Phone Systems |
Buyer's Guide
IP Telephony
The emergence of computer
telephony has thrown another option into the mix. Although
voice over IP (VoIP), or the ability to place and receive
calls for free using the Internet, is touted as the latest
wave and looks good on paper, in practice, this next
generation technology is not all it's cracked up to be - at
least not yet.
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What are the big
selling points? The savings in long distance
charges, the ease with which you can add new
applications and extensions, and the easier
management and monitoring of the system.
The idea revolves
around the concept of melding voice, data, and video
into a single technology. Since calls utilize unused
bandwidth on the data network, voice essentially
"rides for free" on the existing network,
which sounds like a huge plus if you and your staff
make many long distance calls.
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But you also have issues such
as if the computer goes down, then what happens to your
phones? And even if everything is smooth sailing, the
downsides are still apparent in practical use. You may get
annoyed with the delay between when a word is spoken and
when it is heard - meaning a call from Boston to San
Francisco could sound more like an overseas call to
Australia, which is far from ideal for a business
environment. And just the sound quality in general sometimes
leaves much to be desired.
While there are definite
advantages to IP Telephony in an ideal world, the fact is
there are kinks that still need to be worked out.
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