Skype VS Mumble

[hougie5822]

First off, 1000 apologies if I do not give enough info.

So a bunch of my friends use Skype when we play video games (mainly WoW). There is about 4-6 of us normally, but can go as high as 10, and I can start to notice the degradation of quality. I decided to trial a 7 day mumble server and so far I love it...but the issue is that one of my friends (and I think another or 2 do somethign similar) tested the server with me and everytime I talk to him (we don't use push to talk), his sound (pc-hdmi-tv monitor) plays the sound to him but it also opens his mic (a headset mic he puts on his desk somewhat away from the speakers of the tv), so I hear myself all the time. With the same setup on Skype, I never hear myself from his end.

We like the features of Mumble and it definitely sounds better, but it is a deal breaker if he cant use it the same as how he is used to using it on Skype. He does not want to keep his headset on his head due to comfort so he uses the mic exclusively with no issues on Skype. Since I know some of my other friends have a similar setup, I just am looking for pointers to keep using this Mumble server.

He has messed with the settings in mumble like the voice activity slider to make it so my voice coming out of the speakers stays in the red, but then he is forced to almost yell at his mic to open it up for him. Once again, never had this issue on Skype. He has tried lowering the volume of the TV, moving his mic around, and I think he is going to try his webcam mic to see if that makes it better.

Any suggestions?

[LPCSparc]

Personally I am a *huge* fan of PTT (Push To Talk). If you all set up and used PTT instead of open mics or "voice activation" you wont have the problem you describe ;)

I would "guess" a properly set up "voice activation" could work too (though I don't personally know much about it since I'm a PTT'er). Though with the scenario you describe it sounds like you talking or even game sounds could trigger your friends (or your) mic to activate since the program (Mumble) may think you're "talking". You'd have to set the voice activation to be pretty high to avoid that. The only drawback then would be probably having to literally YELL into your mic to get it to start transmitting. AFAIK (my assumptions)

That's why I avoid all those 'headaches' by using PTT ;)

[LPCSparc]

I'm a big advocate of PTT (Push To Talk). I'd recommend setting up PTT, then you wont have the issue you describe. You probably could do it with 'voice detection' (auto mic activation) but you'd probably have to have it set so high that your friend would probably literally have to yell to be heard (so that it wouldn't 'activate' his mic from his TV sounds etc). So IMHO it'd still be best and most simple to set up and use PTT ;)