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Business VOIP?
- Thread starter badtz
- Start date
I am sure many people will disagree with me but my answer to this is "no" to going all VOIP.
I have been researching replacing our companies ancient phone system for a year now. I started out thinking "I am going to save us so much money by cutting out our phone services and doing it over the Internet" but as part of my research I have required any interested vendors to leave me a functioning demo of some type. Usually the demo kills the sale because I just have to many issues that I know my users will not deal with. We do large scale construction and in our business a jitter or glitch on a conference call could muck up estimating numbers and cost us millions.
At this moment I do not trust VOIP services to gamble my business productivity on it. But I would be ok utilizing an IP based phone system with dedicated phone service either through landlines or PRI. Then we would use VOIP through our T1s to connect to the other divisional offices. I have already started moving towards getting ready for an IP based phone system by converting our WAN links to voice/data links with the same provider over their MPLS network. Basically it dynamically balances voice/data on a T1 - when voice is needed it dedicates allocated bandwidth to it. So far we have been very satisfied with it. Just ditching our local phone service has already cut my phone bills in half over all my offices.
I have been researching replacing our companies ancient phone system for a year now. I started out thinking "I am going to save us so much money by cutting out our phone services and doing it over the Internet" but as part of my research I have required any interested vendors to leave me a functioning demo of some type. Usually the demo kills the sale because I just have to many issues that I know my users will not deal with. We do large scale construction and in our business a jitter or glitch on a conference call could muck up estimating numbers and cost us millions.
At this moment I do not trust VOIP services to gamble my business productivity on it. But I would be ok utilizing an IP based phone system with dedicated phone service either through landlines or PRI. Then we would use VOIP through our T1s to connect to the other divisional offices. I have already started moving towards getting ready for an IP based phone system by converting our WAN links to voice/data links with the same provider over their MPLS network. Basically it dynamically balances voice/data on a T1 - when voice is needed it dedicates allocated bandwidth to it. So far we have been very satisfied with it. Just ditching our local phone service has already cut my phone bills in half over all my offices.
Digital-Vortex
Gawd
- Joined
- Dec 11, 2001
- Messages
- 961
I tend to agree.
My other reason for not going VoIP is that its not standard yet.
While there is Asterisk, Cisco Call Manager, Trixbox, and a whole load of protocols to run phones. There isnt really a good solid tried tested approved method of working with it all yet.
It also difficult to find info needed to know how to do the important things in like how to set it up and what each one does.
This is coming from someone who has been exposed to VoIP and recently starting dabbing in its setup. And the stutter/jitter thing is still bad, At least with phones you work on a 1 line = 1 call idea, VoIP has no restrictions so theres no stopping everyone making calls and hogging bandwidth.
Just my thoughts
My other reason for not going VoIP is that its not standard yet.
While there is Asterisk, Cisco Call Manager, Trixbox, and a whole load of protocols to run phones. There isnt really a good solid tried tested approved method of working with it all yet.
It also difficult to find info needed to know how to do the important things in like how to set it up and what each one does.
This is coming from someone who has been exposed to VoIP and recently starting dabbing in its setup. And the stutter/jitter thing is still bad, At least with phones you work on a 1 line = 1 call idea, VoIP has no restrictions so theres no stopping everyone making calls and hogging bandwidth.
Just my thoughts
Not to upset anyone, but Digital-Vortex and Bean-Dip, you're both totally wrong. If done correctly VoIP works exceptionally well in an enterprise environment. Rarely, if ever, would you actually route your calls over the Internet through a service like Vonage or BroadVoice. On the edge of the network, typically at every site, there is a voice gateway that connects to the PSTN. The VOIP traffic is completely internal to the business network and call routing is handled by the call agent, such as Cisco CallManager.
Jitter / overloading WAN links with too many calls are easily corrected. Proper network design and QoS at layers 2 and 3 along with separate voice and data VLANs easily corrects any of these issues. Call admission control can be handled by the call agent or via an H.323 Gatekeeper just to name a few solutions.
Deploying VoIP an an enterprise / business environment is not something to be setup lightly on a weekend thunderun. Extensive planning, testing, and evaluation needs to be to ensure that it is done correctly to avoid problems down the road. Exactly the same as you would approach installing a new PBX system.
badtz, to answer your question. The answer is yes, and it works very well. There are a large number of very large companies using VoIP in their enterprises. Calls can be transferred, conferenced, etc, all using voip. As mentioned before, Cisco Unified CallManager is just one of a few products.
Jitter / overloading WAN links with too many calls are easily corrected. Proper network design and QoS at layers 2 and 3 along with separate voice and data VLANs easily corrects any of these issues. Call admission control can be handled by the call agent or via an H.323 Gatekeeper just to name a few solutions.
Deploying VoIP an an enterprise / business environment is not something to be setup lightly on a weekend thunderun. Extensive planning, testing, and evaluation needs to be to ensure that it is done correctly to avoid problems down the road. Exactly the same as you would approach installing a new PBX system.
badtz, to answer your question. The answer is yes, and it works very well. There are a large number of very large companies using VoIP in their enterprises. Calls can be transferred, conferenced, etc, all using voip. As mentioned before, Cisco Unified CallManager is just one of a few products.
Digital-Vortex
Gawd
- Joined
- Dec 11, 2001
- Messages
- 961
Arch, It depends on how you look at VoIP and what you calss as VoIP.
If you mean internal VoIP then yes your right, it can be perfect and flawless both internal and external because you arre useing the same 1line 1 call ratio as a standard PBX.
However FULL VoIP with calls coming and going through an internet connection can provide the same problems that have been mentioned.
So Full VoIP is still a bit off till speeds/stability can be increased, and till we can do cross company VoIP calls for free.
But internal VoIP systems work fine and come recomended
If you mean internal VoIP then yes your right, it can be perfect and flawless both internal and external because you arre useing the same 1line 1 call ratio as a standard PBX.
However FULL VoIP with calls coming and going through an internet connection can provide the same problems that have been mentioned.
So Full VoIP is still a bit off till speeds/stability can be increased, and till we can do cross company VoIP calls for free.
But internal VoIP systems work fine and come recomended
As has been mentioned; Taking copper to the site, then VoIP from there is the way to go. As long as you control the packet path, voip is the way to go. There are no real immediate cost savings on the calls; However, you get features you just don't get with traditional pbxs. And the flexibility.
I run a few asterisk systems now. I love being able to tell people, "Sure I can do that". There is very little an asterisk system can't do, and that's simply because it's a program built on the standards, so any other software package should be as configurable.
Anyway, I could go on and on about it. The things you should keep in mind are this; If you do voip on your own network, and drop the calls out on the pstn network, you should be good to go.
I run a few asterisk systems now. I love being able to tell people, "Sure I can do that". There is very little an asterisk system can't do, and that's simply because it's a program built on the standards, so any other software package should be as configurable.
Anyway, I could go on and on about it. The things you should keep in mind are this; If you do voip on your own network, and drop the calls out on the pstn network, you should be good to go.
Digital-Vortex
Gawd
- Joined
- Dec 11, 2001
- Messages
- 961
The biggest advantage (that i love, but also like others hate) is that i can be anywhere in the world and receive my calls with the same number and no one would know. Its not as good as it could be yet owing to the fact that wireless isnt available all over the walkable world yet. But look to the future!
Or, for a business application;Digital-Vortex said:The biggest advantage (that i love, but also like others hate) is that i can be anywhere in the world and receive my calls with the same number and no one would know. Its not as good as it could be yet owing to the fact that wireless isnt available all over the walkable world yet. But look to the future!
We have a worker who had surgery earlier this month. Thanks to the voip system I have in place, I was able to set them up at home with a computer and their phone so they could still work as needed.
That worker, technically, was me. I'm in the middle of a large construction project and an even larger office move. I had to have this surgery now however, so I just brought everything home with me. Worked out really well, no one outside of the corporation even knew I was at home and on my back.
Digital-Vortex said:The biggest advantage (that i love, but also like others hate) is that i can be anywhere in the world and receive my calls with the same number and no one would know. Its not as good as it could be yet owing to the fact that wireless isn't available all over the walkable world yet. But look to the future!
This type of functionality is more for the residential VoIP solutions, aka Vonage, BroadVoice, Packet8, etc. Business VoIP is a different animal entirely. The goals of business VoIP are numerous, however I don't think global accessibility of the same number is one of those. Excluding remote-teleworkers of course.
Digital-Vortex
Gawd
- Joined
- Dec 11, 2001
- Messages
- 961
Think of it in an IT area, "Joe the tech guy is in new zeland setting up our new branch there, need to know how hes doing... anyone got his new number?" Instead they can just dial his extension and it goes right to his phone.
From a business point of view that kind of functionality is important.And like XOR said, it opens the doors to all sorts of potential a normal PBX could never give.
Hope your Ok XOR!
From a business point of view that kind of functionality is important.And like XOR said, it opens the doors to all sorts of potential a normal PBX could never give.
Hope your Ok XOR!
S
shade91
Guest
I've been running my company's Cisco VOIP (4.x) implementation for the past 3 years. It can do all of what you've listed and more. It's been rock-solid and never seen a second of downtime. I started using Asterisk at my residence (pure IP voice setup at home using BroadVoice with a POTS line for 911 calling) after seeing XOR brag about it here. I didn't think much of it until I looked further into what it was capable of doing. I use a free softclient on my desktop/laptop and a Cisco WiFi IP phone. It as well is rock-solid.
bradtz: AT&T/SBC was able to get the best price for me. They do roughly 60% Cisco's sales.
bradtz: AT&T/SBC was able to get the best price for me. They do roughly 60% Cisco's sales.
IMO the only downfall to VoIP, is the ISP's that refuse to implement QoS to prioritize the packets to get a better quality connection. My home ISP is borderline with VoIP, some calls are crystal clear, others echo/lag like I'm yelling into a cave, fast connection, good pings, but at times the pipes are clogged it goes to hell real fast.
Digital-Vortex said:
This is not 100% accurate. I do not have an indepth understanding of VOIP systems, but recently I had a chance to talk to a network guy that was replacing an older cisco router with a newer one at my office. He had the router open, so I was interested in what he was doing.
He showed me what I will referr to as the "VOIP module" that he pulled out of the back of the router. He was placing more sticks of memory (again, probably not the right term) into this module. He explained that each stick of memory can support X amount of calls (It was something like 6 calls per stick.
So in this case once you run out of "memory" you cannot place any more calls or recieve any. So at this point the memory can be your limiting factor. I have also heard that you can set the amount of bandwidth that VOIP uses, much like the way you would with a VPN tunnel.
As I said I have a very basic understandingof this. Please feel free to correct me as you see the need.
Sounds like the tech was installing more PVDM modules in an NM-HDV module. This isn't really a "voip" module per-se. Its a voice module that handles T1/E1 CAS and PRI circuits. PVDM modules are just DSPs which are used for the analog / digital conversion at the edge of the network, i.e pstn to voip or voip to pstn.
Ultimately the number of calls, out to the PSTN, depends on the type of connectivity you have. 23 for a T1, 31 for an E1. 1 for a POTS line. VoIP calls across the network, assuming no conferencing or transcoding, requires no DSPs and is not limited by the number of PVDMs installed in the NM-HDV module.
Ultimately the number of calls, out to the PSTN, depends on the type of connectivity you have. 23 for a T1, 31 for an E1. 1 for a POTS line. VoIP calls across the network, assuming no conferencing or transcoding, requires no DSPs and is not limited by the number of PVDMs installed in the NM-HDV module.