I am a big fan of Google’s free products. I’m such a big fan, and I’ve tested and approved the functionality of google’s call service.
What you need:
- A Computer
- a Gmail Account – it’s free! Just go to http://www.gmail.com to register your own gmail account today!
- Installation of the call service plugin – once you’re logged in, you just need to turn on the calling functionality. The Gchat service should load once you are logged in. You’ll see a list of your contacts, along with a small telephone icon. If you click on this icon, a pop up window will alert you on installation of the plugin.
This functionality works! I just tested it by calling three separate numbers in the USA from Serbia. The callers on the other end reported that I sounded great, but my voice was gravely. That’s not enough of a problem to make this free service unusable, so I say it’s a success!!
Google also offers a service called Google Voice. I am a beta tester for this software and I’m a huge fan. Before I left the US, I enabled Google Voice as my voicemail provider. Therefore my cell phone now routes to Google Voice when I can’t answer the phone. Since I’m not using my cell phone here in Serbia, all of my calls are going directly into Google Voice.
What that means is that I can listen to my voicemail messages online. Also, Google auto-transposes the voicemails into text format, and then emails this to me. I love it! I can also call people back through the caller ID directly from the Google Phone service for free.
Google is really a leader in the internet innovations!!
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I’ve had a bunch of problems using the call from Gmail (I’m in Israel now). I’ve found Skype to just work better and it is cheap enough for me. Glad it is working better for you in Serbia.
Hey Rob, Sorry to hear it didn’t work in Israel. Maybe since then they have improved their product? Not sure. If you go again be sure to test it out and let me know. The Google Voice feature is fantastic because I can check all of my voicemail without having to call any phone numbers. Do you use Google Voice at all?