More Skype, Less Echo.
Skype 2.6 for Mac is now available for download.
You’ve written many blog comments, forum postings and support tickets, all asking what we were going to do about the echo when making calls with built-in microphone and speakers. May the brand new Skype 2.6 for Mac that we put out today answer your question. We’ve significantly improved echo cancellation in calls and overall call quality should also be better than ever before, with or without a headset. 
We have also been very serious about fixing bugs and annoyances you’ve pointed out. For example, you can now edit the phone numbers of your SkypeOut contacts and Skype recognizes the timezone change of your computer for chat. Take a look at the release notes for the full list of fixed bugs.
But wait, there’s more! Not only have we spent time on improving quality, but we have also managed to squeeze in brand new features. We’re especially proud of call transfer which was launched on Macs first. We hope you like transferring your ongoing calls to people in your contact list and other new features introduced with Skype for Mac 2.6:
- Join public chats.
- See when others are typing with typing indicators. (See that busy pen on the screenshot?)
- Call Skype Prime services to learn new skills or have fun.
Download the new Skype for Mac and let us know what you think of it by commenting this post or forums.
Crashes!
Windows positions are STILL not remembered! What’s up with that? I don’t want some big fat-ass window with an unnecessary draw opening every-time I want to chat with someone. Gosh. Open. Close draw. Resize. Change position. EVERY SINGLE TIME. Enough already!
The call window is **still** staying on top when switching to another application during a call… how frustrating. This has been a problem since Skype 2.5.0.63 – I’m still running 2.5.0.38 because of this issue. o_O
Hi ipodlove.com,
Have a look in preferences, Advanced. There is an option there called ‘Keep call windows in front’. This will stop the call window from staying on top. Hope this helps
Thanks Ryan.
HI Ryan, tragically 2.6 gold is a bust for me. It installed fine, started fine. I hit echo123, heard two rings, then nothing but dead air, not the pleasant woman telling me about echo123. The call wouldn’t end on its own (as normal echo123 calls do), just kept going on and on…
So I tried to SkypeOut to a PSTN I dial regularly (my office in NY) with my previous version of Skype. I heard a few rings, then nothing. The technical info box comes up, so there’s something going on, but no call…
Then, Skype froze hard. Spinning beach ball, had to force quit.
Sadly, I don’t have the old version of Skype (yes, I’m an idiot), so I’m without…
Skype is such a frustrating story. Does alpha mean that bluetooth audio output on my Nokia BH-900 stopped working, even after un- and repairing and restarting? Or is it about the freeze feature with spinning beach ball? Skype still gets confused with CALLING or TEXTING someone. A very big very off-putting step. Skype folks: brace yourselves and finally get Skype cracking. It absolutely has the guts to be a great piece of software if it finally got fixed!
Skype is such a frustrating story. Does alpha mean that bluetooth audio output on my Nokia BH-900 stopped working, even after un- and repairing and restarting? Or is it about the freeze feature with spinning beach ball? Skype still gets confused with CALLING or TEXTING someone. A very big very off-putting step. Skype folks: brace yourselves and finally get Skype cracking. It absolutely has the guts to be a great software if it finally got fixed!
Hi all, I’m running the new 2.6.0.137 on a G4 iBook with no connection or audio problems using SkypeOut.
I did find a problem with the notification preferences: choosing to bounce the icon in the dock as a hang-up behavior fails…
BTW, I too would love it if the contact window remembered it’s last location and sizing, etc. as a default behavior, (perhaps with 8 sides and corners of the screen as options for location, a la Growl)
Hello. I’m happy to see new releases of Skype for the Mac (especially bug fix releases). I filed a support ticket a few weeks ago about Skype failing to log in when run under an OS X network user account (with the home folder and authentication done on OS X Server). The same system logs in fine with a local user. Unfortunately, I received a canned response that was pretty useless. Have you done any testing with network users under OS X?
First I want to thank you for the version of Skype for Mac. But I still have a problem with the group chats. If I have a conversation and want to invite another or more persons to this conversation I try to add them. After a window opens, where I can see which contacts I want to add, but I only see the online status of my contacts and NOT THE NAME! (green skype button without name). Is this my fault? Thanks for help!
I’m also having trouble getting audio through the Bluetooth headset (Plantronics 590a). It rings fine, but as soon as the echo123 lady (or anyone else) picks up, the sound drops out. Is there a fix?
Hi,
Since upgrading to 2.6.0.137 on my mac yesterday, I am no longer able to hear anything via my Motorola H500 bluetooth headset. The headset itself is working, and I am able to test audio output via Audio Preferences in Skype just fine. I have checked all volume settings etc, and have also tried my headset with another mac running an older release of skype without any problems. It also would appear that this is not the only headset that is experiencing issues in the latest release of skype.
If I can do anything to assist with debugging etc let me know. Also, if anyone else has similar problems it would be great to hear about them.
Managing contacts?
There is still no option for gathering multiple phonenumbers under one contact like you have in your cellphone. Is there a reason for this?
“More Skype, less echo”… and even less bluetooth. This is to sum up what’s new in the last 2.6. Fortunately I’ve kept the 2.6 beta, it does the job well. So dear developers, how’s that? For each solved bug you give us another in exchange? I propose to remove immediately the last 2.6 from download until you find the cause of bluetooth headsets not functioning anymore. For info, I use a Plantronics 340.
Lix
downloaded the latest version of skype 2.6.0.137 but it won’t run
have mac osx version 10.3.9
whats the problem???
so its back to version 1.3.0.17
Hi olderdes, Have you got the latest Quicktime installed? You need to be sure you’ve got an up to date system to run the 2.6 build on 10.3.9. As far the bluetooth problems, we’ll take a look thanks for raising those. About managing contacts, I’ll be sure to pass your feedback onto the team about this – it’s something we are aware that is needed.
Cheers Ryan, the sooner the better!
the audio problems are also present using the plantronics 640. It worked fine in the last beta but now I experience the same problems as described in the posts above.
the audio problems are also present using the plantronics 640. It worked fine in the last beta but now I experience the same problems as described in the posts above.
Same bluetooth audio problem also with Nexxus SmartTalk Pro. Worked fine with the previous beta. I hope to see an update soon to fix this. Thank u in advance.
It looks like this is a generic bluetooth headset problem. I have tested with four different brands and models, and all the same.. the incoming audio drops out just when the call connects. Outgoing audio (that is, from the bluetooth microphone) seems to come through OK in tests.
I haven’t tested all the new features yet, but so far it works perfectly. I am especially happy about the call transfer feature and echo cancellation.
I also have problems with my bluetooth headset (vivanco). I hear nothing….Please fix this problem! Thanks
Hi,
I downloaded the latest version (I’m on OS 10.4.9 and the latest version of Quicktime, if that’s important), installed it, ran it.
It worked for a while then I lost the audio and had to give up after so many tries to get back to my call. Today, I started it again, checked the Skype Test Call and voiced out my complaint to the lady but I did not hear my complaint being played back.
What gives, Skype engineers? Wish I still have the previous version but I was darn stupid to overwrite it.
Here’s hoping the Skype engineers come up with a more stable version soooooon!!!!
I miss my Skype.
Hi,
I downloaded the latest version (I’m on OS 10.4.9 and the latest version of Quicktime, if that’s important), installed it, ran it.
It worked for a while then I lost the audio and had to give up after so many tries to get back to my call. Today, I started it again, checked the Skype Test Call and voiced out my complaint to the lady but I did not hear my complaint being played back.
What gives, Skype engineers? Wish I still have the previous version but I was darn stupid to overwrite it.
Here’s hoping the Skype engineers come up with a more stable version soooooon!!!!
I miss my Skype.
To ryanhunt and all the Skype4Mac team.
Seeing the comments, I think I’ll hold out for a while before ditching my 2.6 beta.
What’s more, I see you still haven’t solved the problem in SMS mode where, if you type in certain accented letters (anything with a circonflex accent as in â, ê, î, ô or û, and also ç, that is a C with cedilla ), the character counter decreases by about 90 and even jumps on to a second message?
This was happening on the PC platform as well and I sent in a bug report with each new version of Skype. (Switched to Mac before Christmas and haven’t used Skype PC since so can’t comment).
This is extremely important to anyone who writes in French, Catalan and Portuguese (I’ve probably missed some languages out, sorry) since words can completely change meaning if we leave off the accent.
This is a basic bug and cost me a fair amount of money before I sussed it out as I was sending two messages rather than one, despite the real character count being less than 160, i.e. my 152-character message was actually counted as, say, 242 characters and charged to my Skypeout account as two messages.
To ryanhunt and all the Skype4Mac team.
Seeing the comments, I think I’ll hold out for a while before ditching my 2.6 beta.
What’s more, I see you still haven’t solved the problem in SMS mode where, if you type in certain accented letters (anything with a circonflex accent as in â, ê, î, ô or û, and also ç, that is a C with cedilla ), the character counter decreases by about 90 and even jumps on to a second message?
This was happening on the PC platform as well and I sent in a bug report with each new version of Skype. (Switched to Mac before Christmas and haven’t used Skype PC since so can’t comment).
This is extremely important to anyone who writes in French, Catalan and Portuguese (I’ve probably missed some languages out, sorry) since words can completely change meaning if we leave off the accent.
This is a basic bug and cost me a fair amount of money before I sussed it out as I was sending two messages rather than one, despite the real character count being less than 160, i.e. my 152-character message was actually counted as, say, 242 characters and charged to my Skypeout account as two messages.
My apologies for the double post. There’s no indication to show that pressing the “post” button has actually taken effect!
Thanks for all the comments on here about bluetooth problems, we’ve checked and it is a bug in this version. We’re working on it right now, and will release an updated version to fix this as soon as we can. We really appreciate the feedback, both good and bad.
- Ryan.
To triskel_tracey:
Your problem with the accents is most probably due to the fact that when Skype notices the use such characters, it automatically switches character set from standard ASCII to (probably) 16 bit Unicode. This virtually doubles your message length. So I am affraid there is nothing to be done, if you want to be too pedant (e.g. use “é” instead of “e”), then you have to pay for this… I tend to believe (as being myself a software developer) that this is NOT a bug.
The new update is great. Ran a couple of tests tonight: One on a G4 Powerbook and firewire isight with external speakers, internal speakers and using both the keyboard and isight mic. The other end reported great quality, thinking me to be on my Polycom Communicator. I also called a land line, and that quality was increased as well the other end said. From my end, the quality is still great voice-wise, but as an unintended side-benefit, the video images are crisper, more fluid and have stopped hanging. Good job!
I’m having the Bluetooth audio problem, too (MacBook Pro 2.16 GHz Core Duo, Jabra JX10). A couple of questions:
1. Any idea when the fix will be released?
2. Where can we get the 2.6 Beta version so Skype will work again for us while we’re waiting for the fix?
Thanks very much.
please fix the bluetooth bug asap!!!!! I need to make calls using my bluetooth headset and the bluetooth doesn’t sound anything with the new skype version! Perfect! I tried to go back to the website to find earlier version but there is none available… oh my goodness………..
Great job, works very well on our Macbook pro. Being able to edit contacts is well overdue and appreciated.
Like some other users I’d love to see contact groupings or at least some way to manage my growing list of contacts. At the very least some delineation between skype and landline contacts would help.
Otherwise super stuff team !
Does Skype still pump out audio through both speakers on Mac portables? iChat only uses the one that isn’t next to the built in mic, so if you really want to get rid of echo, start there! I’d like to be able to use Skype without plugging in my headphones.
Hmmm, still no fix for the bluetooth issue, was kinda hoping this would have been solved by now….
I use skype for the online radio program I put out. http://www.HooterandGreenway.com
I haven’t got a chance to test it fully. But I hope the echo cancellation is a good as it sounds.
I am leaving a comment to suggest a feature…
I think the ability to be on a call, and then add a incoming call directly to the conference, without putting the original call your on, on hold.
Otherwise I haven’t had any problems so far with this version.
“Hmmm, still no fix for the bluetooth issue, was kinda hoping this would have been solved by now….”
Hey djmagra, why don’t you check out our latest release (released yesterday) that fixes this problem. More details on our Mac blog
- Ryan.
Thank you for a wonderful product. It works great on our Macs if signed in as administrator, but does not work with users having network accounts. That would be almost everybody. We are using 2.6.0.140 on Macs 10.4.9. Look forward to a resolution of this problem.
It is not working on my iBook and it is version 10.3.9. I can download the program but when I try to open it, it does not open so I cannot use the program. What may the problem be?
Hi,
have now this latest version on mac g4 667Mhz with 10.3.9 and on an intelMac 2Ghz and 10.4.9.
So both work fine, but I never try to use video on the g4.
conference calls are very bad, voice quality is so that you do not understand a thing do to interruptions in the transmission – on both macs.
I am very disappointed when it comes to features and functions.
the mac version has no share groups, no way to organize the growing amount of contacts in the skype window. Than I can not offer services on skype prime, why not, what is so complicated to do that for mac, since windows has it, what is it this time????
The mac version is still ages behind windows and please do not tell me all the time that mac is so much different. Video was already very bad news for mac. You really need an intelMac to use it and I do not understand it, since ichat is already a long time with mac and working great. But I guess it is an other story….
So please add the features we see on windows, like skype prime, share groups, and extras (they do not work ether and it is a pain to find them, please organize that part better. would love to see at once if it is Mac, Win, Linux )
Thanks and get back to work now
STOP reading, you had your break, start working now on mac version 2.7
Cheers
Andrew
Not a major issue, but has anyone seen the typing indicator work with Skype 2.6 on Mac? Doesn’t seem to work for me.
also have problems with positioning the skype window and having it be remembered. Version 2.6.0.148
I need help on iBook G3 10.3.9 Echo and dropouts with D-link router make Skype out un-usable. Is there a fix? I’m using Version 1.5
I just downloaded and installed version 2.7.0, but it will not run. I have an ibook G4 running at 1GHZ and 800MB ram. It should run as it meets the min req, but refuses. Sadly, I will have to try to find an older version.
I’m using a Mac laptop, I’m video conferencing with a PC user, using a Rocketfish webcam and have the 2.7.0.330. Video’s fine, audio testing’s fine, my friend hears me fine, trouble is… I hear the echo of everything I say. I’m using the audio input of my webcam. I’ve tried setting up my audio input as my internal microphone but the sound quality was poor and my friend couldn’t hear me well. My friend hasn’t encountered echo problems with others.
Any idea what I can do to get rid of the echo?
@dearbridge are you using speakers? If so, try moving the webcam mic further away from them. This advice might help too.