Low resource Skype alternative

[Tudz]

G'day all,

I'm wondering about Skype alternatives that aren't quite so performance draining.

I've recently moved overseas for an extended trip and am using Skype to communicate with family and friends back home on my old netbook (eeepc 1000H). I did the same thing last year and it worked great.

This year I'm trying to do the same thing and it's being a real headache. I don't know if there's been an update or something, or maybe it's because my hard drive is dying, but Skype runs like utter shit on my netbook. It consumes heaps of resources so I can't even browse the internet while doing a voice chat, and forget about a video chat, it barely runs at all. The frustrating thing is I can actually use Skype on my mobile phone and it runs better than it does on my laptop!

The netbook sure as heck isn't fast and I think the HDD is on it's way out, but it's sufficient for browsing and only slows down when Skype is opened.

So, anyone know of a low resource alternative to Skype? I've read of some alternatives, but it's kind of hard to go through and test them all when I'm on the road and in hotels and my family aren't computer savvy so each program I have to walk them through the install and account process. Some guidance on where to look would be really great.

 

[Sgraffite]

When you say "resource", which do you mean? Hard drive space, IO reads, memory, CPU usage, etc?

I find it hard to believe that Skype is constantly reading from your hard drive, unless you have extremely low total memory?

 

[PTNL]

The netbook sure as heck isn't fast and I think the HDD is on it's way out, but it's sufficient for browsing and only slows down when Skype is opened

If you think the HDD is on it's way out, then you've got a bigger concern to deal with first.

 

[Tudz]

I didn't actually think to check what the bottleneck was, I'm making a call at the moment and looking at the resource monitor my CPU usage is on the high side, around 60-100%. RAM usage is about 800mb of my 1gb (with Opera open in the background and 8 tabs). So it may not be the HDD that's the problem, it may just be using too much of the little atom CPU. I don't know how to check hard faults in XP so I couldn't say whether it's thrashing the drive or not.

But yeah, it worked fine last year, but now it's running like arse. I have downgraded from Windows 7 to XP and from an SSD to the original HDD since I was using it last year.

 

[Tudz]

If you think the HDD is on it's way out, then you've got a bigger concern to deal with first.

Well it's still good for browsing the internet and stuff. Until it catches on fire or something my bigger concern is not being able to communicate easily with my family It's a 4 year old netbook and it doesn't have any important data on it, if it dies it dies I won't be crying, but I don't want to go buying a new laptop for the sole purpose of voice chat and internet browsing while this thing is still kicking.

I do plan to drop my SSD back in to replace the HDD, but I won't be able to do that until I'm near a desktop machine that I can use to setup the SSD.

 

[Tudz]

Really, not any suggestions at all? You disappoint me [H]!

 

[octoberasian]

This is what it looks like on my current computer:

That's Windows 7 64-bit, Core i5 2400, 16GB DDR3 RAM.

Not sluggish at all. However, this is a full desktop computer.

I also have Skype running on a Dell laptop and an HP netbook, Mini 110. The Dell notebook has 2GB DDR2 RAM and a 2.0GHz Celeron processor. With Windows 7 32-bit, it slows down a lot and there is a lot of hard drive thrashing, not because of Skype but because of Windows 7 and the amount of resources it takes up. And, this is after four reinstalls of Windows 7 and only loading the bare necessities on that laptop. My HP Mini 110 can barely run Windows 7 Starter and Home editions with more than 3 or 4 windows open, and no more than 2 to 3 tabs opened in Chrome. It has 1GB DDR2 RAM and the Atom CPU sucks for doing any heavy day-to-day tasks. If you are intending to do just one or two things at the same time like email and Microsoft Word, that's fine. However, overload it with more programs open and multi-task more than two items, good luck. The netbook slows to a crawl.

That is until I switched both the laptop and netbook to Linux Mint. For the netbook, it was Linux Mint XFCE. Yes, there is Skype for Linux but take note that it is rather different than the Windows version. Both Linux and Skype run pretty well on both notebook and netbook. There are different distros that are also pretty light on resources than Windows 7 is on a netbook. Windows 7 should never have been the OS of choice for something with 1GB of RAM and a 1.2 to 1.5GHz Atom processor.

I hope that changes with Windows 8 RT or Windows 8 Home for x86 laptops and ARM-based tablets. (By the way, Windows 8 Preview runs very well on the Dell laptop. It is a lot better than Windows 7 is-- lower memory and resource usage, better processor resource use and program management. They took a page out of Linux by putting idle programs and services into a "sleep" mode, and it works very well.)

However, if you are not willing to switch to Linux for your netbook, there are two alternatives you can use:

• Google Talk - http://www.google.com/talk/
  
  It has both video and PC-to-PC communications, and is relatively lightweight on resources. I use this alongside Skype since I have friends that do not want to sign up for Skype. It runs very well. You will need a Google account though.
  
  

  
• ooVoo - http://www.oovoo.com/home.aspx
  
  Next one down that I've heard good things about is ooVoo but you only have a maximum of 12 people of video/audio chat, and there are ads in every call. It's $29.99/year to remove the ads by the way. I have never tried it but I've read it's a decent alternative to Skype.​

 

[Tudz]

Thanks for then rundown and suggestions! I'm not adverse to running Linux on my netbook, but I'll have to find some way of downloading it and installing it (at the moment I have very limited internet via tethering on my phone and random cafes/hotels that have it, and without a CD drive I'll have to figure out how to install it from USB).

I've actually stayed with XP on my netbook because I found it quite low on resources. Windows 7 ran like a pig on it compared to XP.

I'm not sure why Skype ran ok last year when I used it but not now. I walked around India having video chats with my family and using the netbook's webcam to walk around buildings and things so they could see, but now even a simple voice chat is stuttery, I don't know if Skype have updated their program to be more of a resource hog or my netbook is dying, but either way it's annoying!

Thanks.

 

[Database]

I'd look at upgrading the ram on the cheap. 1 gb is unacceptable. 2 would be much better.

 

[octoberasian]

Yeah, upgrade RAM, it should help somewhat.

Also, if you want to get Linux on USB, try this: http://www.osdisc.com

You can get your choice of distribution on USB for $9.95 or $14.95 USD, and they ship internationally.

It'll also give you a chance to try out the Linux OS before installing it. Like on my netbook, I have two partitions on the 250GB hard drive-- one for Windows 7, the other for Linux Mint. That way I have access to programs that probably won't run or work in WINE.