VoIP or Voice over Internet Protocol is a new entrant to the telecommunications media. In VoIP your voice is transferred across a broadband Internet connection instead of the traditional public switch telephone network. You can say, o.k. fine, but why on earth should I switch from my present telephone system which is working so well to a relatively new technology called VoIP?

While considering VoIP for my use I too had the similar question. When I studied VoIP in detail, then only I could understand the technology as well as its advantages. VoIP is more efficient than your traditional phone system in many ways like:

Cost effectiveness: Low costs are the main reason for switching from traditional phone system to VoIP. You can avail all the features and benefits associated with VoIP at a low monthly fee. Depending upon your VoIP services provider you can also make free calls on some numbers. There are no associated fees for VoIP phone services as there are with traditional phone network.

Portability: VoIP has a portable system. You can use it permanently at your house, or you can travel along with it. All you need is access to a high speed broadband connection. You can choose any area code as per your convenience. This means you can choose an area code where you frequently make calls and the calls will be charged as local calls.

Flexibility: The VoIP system is highly flexible which means that it can adjust well to your personal needs. If you need more lines you can upgrade your system at low cost and vice versa.

Added Features: - Most of the added features on traditional phone networks are charged heavily. These features are charged as per your normal rates in VoIP systems. The included features can be call waiting, caller id, voicemail, call routing, tele-conferencing, and video-conferencing etc.

These are some of the reasons which compel you to switch to VoIP network from traditional phone line. So, if you want to talk freely with your kith and kin then switch to VoIP services and enjoy the pleasure of talking freely at limited costs.

VoIP Phone Service
Alen
voip-traffic.com

I don’t know about you, but I am sick and tired of being ripped off by my local phone company. For years, I have been held captive by this monopolizing regime with no hope of moving on to something better. It’s been a financial struggle that has caused me to seek counseling numerous times throughout the years. Why? Because my phone company charges me for everything: I want to add voicemail, they charge me. I call to change my number because I am getting crank calls, they charge me. I want to add call waiting, they charge me. I want to disconnect, they charge me. I’m surprised they don’t charge me when I call into a customer support.

So the question remains. Is there an affordable alternative to local phone service? The answer is yes, and it’s called VoIP, short for Voice over Internet Protocol. VoIP is an emerging technology that allows telephone calls to be transported over an existing Internet connection.

Here is how it works.

First of all, you absolutely have to have a high speed Internet connection, either DSL or Cable. Then you have to subscribe to a monthly service plan offered by a VoIP service provider. Most plans range from $20 and $30 per month, plus applicable taxes and fees.

Once you sign up for a plan, most VoIP service providers will send you a phone adapter. This is a little black box that resembles a modem. There are several connections in the back of the phone adapter. One is for your existing Internet connection, using an Ethernet cable. Another connection is for the power supply. There should also be a connection for a phone line. That’s right. Whatever phone you have at home (unless it’s a rotary phone) will work. Simply plug it into the phone adapter, wait a few seconds and you should have dial tone. Hopefully, whatever VoIP service provider you sign up with will also send installation instructions on how to set up your phone service. It’s really easy and takes about five minutes or less to get set up.

Why Choose VoIP?

This is simple question to answer. Say goodbye to the counseling bills you have accumulated over the years because you were inches away from bankruptcy. Say goodbye to all the additional charges for the features that should have already been included in your service plan. With VoIP, not only do you pay a low monthly fee for unlimited calls to the U.S. and Canada, but you also get all the features included like: voicemail, call waiting, caller ID, and three-way calling. Better yet, you get additional features that the traditional phone companies cannot even offer like voicemail to email (when someone leaves you a voicemail, the system will send you an email with an audio attachment so you can listen to the message from any computer), follow me - find me, call forwarding and the ability to choose your area code. This means that you can live in New York and have a California phone number.

What to look for in a VoIP service provider.

First and foremost, ensure that the company offers true 911 emergency calling (E911). This is vital since the FCC might shut them down if they don’t. Also, find out if they have a trial period. This is always good practice because if you don’t like their VoIP service, you can always cancel without penalty. Other things to keep in mind are the following:

1. Are they a stable company?
 2. How long have they been in business?
 3. How many customers do they have?
 4. What is their customer service like?

You can find out most of these questions by doing some preliminary research in any VoIP forums or blogs.

Hurry up and switch to VoIP!

So what are you waiting for? Make the switch to VoIP so you can start saving on your monthly phone bill and finally tell your phone company to VoIP Off!

Click here for more in-depth information about voip products and services or visit the voip blog to post your comments and suggestions. Michael Brito is an internet marketing consultant and freelance writer for a variety of consumer related products.

VoIP stands for Voice Over Internet Protocol and is the process of placing a voice call over the Internet using Internet Protocol (IP) Packets. Packets are bits of data that are passed, or routed, from node to node, until they are received by the final digital device (node). The final Node then turns the packet of information back into an analog voice stream that can be heard over a regular telephone.

While both types of phone service, VoIP and Plain Old Telephone Service (POTS), rely on switching the telephone call through the quickest connection. The POTS telephone call creates a static, dedicated connection, traveling over the same exact route in both directions. This connection stays open until the callers break the connection. The packet switched phone call over the VoIP system actually contains the complete destination address of where it is going, and each packet can take different routes and different amounts of time to reach their destination.

To make a VoIP telephone call, the user has to have two things, a high-speed Internet connection (256kbs or higher) and a broadband telephone adapter. The telephone adapter plugs into the users existing system, either directly into the modem, or into a router. Many of the new broadband phone adapters have a router built into them, so that the user just plugs it directly into their high-speed modem and they can then plug their computer or router into the broadband phone adapter.

In most situations, it is best to have the router built into the broadband phone adaptor, so that if the user is making a telephone call and on the computer at the same time, the router knows to give most of the bandwidth to the phone call, thereby reduce lag time and the frequency of dropped calls. While the new VoIP phone systems are a hundred times better that the ones seen just two or three years ago, they can still drop calls when confronted with a slowdown in the network between the caller and the person receiving the call.

So, while the new VoIP can save the average user a lot of money, VoIP telephone service is still only practical for home and small business users, since the stability isn’t there that is required by large business ventures. Anyone who is thinking of switching to VoIP should remember that anytime their Internet service goes down, so does their phone service.

For more information on VoIP phone service is available at http://computer.howstuffworks.com/ip-telephony.htm and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VOIP_Phones.

To see a complete list of VoIP Phone companies and what they charge for service in the United States, visit http://www.calling-plans.com/broadband-phone.html.

Greg Anliker
http://www.calling-plans.com

Over the years I have had many, many disagreements and punch-ups with telephone companies and their agents. Admittedly, I am quite fanatical about Customer Service and when I pay for a product or service, I expect suppliers to try their hardest to deliver what they’ve promised.

At the risk of starting a Race War, and perhaps my own extradition, I suggest that the general standard of customer service in this country is decidedly average. A while ago it was the done thing for a company to display copies of their Mission Statement all over the place. The tone of the statement would generally indicate how much the company and staff appreciated their customers. At first I was delighted that companies would go to the trouble of producing these good-news documents. Alas, I found that in many cases they were merely paying lip-service to the concept.

Maybe my expectations are too high, but in fairness, I try my damnedest to give top-class service when I am the provider, so when I’m paying the tab, why should I settle for anything less? Anyway, rightly or wrongly, my past dealings with them have left me with a bad taste in my mouth. So when I hear of a chance to save a few quid on my phone bills, I’m there with “bells on.”

Before I started looking into VoIP, my phone conversations had been handset to handset. I have friends and family in the UK and some contacts in the US and New Zealand, and the procedure usually went something like this: - I’d dial the appropriate number, talk to whoever answered for a few minutes; they’d then pass the handset to whoever else was available and I’d ‘do the rounds’. Of course, where there was a second handset available, three-way or even 4-way conversations were possible.

One of the cute things that VoIP has enabled me to do has been to set up conference calls; recently I took part in a training seminar with over 90 people on the call. They hailed from Canada, UK, Mexico, USA, Alaska, Jordan and Germany and God knows where else.

Now I know that phone companies offer conference call facilities using just the telephone, but with VoIP, conversation is just the beginning. In my training room I can run Powerpoint presentations, use a whiteboard, swap files instantaneously and play videos. I can even share my desktop; in other words, I can open any file on my computer with the flick of a switch, it can be seen by everyone else on the call. Similarly, if they are having a problem on their computer, with their permission, I can access their machine and correct the problem for them.

If you think this technology is just a “flash in the pan”, consider this. SKYPE, one of the earliest suppliers of VoIP, was recently purchased by Ebay for a staggering $4,100,000,000.

Of course, the real challenge is in finding an economical way to gain access to this technology. A search for “VoIP” on Google will return “about 294,000,000 results”. And of course, in case Uncle Bill should miss the boat, Microsoft has its version now available. It’s called Live Meeting, and judging by the hefty price tag, seems to be targeting the corporate world.

I’d like to finish by offering a word of caution to smaller players, especially exporters who can see the potential in VoIP. The old adage about “getting what you pay for” just isn’t true in this business. Some companies have a fixed monthly charge; some base their charges on time used; some base their price on the number of people on the call.

So, for those who remember Hill St Blues; “Let’s be careful out there.”

Regards,
Tom

Over the past 6 years I have been watching the growth of the Internet Based Telephone Industry. With the bursting popularity of Broadband or High Speed Internet like DSL, Cable Modem, or Satellite, telephone service has become a natural addition of applications to run over the Internet.

Many people are not aware that most of the major telephone companies use the Internet to route their long distance calls already and have been for years. They use a protocol called SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) to offer Voice Over IP (VoIP). This same protocol is available in many of the leading messaging programs like Skype, MSN, AOL, etc … For many years people have been using this protocol to talk over long distances on their computers using programs called “Softphones”. Softphones are basically computer programs that run on computers and use the sound card in a computer to convert analogue sound, like a voice, to digital packets that can be carried over the Internet. Then some program or device on the other end can decode the packets and play them back. Of course it goes in both directions. Thus you can use it like a telephone.

This same softphone technology is being embedded in small devices called Analog Telephone Adapters or ATAs. These devices have really become popular in the past few years and the quality of the devices have greatly increased. ATAs basically connect to a normal telephone in your house on one side and to the internet on the other. The ATA acts as a gateway translating the sound from the telephone into SIP that goes over the internet and eventually to the phone system where it is decoded and passed on to regular telephones.

Many companies over the past 5 years have tried to make a business plan using ATA devices. The most popular is Vonage. Vonage has spent literally 10s of millions of dollars on advertising and have established a good market. Their latest adds say they are a million customers strong. I can remember when they were just in a few local markets. Many companies have followed their lead like USP Connect, Packet8, Sun Rocket, etc … All these companies have worked out agreements with national and international carriers like ATT, MCI, WorldCom, etc… to pass to them SIP traffic and vice versa. This allows them to offer full residential telephone service over the Internet. The dirty little secret that telephone companies will not tell you is that, it is whole lot cheaper to route with SIP than normal analogue phone systems. Therefore, since these new companies do not have to pay for copper telephone wire in the ground like most telephone companies, or for big analogue based switches, their prices are a lot cheaper. Also, Internet based telephone systems are not taxed like local telephone companies. It is not uncommon to get telephone service from $9.99 for 500 minutes a month to $24.99 for unlimited long distance and local calls. You may have to pay a federal excise tax of $2.00 or so, but not all of the crazy taxes and fees like a company like Qwest would charge. It is impossible to understand the bill most of time with Qwest. Qwest, Verizon, SBC, Sprint and other local traditional telephone companies can charge more than $20 a month in taxes and fees. They advertise a $20.00 a month special but then add $20.00 in taxes and fees which are never explained to you. They also have a nasty habit of selling your telephone numbers to telemarketers that inundate you until you can get on the National Do Not Call List. On top of that they will charge you extra for Long Distance. I am always amazed the way people are brainwashed to think they are getting a good deal at $20.00 a month when in reality it is more like $55-$75 a month with taxes, fees, and extra packages.

The other thing you get with SIP based phones are all the new bells and whistles like Call Waiting, Call Forwarding, Voice Mail, and 3 Way calling without additional cost. It is just included in their base packages. International calls are also significantly less expensive as well. It is not uncommon to be able to call Asia for 2 or 3 cents a minute or Europe of 1.5 cents a minute.

Additionally, now it is possible to take an ATA anywhere in the world and call another ATA anywhere in the world on the same network for no long distance cost at all. All you need is a high speed internet access and just plug it in and connect it to a phone. You can get your local calls anywhere. You also can have virtual telephone numbers anywhere. If you live in one state, but would like people in another area to call you at no charge or with a local call, you can get a telephone number from that area and have it virtually routed to you ATA where ever you are. So you can have numbers in CA, NY, FL and WY all ringing the same ATA. You can get virtual 800 numbers. Never have anyone call you collect again. Give you children an 800 number to call you from college or from a payphones where ever they may be. This is really an exciting industry and growing quickly.

Now there are some Cons to this type service. If the power goes out, the ATA turns off. So does your TV, refrigerator, air conditioner and all of your cordless phones in the house anyway. However, since you are not connecting to a computer, it can break without any repercussion on your service. The use of 911 is becoming more available with the advent of E911. Congress has mandated that all VoIP providers now support E911 that acts the same as regular 911. However there are some older areas in the world that are not equipped to receive E911 so the best the provider can do is give you the general emergency assistance number there. If you live in areas like this, use a cell phone for emergencies or keep a local land line for emergencies and dial long distance over SIP. It will still save you hundreds of dollars a year. You also may need a little assistance setting it up if you are technically challenged. However, be rest assured it is a one time setup of plugging the right wires where they go and you are off and going. So don’t be scared if you are over 60 years old. Your generation can benefit too from this technology.

The best thing is that this industry is very competitive. Because of the low cost of the service, companies can do some attractive marketing plans. I personally use USPConnect because they offer a very aggressive referral program and have a very high quality of service. If you would like more information go to www.Free4LifeCalls.com.

So don’t believe the hit pieces placed by local telephone companies bashing VoIP based phones. They are running scared. It is becoming very apparent that in the future traditional telephone service will become obsolete. They are all moving to VoIP, so you should too and take advantage of the great savings! I personally believe that telephone service should be free and I can use the money I save to go golfing or something.

This ain’t your Daddy’s old land line Telco anymore! Times are a changin’.

Wilford Lee
Technology Consultant
http://www.Free4LifeCalls.com