta work. GV would ring your Skype app on your phone and then when you placed outbound calls, people would see it coming from your GV #.

The Skype # isn't free but its not too expensive

[Edited on August 31, 2010 at 9:57 PM. Reason : .]

8/31/2010 9:54:30 PM

Quote :

"^ so.. uh.. wrong thread?"

check the quote in the comment above mine

8/31/2010 11:49:06 PM

My bad...the shit was funny though...damn clipboard

I was quoting the second post above mine...I think.

Back on topic...I have an M003 (runs Android) and when I go to Gmail and switch views, the call phone option isn't there.

I just knew I was going to be able to use the pad to make calls, but I guess not.

9/1/2010 10:13:10 AM

Just because something is in the desktop version of Gmail doesn't mean it's in the mobile version too... especially the Android app.

9/1/2010 10:24:26 AM

Anyone having trouble with gvoice not syncing on android this weekend? I finally opened it up this morning and got 20+ texts that were sent friday-this morning and never got a notification

9/7/2010 1:44:46 PM

^Nope. It's been working just fine for me. Make sure the "Synchronize Inbox" option is checked. Maybe uncheck and recheck it to force it to sync up again. If that doesn't work, uninstall and reinstall the app maybe?

9/7/2010 7:41:47 PM

will try reinstalling. Thanks.

9/7/2010 8:33:00 PM

http://gizmodo.com/5649613/did-apple-quietly-approve-the-official-google-voice-iphone-app-already

Maybe that means free VOIP. Don't know how AT&T would allow that though especially when everyone's data capped.

9/28/2010 1:19:37 PM

Its been available for Android - does anyone actually use it for VoIP features?

9/28/2010 2:12:18 PM

Well considering it's free VOIP I don't see why they wouldn't. Google just released it a few weeks ago and it's already implemented into Gmail.

9/28/2010 3:14:07 PM

Just spent an hour doing a case interview on google voice with a Logitech 930. Was pretty awesome. I even got complemented on the sound quality.

10/8/2010 2:47:19 PM

As far as I know, the VOIP feature implemented into the web client doesn't work on the phone, correct?

That is, I can't make native free voip calls over wifi with a handset (Droid, et al), right?

10/8/2010 3:45:32 PM

^not officially. That's what we're waiting for on the Android and iPhone. Although this popped up in google:

http://lifehacker.com/5354607/make-and-receive-free-phone-calls-with-google-voice-and-android

Should try that out. If it still works.

10/8/2010 3:53:13 PM

I've been having problems with text messages not coming through unless i manually refresh google voice. Anyone had this problem and fixed it?

10/8/2010 5:46:39 PM

Like on the web browser? Yeah it seems like you have to refresh for them to show up.

10/8/2010 5:53:08 PM

the mobile app does a shitty job of sending messages. half the time, it says cannot be sent when it's sent. sometimes it sends them twice. horrible.

10/8/2010 9:34:20 PM

yes it is indeed horrible. Fills up my inbox rather quickly...

10/8/2010 10:29:51 PM

Quote :

"I've been having problems with text messages not coming through unless i manually refresh google voice. Anyone had this problem and fixed it?"

If you're talking about the android app, if you ever lose data or are in a low connectivity area I think gvoice will turn off its auto-updating, it's somewhere in preferences you can turn it back on so you dont have to manually search for new texts.

Quote :

"the mobile app does a shitty job of sending messages. half the time, it says cannot be sent when it's sent. sometimes it sends them twice. horrible."

I've found the two situations to be mutual, but it never happens unless I'm in a low signal area and data barely has any functionality in the first place. I can't really blame that one on the app.

10/9/2010 12:07:32 AM

My situation is independent of signal. Happens in RTP and in rural nowhere.

10/9/2010 10:36:51 AM

I'm getting a blackberry for my job and I can finally take full advantage of Google Voice. I'll use my Gvoice number as my primary number and have it ring my personal or business phone based upon time of day, caller, etc.

10/21/2010 3:53:13 PM