Gizmo Project

[mtnbluet 0]

Contrary to public opinion, not all Americans have cell phones. For those of us who want freedom from paying high long distance bills, there is Gizmo Project. Gizmo Project is a light application used on your desktop and is useful as a VOIP phone, but with cost can dial landlines and wireless phones and vice versa.

 

After downloading, it places itself on the desktop everytime after startup. Hence it is always ready should you need to make a long distance call. The Home page is where you choose either Call Out or Call In numbers. For 3 months at a cost of $12 or 12 months at a cost of $35, you will receive a Call In number. For $10 you get up to 500 minutes of Calling Out and for $20 you get up to 1000 minutes of Calling Out at the low low cost of $0.019 per minute. The beauty of these programs is that there are no connection fees nor any account maintenance fees. In the wake of everything from activation fees to installation fees to maintenance fees, this is very refreshing.

 

I started with $10.25 (you get 25 cents free) and after one full year, I still have $3.68 left to spend on my Call Out Balance. This would not have been the case with a regular long distance program. Including the fees and taxes each month of a regular long distance program it would have probably cost at least $7.00 per month.

 

Now if you get friends to download Gizmo Project, then all your calls to and from them will be free. It is important to note that a new notice is on the Gizmo Project website stating that unused balances will expire after 6 months from the purchase date. However, this still is reasonable pricing.

 

The Home page allows you to create your Profile, Instant Message someone provided you know their account number, Add a contact and Invite some friends via email.

And the Options icon allows you to choose some advanced options. General allows you to uncheck the Launch the application when you log in. It is set to automatically login when you launch the application. The Prompt to upgrade when it is a recommended I unchecked because perhaps by not downloading upgrades I am still able to use the money invested.

 

After selecting the General icon, you can Auto answer incoming calls and you can determine what happens when you click on the X in the title bar. Either you can minimize the application or you can Exit the application. Your choice. Lastly you can specify the location and the folder that you want to save recorded phone calls to. And you can choose from one of 3 languages: English, Spanish, or French.

 

Clicking the Accounts icon brings you to a place where you can add more than one account, meaning that all account names and their passwords are kept here. The Audio icon allows you to control the Input and Output volume as well as Echo Cancellation and Automatic Gain Control which have been prechecked for you. The Status icon is similar to Google talk in that you can automatically let all your contacts know that you are Idle after a specified number of minutes (usually 10) and that you are Away after 30 minutes or more or less-you choose by a drop down box.

 

The Sounds icon has 3 tabs. Application sound, Blasts, and Hold music. You can select a Gizmo Project sound pack or none at all. These sound will occur at Ringtone, making the Call, at Hangup, at Login, at Toggle Dialpad, at Message Received and Message Sent. Any of the immediate above can be eliminated individually at your preference. When you click on the Contacts icon it allows you to choose between Making a call or Sending an instant message When you double-click a contact. In addition., you get to choose whether to make the contact list appear as Large icons or Small icons. You can also have Group contacts or not.

 

Selecting the Chat icon gives you a preview of what the chat looks like and allows you to change the Message Style from Simple to Renkoo to h4x0r and back again. You can select the Color Scheme mainly simple combinations of Orange, Green, Blue, Red and Purple. You can even show emotions in your chat â¦or not. Finally, clicking on the Advanced icon allows you to Set connection settings as HTTP (S) proxy and you will see the SIP and RTP Port Ids and Enable Debug Logging.

 

The second tab after the Home tab is the Calls tab. Here all your Calls, Dialed, Received or Missed are logged. You will see the date, time and length of the call in minutes and seconds recorded. The list can be quite lengthy, but one nice feature is the call out green icon button next to each call means that you can dial the number just by clicking on it. No need to use the Dialpad for the phone numbers already logged.

 

The next tab is Conference. You can make free conference calls with landlines, moble phones and other Gizmo Project users. You can also make conference calls calling PC to PC and both methods have step-by-step instructions listed on this Conference tab page.

 

Lastly, there is the Dialpad tab that has buttons just like a push button telephone. When you press a number it will appear in the box above. Now these buttons are fairly sensitive so you must double check before you actually make the call. Otherwise you may have to start over in dialing the number.

 

All in all Gizmo Project is a handy VOIP phone on your computer and youâll love the price, especially if you do not have a cell phone. Would not recommend this as a professional long distance phone solution as sometimes voices have a distorted quality to them.. However, the call is continuous, that is, there is no dropping of the connection.

 

Remember it is free to download Gizmo Project and to use it among other Gizmo Project users, but to enable it as a long distance phone outside of this, does cost something.

 

Here are some printscreens of Gizmo Project: