Team Speak/Skype/others... What do you use? and what is your CPU usage?

Hey guys & gals:

I was wondering about what is the best Voice Chat service to use when playing with my friends. We have been using skype because there is no need to host/serve for this service, however one of my friends has had trouble with maxed out CPU usage which creates choppy gameplay for him. A few of my other friends and myself, though the game seems to run fine when using this service along with Guild Wars, maxes out of CPU at 100%. My one friend has a top of the line machine and this still occurs. Is there a better service to use that will not stress out our systems like this.

Thanks in advance.

Our guild uses Ventrilo. We normally have between 20-30 people on there at any one time. The guild leader pays a £5 a month for the use of a server, and it allows up to 50 of us to chat on there simaltenously in different rooms without suffering any lag whatsoever on guild wars.

I've tried TS, and say I prefer Vent to TS.

i used to use Team Speak when playing Eve Online, our corp CEO paid some small monthly fee, and i dont think we ever had any problems or maxed out the member limit

What was you CPU usage during play with one of these services on. I am willing to look into other services, but I do not feel like wasting time if it is still going to max out the CPU...?

We use Vent. I have experience with both Vent and TS and believe Vent is clearly superior in quality. You can find free servers if you dig a little bit.

You will have NO cpu issues if you use a server with one of these products. Only if you use your own comp to session the chat will it rinse your cpu, and your bandwidth.

Do you have any links to these free servers?

I use teamspeak, best communication program in my honest opinion.

My css clan has a server
My m8 has a server
And i got a server for my guild.

No real need to pay or find a free server just host one yourself on your own connection. On 25.9 kbit codec (highest quality) it uses no more than 5kb of your bandwith.

As for cpu usage, never used more than 10% on a barton 2800+

Google is your friend.

Maybe so, but as I said earlier I have had experience with both and the reason Ventrilo is better is (1) The voice quality far exceeds that of TS's, (2) TS lags like hell, and no it's not my computer, it happened for many of our guildies. That right there is reason enough for me to use Vent over TS.

TS = Overrated.

yea your right, it probably wasnt your pc, it was most likely the server.. especially if other people were experiencing the same "lag like hell"aswell. Iv been using Teamspeak for nearly 2 years now, never had any lag of any sort, as for sound quality, the server you was on (especially if it was a free one) would have been using a cra*py sound codec. Or the person who was hosting it was not on a decent enough connection to be able to send and receive voice in and out.

That is my point precisely. The server we used for TS was not a free server, our guild leader pays monthly for it. We used TS originally with that server, had lag issues on quite a consistant basis, so we moved the server to Ventrilo, and we have better communication, better quality of sound and no lag whatsoever. Maybe it's pure fluke, but either way I'm having a far better experience on vent now than I ever did on TS.

Hmmmmmmmmmm...... anyone know how i can host a ventrilo server on my computer and still use that computer to talk to guildmates.

My guild uses TS.....I really dunno why, never tried Vent.