[Asterisk-Users] InfoWeek Article on VOIP

[Michael Graves]

On Sat, 16 Jul 2005 10:10:29 -0700, Bruce Ferrell wrote:

>Michael Graves wrote:
>> Here's t
>> link:
>> 
>> http://www.informationweek.com/story/showArticle.jhtml;jsessionid=JUEFVG
>> ENEA01YQSNDBCCKH0CJUMEKJVN?articleID=165702588
>> 
>> The bottom line is that they compare retail VOIP providers like Comcast
>> Cable, Time-Warner Cable, AT&T, Vonage, Packet8 et al. Their
>> methodology seems sound. Their conclusion is that retail VOIP services
>> don't yet match the PSTN for reliability & call quality.
>> 
>> It is interesting that all of these retail providers use ATA type
>> devices. I wonder how some of the stronger true ITSPs like Level3 or
>> even Nufone, VOIPJet, etc would fare, especially with an all digital
>> scheme...ie hard IP phones.
>> 
>> My own sense is that my IP base calls are cleaner than my SBC lines. I
>> accept that they're less reliable, but much of that I attribute to the
>> fact that I'm no Linux guru and I use a retail DSL line as my IP
>> access.
>> 
>> Michael Graves
>> 
>
>How do you see an ATA as different from and IP hardphone?  As far as I 
>can tell having the phone and ATA integrated isn't all THAT desirable, 
>but that's me, I like to be able to choose the features on my phone and 
>be able to connect it to the net... But that's just me.

I have personally used Cisco ATAs, Sipura-2000s and 3000s. When I begin
investigating switching to IP phones I tried Pingtel, Grandstream,
Zultys, Snom and Polycom. To be fair I used each one for a couple of
months, often as my primary desk phone if it looked like the device
would cut it. I settled on Polycom 600s and 500s for my home office. I
only have 5 phones.

As someone who works from a home office professionally I feel that the
call quality, multi-line capability and availability of serious
business features are important. For a while , before I had a
production * server, I had a pair of Sipura units connected to a 4 line
Panasonic KSU system. The Polycom's simply sounded best, feel best in
the hand, and have the on-board tools that I use daily. ATAs just don't
go that far for me. 

I don't see it as having the phone and the ATA integrated. It's a SIP
phone. Asterisk sees it as something slightly different than an ATA. I
may have multiple registrations, of which several may be in use at
once. It supports simple SMS stlye messaging. Heck the IP600 even has a
micro-browser built into it, although I've not used this yet myself.

I agree with others who have chimed in that IP-to-IP calls can sound
better than PSTN calls. I have a co-worker who has a SipGate account in
the UK. Calls to him via SipGate go out through my FreeWorldDialup
account. They sound great. So good that in silent moments we often
think that we've been severed, even with no silence suppression on the
line. 

It really would be great to have a truly wideband codec available
within Asterisk. I recall reading that the wideband version of iLBC is
not released under GPL. Anyone know more about this?

Michael
--
Michael Graves                           mgraves at pixelpower.com
Sr. Product Specialist                          www.pixelpower.com
Pixel Power Inc.                                 mgraves at mstvp.com

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