It should work with pidgin also. Maybe you are missing some packages as stated at pidgin faq:
Why can't I do a video call with the GMail client?
Interoperation with the GMail client requires you to have the H264 GStreamer codec installed. You can find these in gst-plugins-ugly and gst-ffmpeg. For debian based systems that's gstreamer0.10-plugins-multiverse and gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg.
As stated in this askubuntu question you must install
gstreamer0.10-plugins-ugly
and gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg
(I also installed by myself gstreamer0.10-plugins-bad-multiverse
, because I read about it somewhere I don't remember)
But after installing those packages, and after restarting pidgin, I couldn't make it work at first. (Empathy works at first restart, see below).
So what I did after installing the packages to make it work (I'm not sure of which steps are really necessary, but doing them all made it work):
- Removed all accounts from pidgin (it could work just by removing the google account, but let's make sure here)
- Restart pidgin (make sure you really shutdown pidgin)
- Add the google account
- When adding the google account go to the tab Voice and Video ( or Sound and Video )
- Check the only checkbox that exists in this tab if not already checked (something about sound/silence suppression)
- Complete other account information and then save
- Profit! =D
I tested with Pidgin and definetely works with one official Google Talk client:
From Ubuntu with Empathy I was able to video/talk with other person using Gmail's Google Talk
Couldn't video call from Ubuntu to video/talk with Android's Google Talk client. In this test, I didn't test sound/voice. Maybe just sound/voice works with Android's Google Talk client.
An alternative
That seems to work more easily just after a restart of the program AND seems to work better with other Google Talk clients overall.
Try Empathy. (Default for ubuntu now)
I tested with Empathy and definetely works with other Google Talk clients (google ones):
Note: Remember that you need to install those same packages needed for pidgin to make video/audio work with Empathy also. (source)