Computer Phone, IP Phone or Internet Phone, all are names for a method of communication called Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP).

Voice over Internet Protocol, what a mouthful! Really all it means is you can make telephone calls over the internet using your computer and your broadband connection.

VoIP gives you freedom. You can shop around and get the internet connection you want, then shop around and find a VoIP provider that best meets your needs. Increasingly you are able to get both from a single provider.

Here is how it works.

Just like on an old-fashioned phone, you pickup your telephone and dial the number of the person you wish to contact. Your computer or a special module connected to your network sends your request over the internet to the computer or telephone exchange you are attempting to contact. Then the phone at their end rings.

In more technical terms, computers on the internet communicate using a set of rules called TCP/IP. TCP/IP tells us that data needs to be sent across the internet in small pieces called packets. These packets are sequentially numbered so that the computer on the other side can put them together in the right order.

An internet phone uses the same process. Your voice is converted to a digital signal, like the sound from an old record when it is recorded on a compact disk. It is then broken into packets and transmitted over the internet to the destination computer. Just like your data. Once there your computer assembles the packets in the correct order and sends it to your telephone.

Voice over IP offers several advantages over traditional telephone systems.

VoIP is usually less expensive than your old telephone service.

Internet telephony (Yes that really is a real word!) makes offers such as video phones possible.

VoIP allows you to reduce costs by eliminating the need for a dedicated landline.

Businesses can benefit from VoIP by lowering their telecommunications costs while presenting the appearance of a larger organization. You can have number with just about any area code. This means your office could be in Dallas and you could have numbers with area codes from Los Angeles and New York. This would make your business seem larger and more prosperous.

Individuals benefit by gaining choices and lowering costs with services like free long distance.

Unfortunately, like every thing else VoIP has some disadvantages.

First, you need to have access to a broadband connection such as cable or DSL. This can be a problem for people in rural areas, but there are some exciting alternatives coming down the pipe soon!

Another problem is that some internet services have a problem with latency. Think of latency as the delay or echo you used to hear when you made a long distance call. A clean internet connection is vital; fortunately, most internet services have upgraded their networks to minimize this problem.

Some VoIP customers do not have access to 911 services. This too is becoming less of an issue with the advent of Enhanced 911 Service legislation passed in many states.

Many telephone directories do not list Internet Phone customers. Is this really a disadvantage?

Despite the few disadvantages, Voice over IP is poised to explode. As non-traditional providers such as your cable company increase their market share, your communications needs can be integrated into a single package. This will bring consumers many of the benefits enjoyed by almost 90% of corporate America (INC.com - Anne Stuart).

Have you ever heard of wireless broadband? This is where your internet service provider broadcasts their internet traffic over the air. A card on your computer receives and then transmits your traffic back to the provider. It is called WiMax. You can be any where from three to thirty miles from the antenna and surf the internet.

If you can surf the internet, you can make VoIP phone calls. Wireless broadband and VoIP could allow you to have a true mobile office. Think of the possibilities. You will not have to make trips to an internet caf

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It use to be if someone spit on you it was in grade school and some dumb kid spit, but these young and restless tikes have now grown up and they are actively involved in the computer industry. They are SPIT’ing on you still, this time on your new VoIP Telephony Service. What is SPIT, well it is SPAM over IP Telephony. Basically they are sending you unwanted adds. But the Do Not Call Lists do not go there. And the SPAM law is not applicable to VoIP, thus they are in loophole land, just like in the ole’school yard days.

What can you do to reduce SPIT’ing? Well in this country we do not cane people like they do in Singapore and it will probably be nine-months until the Federal Trade Commission has a few committee/party meetings to draft a regulation and come up with a mission statement. Then another 3-months until they define what SPIT is. What does all this mean? Well it means all the people who signed up for Vonage VoIP service will get SPIT. So for those who switched to a new phone system for long distance for $29.95 per month are now going to wonder why. Can you imagine getting 100 Voice Mail SPITs per day and you have to listen to the beginning to delete them just to get your Voice Mail? Likewise the incoming wads of SPIT or batches of SPAM over IP Telephony could disrupt your telephone? Oh great, what will be next? We have SPAM, SPIT and next thing you know all we will have SH_T? SPAM Harassment Internet Troubles. Think on this.

Lance Winslow

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2005 is predicted to be the year of voice over IP (VoIP) solutions for a growing number of corporate enterprises - both large and small.

If you have been considering the benefits of implementing VoIP, you are certainly not alone. In its just-published “2005 Telecommunications Report,” Harris Interactive found that 87% of business decision-makers are familiar with VoIP and, of that number, 12% currently use it in their organizations.

So what’s the big attraction?

Cost mainly. But lowering company telecom expenses is just one aspect of the lure of implementing VoIP solutions. Other advantages include the potential for value-added services and the capability of more advanced features made possible through the integration of voice and data (e.g. videoconferencing, advanced voicemail features,etc.)

Sounds good, but here’s the rub…it’s also been estimated that up to 85% of corporate networks are simply not ready to handle VoIP.

Combining voice with data is a tricky proposition. After decades of getting used to near-perfect sound quality delivered over traditional voice networks, even the slightest delays in voip can be very annoying.

Before diving in to a full-blown VoIP solution, it is advisable that you conduct a voice over IP readiness assessment of your existing network. This assessment will provide you with two very important pieces of information:

The capability of your existing data network to deliver high-quality voip calls, and;
the ability to evaluate the quality of these calls during a wide variety of traffic scenarios.
Keep in mind that most data networks were not designed for VoIP, so chances are that some upgrading of your existing network will be necessary. One critical requirement for VoIP to work is QoS. (Short for Quality of Service, a networking term that specifies a guaranteed throughput level). For QoS to work, the routers and switches that manage the data traffic flow in your network must be able to prioritize VoIP data packets via QoS.

4 Steps to a Successful VoIP Readiness Assessment

1. Conduct a complete inventory of your existing network. Identify routers, switches and links in your network and store their configuration data in a database. This step is crucial before you can move to step 2.

2. Determine the current CPU, memory and bandwidth of your network devices, routers and switches. This information will give you a “baseline” of your existing network infrastructure and current capacity.

3. Simulate and compare VoIP usage scenarios to estimate the call capacity of the network.

4. Determine how well VoIP will perform on your network by measuring simulated VoIP traffic and calculating call quality based on a Mean Opinion Score (MOS).

We have recently added a VoIP bandwidth calculator tool to help you determine various codec, MOS, and bandwidth scenarios.

While VoIP can ride over the highways that your data currently does, it is a new application with new rules. A VoIP readiness assessment will give you the information you need to incorporate a VoIP solution without unnecessary hassles and expenses due to lack of proper planning and research.

About the Author:

Karen Thatcher is President and CEO of TelCon Associates, Inc. a 32 year old telecom auditing and bill management company. For help in assessing your telecom network for VoIP implementation, visit http://www.telconassociates.com

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