VoIP in Android Hangouts
Myrmidon
Baron von PuttenhamCalifornia Icrontian
It's... it's finally here.
For those of you POOR BASTARDS like myself that went with the T-mobile 100 minutes, unlimited data plan and moved your phone numbers to Google Voice only to have the sweet, sweet dream of WiFi calling and crazy low phone bills ripped from your trembling hands on May 15th (RIP Gvoice XMPP), there is finally a light at the end of the tunnel.
Unless, of course, you've had an iPhone all along, in which case you've HAD this functionality since October (Google's priority: "figure out VoIP on iOS, but not on Android!"), but I don't know anyone with an iPhone that gave a damn.
Unfortunately, this still leaves the ObiHai guys in the dust. 
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Is there even such a thing as less-than-unlimited-everything T-Mobile plans? I had no idea.
You have to go to walmart and ask for it.
I just called the rep and told them that's what I wanted. Didn't know walmart was involved.
Technically, none of their plans are REALLY unlimited - their unlimited plans have a bandwidth cap on 4G access, dropping you down a tier to the 3G if you ever exceed the cap. If memory serves, $70 gets you 5GB of 4G, while $40 only gets you 500MB of 4G, along with unlimited minutes and text (both plans). Not sure if they have a moratorium on hotspots like SOME UNMENTIONABLE CARRIERS.
Right now I'm paying $30 for 100 minutes, unlimited text, and a 5GB cap on 4G access. Since I don't actually use minutes, I'm basically getting a $70 package for $30. They also haven't given me any shit about using my phone as a hotspot (and they aren't net neutral, so its conceivable that they MIGHT inspect my traffic and charge me for hotspot action). Not sure how much, if any, they charge for that. I think they charge $10 for wi-fi calling, which I'm getting for free, as well. So, $80+ plan for $30 by doing it through GVoice.
Nice! I was not under the impression you were able to do that anymore.
As of legitimately TODAY I am able to make calls with hangouts over data again.
YUUSSSS
I'm going to give this a try tonight and see how it goes. This might push me to moving.
Give it a few days. Right now I am dual-apping it (hangouts won't show any SMS or VMs from my Gvoice number, because I'm not one of the 'lucky few' asked to merge my Gvoice with hangouts yet). Within a few days, everyone should be pushed over to hangouts.
My body is so very ready. I switched to Ting a few months ago, since I'm on WiFi 90% of the time already, this should slash my minute usage down to basically nothing, which will actually reduce my phone bill.
So one thing I've been thinking - the big G plans to do away with google voice. Will they stop allowing people to sign up for Gvoice numbers then?
Get your number while you can!
They're not doing away with it, just merging it into Hangouts. What good is VoIP calling if you can't get a number? It just won't be called Google Voice anymore, I would imagine... it will be unified under the Hangouts roof.
Yussss.... rolled out for my account yesterday. Made my first phone call with it last night. Quality was good (on my 25Mbit Comcast connection at home). It's kind of annoying having to use a separate dialer to make VoIP calls, though I can understand why that is necessary. My only real complaint is that the ringtone when connecting a Hangouts VoIP call is.... different.... and odd.... c'mon Google, just use a standard ringtone would you?
You don't actually have to use a separate dialer - once you've downloaded the 'dialer' app, the dialer shows up in the normal hangouts app. It's really just another app for your app drawer.
I meant a separate dialer... as in, I have to use the dialer app (or hangouts) to make a voip call or the regular phone dialer to make a regular phone call. It seems like they should add the ability to choose which type of call you want to make to one dialer or the other.
Oh man, if only they would. The GVoice app, I think, had that functionality - you could have it intercept dialer intent and ask you to choose between 'call with google voice' (your GVoice number) or 'call without google voice' (your handset number). Of course, both options used minutes... Let's hope they bring this back.
There's a lot of little polish that's missing from this iteration hangouts, but I'll put up with it in the hopes that it gets an overhaul. Just wait until you click a phone number in a browser and 'hangouts' isn't one of the contextual options - and let's not talk about the three or four different options menus, depending on what context you're using the app in!