VOIP, or voice over internet protocol, has already changed the way that many Americans communicate with friends and loved ones. With VOIP it became possible to make seemingly regular phone calls – even long distance phone calls that would have cost a fortune with regular phone services, for free.
In today’s world, with the current state of the economy, everyone is looking for ways to cut their costs of living and to save money in any way possible. Eliminating high phone bills all together would be a tremendous way to save money, but there was one problem with using VOIP that severely limited its value in its original state – the user had to be close to a computer to use it.
People today have grown accustomed to portability, almost everything that we communicate on these days is portable – cordless phones and cell phone let us communicate with friends and loved ones no matter where we are or what we are doing, so it was almost like taking a step backward in terms of convenience in order to save some money.
Saving the money on all phone calls is great, but are people really willing to give up the portability of their cordless phones and cell phones to save the money – sure the VOIP would be good for calls if you new you were going to be just sitting and chatting for a while, but not being able to move about while conversing is a pretty big inconvenience for saving some money.
Enter the WiFi VOIP phone
Looking to advance the technology even further and to make VOIP a serious threat as an alternative to traditional phone service, manufacturers began to look in a similar direction to wireless modems for VOIP to operate on. The WiFi VOIP phone will allow users the same convenience and portability that they enjoy with a wireless internet connection in their homes. What this does is to give the user the same portability with their VOIP service in their homes that they would have with a regular cordless phone. With a WiFi VOIP phone, the user honestly won’t even be able to notice a difference in a switch over from the phone that they had been using to make all of their home phone calls – in fact the only difference there will be will occur in the absence of a bill from the phone company.
The Future
As technology improves and further advancements are made, there is almost no limit to what users will be able to accomplish with a WiFi VOIP phone. As more and more cities begin to adopt city-wide wireless networks, which residents can pay a monthly fee to have access to, there is a strong potential that VOIP technology will allow users to all but replace their cell phones with VOIP phones. Users would pay the monthly fee to have access to the wireless network which would cover their regular internet access, but also give them city wide access to the network on their portable VOIP phones.
What this would mean for end users who use their cell phones for nothing more than connecting with friends, family and associates is that they could effectively eliminate those cell phones and the bills that come along with them. So what we could see in the future of VOIP could conceivably be a device that would very effectively allow end users to do away with their home phone service as well as their cell phone service and allow them to do all of the connecting that they need to (local and long distance, day and night) without spending a penny more than they would already be spending for a wireless internet connection.
By: Amy Nutt
Posts Tagged ‘Traditional Phone Service’
The Present and Future of WiFi VOIP Phone Technology
December 5th, 2009VoIP Tutorial – Understanding VoIP
October 20th, 2009
VoIP is fast becoming the replacement technology for voice communication. However many people still have questions as to how it works? VoIP costs less than your traditional phone service, this is what makes it attractive to most consumers. Not only does it cost less than your traditional phone service it also costs less than the vast majority of monthly cell phone plans.
The number of VoIP providers is increasing giving you more choices and better calling plans. VoIP is still at its developmental stage. The VoIP service is available for both commercial and residential use, ranging from PC-to-PC service, all the way up to phone-to-phone. The following are the basic features of VoIP.
Anybody with an internet connection has the basic capability to use a VoIP service and benefit from the cost savings associated with VoIP. A basic plan that offers a number of long-distance minutes is very inexpensive and if that’s what you need then VoIP will work perfectly for you.
VOIP is a method which takes voice phone calls and then encodes them digitally. Basically VoIP is the protocol that is used to send your voice over the internet. The VoIP technology transmits your voice over what is called an IP network.
Most everyone agrees that VoIP is the future of voice and data communications.. By the looks of it VoIP is going to continue to grow and expand. VoIP is the Wave of the Future–”and the Present. Although you may be intimidated by this new technology at present, my advice would be to learn more about this new service as it seems this technology is here to stay.
By: Paul Hegarty
VOIP Considerations
October 14th, 2009
Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIP) is changing the way that we look at phone service. The relatively new technology is quickly becoming the norm in many homes across the world. But a variety of VOIP considerations should be explored before you take advantage of the technology.
It allows a caller to make long distance calls without having to pay much, or anything for them. Combine the VOIP technology with a broadband, or high speed, internet access line, and VOIP provides an easy, inexpensive way to make phone calls all over the world. However, there are still some disadvantages of VOIP – especially when it comes to using the technology for functions beyond the one caller to one caller scenario.
VOIP considerations for you to examine start with understanding how the technology works in comparison with traditional phone service. With traditional phone service, your long distance phone calls are routed from your local provider’s network to your chosen long distance provider’s network, where it is routed to the receiving party’s local phone provider’s network and finally, to their home phone line. Since multiple providers are involved, multiple providers charged a fee for the call, which the long distance provider passed on to you in the form of an often hefty per-minute charge.
But VOIP has changed all of that. It removes the long distance company from the equation, making a long distance phone call virtually the same as a local phone call. How? By using the internet as the routing method that passes the call from your local phone provider to your receiving party’s local phone provider. You initiate the call, and your analog voice signal is translated into a digital signal. That signal is then sent via your internet service to the internet, where it is routed to the receiving party’s local phone provider’s network, translated back into an analog signal and sent to the receiving party’s phone.
The disadvantages of VOIP should be part of what you understand regarding VOIP considerations, but they are relatively limited for the average consumer. The main complaints regarding VOIP have to do with providing the level of quality of service that customers are accustomed to with regular telephone technology.
The reason for this is multifold. VOIP requires a large amount of data to be compressed and transmitted, then uncompressed and delivered, all in a relatively small amount of time. Problems develop in VOIP conversations when this process takes too long and the callers experience one of two problems; echo or over-talk.
For businesses, VOIP considerations have more to do with how to manage the traffic over their network. Since they may be using their bandwidth for internet and even voice conferencing, they will need to analyze the amount of bandwidth that is necessary to handle all of their activities.
But for the average consumer, the greatest advantage of VOIP is the cost – or rather, the lack of cost. If you have a computer with a sound card, modem, speakers, a microphone and a (preferably) high speed connection, and you download software from companies such as skype.com, you can be making free long distance and international phone calls using VOIP in as little as 5 minutes.
By: Van Theodorou
