Which router is better for VOIP?

[tom2u]

I just bought a Nettalk Duo and can use either of these wired routers:
D-Link DL7004
SMC Barricade 7004VBR
I would like to set them up so when I'm on a phone call the router allocates that port(?) a minimum amount of bandwith. Can't remember what that is called but was wondering if either of these or neither of these routers are able to offer that feature. Or should I just not worry about it? Sometimes I download a torrent and if it comes down fast it can gobble up significant bandwith. I'm on a mediocre DSL connection at about 3mb down and 80kb up.

 

[john-b691]

You can't really fix this problem on your end. Many routers have QoS feature but they have limited ability.

When you run with no QoS the problems occur at the ISP end when say you are already using 3m and a voice packet comes along. It does not fit so they drop it (its actually much more complex).
If you use the QoS features on your router they attempt to drop the torrent traffic in your case but they are dropping it AFTER you have already received it. That does not magically recreate the voice packet the ISP already dropped before you even got it. The only reason people THINK the QoS works on their routers is it is actually causing a error recovery slowdown mechanism in TCP to occur.

The only true way to do QoS especially for voice is to have the ISP doing it on their end of the link making sure voice packets are not dropped.

 

[tom2u]

I'm using an Actiontec GT710D DSL modem. It seems to have some QoS configuration in the driver, for both upstream and downstream.

 

[john-b691]

Yes you can configure it if you like but it may not help. Upstream would if you are overloading your link in that direction. Downstream the only way to get it to partially work is to set it about half the bandwidth. This will cause so many errors on the torrent connections that they will go into tcp recovery mode and slow down a bit. Still with as many sessions as a torrent opens it may or may not help.

Again it does little good to apply rules to traffic that the ISP has already thrown away before you even get it.