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  • Aykut, Wed 01 of Aug, 2007 [07:53 UTC]: Hi all, does anybody know about Thomson ST2030 SIP phone. I have upgraded it to latest version (1.56) but "Hold" and "Conf" features are not working after the upgrade ?? Do you know any solution or do you have Ver. 1.52 ?? Where can I find it?
  • Edward J Brown, Tue 31 of Jul, 2007 [23:33 UTC]: Has anybody experienced Choppy voice quality when using a Linksys SPA942 in an Asterisk Conference bridge? It works fine with my polycom and Cisco, but sucks with my Linksys.
  • www.astawerks.com, Fri 27 of Jul, 2007 [18:00 UTC]: does anyone use asterisk on top of clark connect? does it work good?
  • simon, Fri 27 of Jul, 2007 [14:16 UTC]: Hi All, Has anyone here managed to get the Cisco79x1 to successfully fail over to the backup proxy. I have 2 asterisk servers , handsets all register and function, except that backup proxy function doesn't work. Any working example would be very apprecia
  • Matthew Richmond, Thu 26 of Jul, 2007 [03:40 UTC]: using the page() application to page across our building...often the meetme conferences don't disconnect after the caller hangs up. Anyone else having this problem. (using Polycom phones)
  • Matthew Richmond, Wed 25 of Jul, 2007 [02:58 UTC]: thanks Nicholas Blasgen! I haven't worked with AGI before, but there's always a first! Thanks again!
  • Nicholas Blasgen, Tue 24 of Jul, 2007 [19:18 UTC]: Matthew Richmond, AGI will handle all that for you.
  • sam, Mon 23 of Jul, 2007 [16:39 UTC]: need help - certain voicemail extension will stop working and recording voicemail on asterisk - anyone know why and how to fix it? Thanks
  • john haji, Mon 23 of Jul, 2007 [14:55 UTC]: free calls to pakistan
  • bong, Sat 21 of Jul, 2007 [19:09 UTC]: hi good day to all can anyone help me how to configured the nortel sip to the signaling server and how to activate in mobile w/ sip compatible without mcs
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Asterisk VoIPBuster

VoIPBuster http://www.voipbuster.com/en/index.html offers free-of-charge calls to 40 countries. (But note that the same company that provides this service, (is now shown as Betamax GmbH of Cologne, Germany instead of Finarea SA ), now offers another service called Sipdiscount with a larger number of free destinations, at least for the time being; and an even larger number is offered by yet another service, VoipStunt).

Beyond the free 1 mintute limited calls, the fees for these services are now MINIMUM 10 EUR + VAT per 120 day period. A good deal for many, but not quite free. Rather it is unlimited calling for this period to some "free" locations.

For the most updated list of free destinations, please refer to Finarea SA's page, where the list includes also other sibling services.

Finarea SA are known to revise the list of free countries on their services, it is common for a popular country to be removed from one service and become available on another service, with their usual system where you must top-up with a certain minimum amount in order to make free calls lasting longer than a minute. If you join near the end of a scheme, this can be annoying, but you can of course still continue calling until your initial topup is used.


VoIPBuster has a SIP server that can be used as a PSTN Gateway. However, first you have to install and run the VoIPBuster software (Windows only) to get an account.

They originally had Canada, Belgium, France and USA on their list of free countries but now they seem not to be there. You can also try other services run by the same company, Finarea SA of Switzerland , such as NetAppel, voipcheap, sipdiscount. However, it appears to be impossible to use Netappel with standard IAX or SIP client (including Asterisk), at least using the same username and password registered through the Windows client (which, instead, works for VoipBuster). Has anybody succeeded in doing that? if so. please write your comments in the NetAppel page.

Call charges appear to start at EUR 0.01 per minute, but are subject to sales tax (VAT). The VAT doesn't seem to be charged on the call itself but when you buy your credit, for example, if you buy 10€ of credit you are charged 10+16%=11.60€.

The sudden disappearance of a country from the free list may mean unexpected charges that deplete your account. The following "wwwatchdog" script, run by a cron job, may be used to alert a user by e-mail about changes in Voipbusters's "rates" page:

#!/bin/sh
# Copyright (C) Enzo Michelangeli 2005 -- hereby put in the public domain

WWWATCHDOG_DIR='/tmp/wwwatchdog'

RECIPIENTS="$1"
NICK="$2"
MONITORED_PAGE="$3"

OLDIMAGE="$WWWATCHDOG_DIR/$NICK"
NEWIMAGE="$OLDIMAGE.new"
DIFF="$OLDIMAGE.diff"

mkdir -p "$WWWATCHDOG_DIR"
lynx -dump "$MONITORED_PAGE" >"$NEWIMAGE"
if [ -e "$OLDIMAGE" -a -e "$NEWIMAGE" ]; then
       diff -u "$OLDIMAGE" "$NEWIMAGE" >"$DIFF"
        if [ -s "$DIFF" ]; then
                (  echo "$MONITORED_PAGE has changed! Differences:"
                   echo
                   cat "$DIFF"
                ) | mail -s \
                 "Detected change in page \"$NICK\" at $MONITORED_PAGE" \
                $RECIPIENTS
       fi
fi
mv "$NEWIMAGE" "$OLDIMAGE"
rm -f "$DIFF"


(Don't forget to chmod it "+x").
To install it, just create in crontab a line like:

# Every hour scan for changes on Voipbuster's rates
0 * * * * /home/myusername/wwwatchdog 'me@somewhere.com' 'vbrates' 'http://www.voipbuster.com/en/rates.html'


This second version of wwwatchdog detects ONLY modifications that indicate a change from "free" to "paid" destinations, and can avoid a lot of unnecessary mails triggered by cosmetic changes (especially frequent with SIP Discount's rates page):

#!/bin/sh
# Copyright (C) Enzo Michelangeli 2006 -- hereby put in the public domain

WWWATCHDOG_DIR='/tmp/wwwatchdog'

RECIPIENTS="$1"
NICK="$2"
MONITORED_PAGE="$3"

OLDIMAGE="$WWWATCHDOG_DIR/$NICK"
NEWIMAGE="$OLDIMAGE.new"
DIFF="$OLDIMAGE.diff"

mkdir -p "$WWWATCHDOG_DIR"
# Note: use "links": "lynx" is untested in this context
links -dump "$MONITORED_PAGE" >"$NEWIMAGE"
if [ -e "$OLDIMAGE" -a -e "$NEWIMAGE" ]; then
       diff -y -W 160 --suppress-common-lines "$OLDIMAGE" "$NEWIMAGE" \
       | egrep ' free .*[0-9]|[0-9].* free ' \
       | sed -e 's/[|][^a-z]*/|-->/;s/$/|/' | tr '|' '\n' >"$DIFF"
       if [ -s "$DIFF" ]; then
                 (  echo "$MONITORED_PAGE has changed! Differences:"
                   echo
                   cat "$DIFF"
                ) | mail -s \
                 "Detected change in page \"$NICK\" at $MONITORED_PAGE" \
                $RECIPIENTS
       fi
fi
mv "$NEWIMAGE" "$OLDIMAGE"
rm -f "$DIFF"


The "trial" free-of-charge-calls are limited to 1 minute each. If you transfer at least EUR 10.00+VAT via Visa/MasterCard, PayPal or Pay-by-Phone (at least these are the options in Germany) you can do free-of-charge-calls for 120 days. After this period, you must deposit EUR 10.00+VAT for an additional 120 days.(update 10mar06)

With your username and password you make an entry to your sipconf:

[voipbuster]
type=peer
host=sip1.voipbuster.com
username=YOURUSERNAME
fromuser=YOURUSERNAME
secret=YOURPASSWORD


You can now use
Dial(SIP/NUMBERTOCALL@voipbuster)

in your extensions.conf dialplan.

If you have difficulty calling, it may help to have
register => YOURUSERNAME:YOURPASSWORD@sip1.voipbuster.com

in your sip.conf.

Currently, G711alaw, G723, G726 and G729 are now supported; iLBC and GSM should be added soon.
Update 10MAR06
If you live in the US, it might help to add a qualify=yes statement to the above and regularely check your ping time since this provider is based in Europe.

  • At the time of writing, "sip.voipbuster.com" and "iax.voipbuster.com" still work (and support more codecs), however they are deprecated and will be removed.

The NumberToCall is always in international format: 00 + country code + area code + local number.

Created by dieck, Last modification by Enzo Michelangeli on Tue 28 of Mar, 2006 [11:38 UTC]

Comments Filter

Re: Accounts problems

by Awi Kwong on Friday 01 of December, 2006 [03:58:04 UTC]
I got the same problem, I could not dial out.
WARNING21744: chan_sip.c:9527 handle_response_invite: Forbidden - wrong password on authentication for INVITE to '"25" <sip:25@myvoip-domain>;tag=as2d0f032c'

After reading http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/index.cfm?a=wiki&tag=iiNetPhone_asterisk, I notice that on my SIP account missing : "fromuser".

here is my sip.conf example:
voip2
type=friend
insecure=very
qualify=yes
canreinvite=no
context=from-voip
username=my-phone-number here
host=voip-provider.domain
fromuser=my-phone-number here
secret=mypassword
disallow=all
allow=g729

Max Channels?

by markosjal on Tuesday 15 of August, 2006 [05:31:15 UTC]
What are the maximum channels (simultaneous calls) you folks are getting with VOIPBuster?

voipbuster - voipcheap - internetcalls

by paul on Sunday 16 of July, 2006 [11:03:30 UTC]
It seems that betamax no longer offers inbound numbers for new accounts
im looking for unused or old accounts with inbound numbers, any area or country.
if you have a unused account and no longer want to use it, please would you email the account info:
voipsite: i.e voipbuster, voipcheap, internetcalls ect
the user name and password. number@ptt-telecom.eu
anyone wishing to swap account i will be happy to help, I have London 0208, Nottingham 0115 Switzerland +41 Manchester 0161.
im fairly happy with betamax service, I mostly call uk numbers, to use up my credit i also call mobiles.
for me its a good deal.



Accounts problems

by Jenifer Saenz on Thursday 20 of April, 2006 [20:17:26 UTC]
I have problems with my accounts.

Apr 20 10:37:08 WARNING4092: chan_sip.c:9527 handle_response_invite: Forbidden - wrong password on authentication for INVITE to '"Genesis" <sip:evocalls5@stun.sipdiscount.com>;tag=as1ec1835a'

i have credit on all my accounts but all doesnt works.
Somebody help me?

Accounts problems

by Jenifer Saenz on Thursday 20 of April, 2006 [17:52:57 UTC]
I have problems with my accounts.

Apr 20 10:37:08 WARNING4092: chan_sip.c:9527 handle_response_invite: Forbidden - wrong password on authentication for INVITE to '"Genesis" <sip:evocalls5@stun.sipdiscount.com>;tag=as1ec1835a'

i have credit on all my accounts but all doesnt works.
Somebody help me?

they actually expired my remaining credit

by hmilz on Thursday 23 of March, 2006 [13:22:03 UTC]
a couple of days ago, Voipbuster actually cancelled my remaining credit (of about 4€, not more) after announcing this measure in an e-mail (after which I protested, without any reaction from them). This might be against German jurisdiction (see the ruling against O2 here -> http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/69365). But no lawyer will accept a case for 4€, so they probably get away with it. :-((

Bad move, voipbuster, you (and your sister sites) lost a customer.

Finarea -- FBI probe?

by Ian Worthington on Monday 20 of March, 2006 [10:43:23 UTC]
I'm unable to find any evidence to support the accusation that Finarea is the target of an FBI probe "to investigate and shut down the company". Apart from the implication that the cart is firmly in front of the horse, last time I checked the FBI's powers didn't (yet) extend to Switzerland. "An Loner" joined 6Jan and seems to have left just this one message. Disgruntled 13 year old troll?

Germany > 1 ct/min

by hmilz on Wednesday 01 of March, 2006 [08:47:04 UTC]
OK now voipbuster has become too expensive within Germany (1 ct/min plus VAT)...

Re: Voip-in

by Enzo Michelangeli on Tuesday 17 of January, 2006 [03:25:54 UTC]
Eski: see my notes on the VoipStunt page about Asterisk configuration to receive incoming calls (the new servers that Finarea uses for VoipBuster, VoipStunt and SIPdiscount are the same).

Finarea SA ---Busted! Cheaters

by An Loner on Friday 06 of January, 2006 [06:48:32 UTC]
Don't ever buy an account from Finarea SA, the Swiss based company. They are pranksters and are ready to rip off everyone who buy their account.

Currently a FBI probe is ordered to investigate and shut down the company.


Beware of CHEATERS ON THE NET.. now thorugh VOIP

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