Why My Business Chose VOIP

My world got smaller, my business grew five times over, and I got talking

I’m a web designer and I work wacky hours, push buttons on a computer, talk to a lot of people, send out email, drink coffee, like the Discovery Channel and enjoy running my own business. My business consists of working with people, helping businesses out, generating ideas, communicating with others, creating reports, talking to people. Sometime I talk about business, sometimes about the internet and sometimes I talk about nothing. If you catch me in an espresso moment, you’ll probably want to stop talking to me after a while.

My business has clients that are everywhere in the world. My clients need me at all hours at times, hence the cappuccino moments. My clients want things done yesterday. My clients like good work, good communication, and good results. My clients can be demanding, abrasive or reactive. I put out fires to keep my clients happy, its part of my business. Sometimes my clients can’t wait for me to call and sometimes I can’t wait to not talk to them at all. My business relies on me being in touch with my clients. These days, who do you know that does not need to be in touch with someone out there?

At the end of the day, I need to keep in touch with my business customers, because if I don’t, I won’t see any steak or cake next month.

I have a cell phone, a computer, a scanner, a printer, a telephone, a pda, a new iPod, a digital camera, some speakers, headphones, a wireless mouse and various other gadgets to keep my life simple and keep my business running smoothly. Little did I know that there is this something new out there called VOIP. Voice over Internet Protocol. Sounds high tech huh?

With all the phones, cell phones, internet phones, pagers and everything that is out there to communicate with, why would I now need VOIP?

Do I really need another device on top of another device? Do I really need to figure out how to use another gadget? Do I need to download more software to my computer? What all do I have to buy now? I pride myself in being up to date and with the times and on top of all that is new out there, but this thing surprised me, because it’s been out there already for a while. The more I looked in to it, the more I found there to be people subscribing to this technology of getting free, or shall we call it, unlimited long distance. I’ll explain more about the technical parts of the technology a bit later.

Here’s my most recent scenario of why I chose to even consider VOIP.

I recently moved to a community where for some reason I am out of the local calling area for the district that I live in. That’s not exciting when all my clients live in the city and now it costs me money to make a simple phone call. Long distance during the day is not cheap yet. So I decided to look at my options.

Do I use my cell phone and make long distance calls? If I did that, I run the risk of using up my valuable daytime minutes. It turns out, long distance on some cell phone plans are almost double the rate the normal landline rates. I can just see my bills now running close to a thousand a month.

Second option was email to stay in touch with everyone. Email is great, but when you need that answer right away or a simple yes or no, somehow it just did not work out for me. I’d heard the common feedback, “Sorry, I was away from the computer”, “My computer has a virus”, “What email?” Don’t get me wrong, I rely on email daily, but for some matters it just was not there for that instant touch.

I called the phone company and they gave me a few options. Would add a bit extra on to the phone bill, but I was limited to time and to when I would be able to make call. Sure I can make call during the day, but guess what, climb that money tree and shake some more coins out of it.

I tried downloading some of these free long distance internet software applications. Worked fine, but to have free calls, others would wither have to have the same software and they would need to be in front of their computers. Remember, their computer is still in the shop and they are away from it most of the time. Don’t get me wrong, for some people, these systems work great and productivity is greatly increased. My issue was I could not get everyone I wanted on board to download the software without me having to troubleshoot and guide through the usage.

Then I talked to a friend and she told me about the service she was using for all her long distance needs. Somehow I do recall her calling me from Toronto and us talking forever about nothing. Then the following week she called me from New York and we talked again. I began to wonder what her phone bill was like every month. So I asked her.

It turns out she was and still is paying a flat rate per month and gets unlimited long distance calling anywhere in North America.

What? Run that by me again? Unlimited, there’s no such thing as unlimited. There has to be limits. Even on some of these advertised cell phone plans where they tell you that it is unlimited, if you read the fine print, somewhere in there it says you are limited to ten thousand something or another.

I asked her for more information. She basically told me that she signed up with this company, they sent her an adapter, she plugs any home phone in to it, plugs the adapter in to the internet and starts calling. That’s it. Any software downloads? Anybody else to call to set it up? Turns out, she simply went online, chose the package the wanted, the unlimited one of course, selected her phone number and within days had her phone adapter arrive in the mail. After that, wherever she traveled to, she would take the adapter with her, plug it in to the internet and start making calls. Best of all, people would call her on her local number and no matter where she was in North America, she would be able to take the call. If the was away from her phone, voicemail would kick in. If she decided she wanted to go mobile, she would call forward the calls to her mobile.

I called her a couple of times on her local number and instead of asking where she was in the city; I’d have to ask where she was in the country right now. Quality of the call was the same all the time. Unlimited means unlimited. Does not limit you to the city you are in, does not limit you to how many minutes you want to talk. Does not limit you from what device you want to talk from. That’s this new thing called VOIP.

When she told me the price she was paying per month, I was immediately on the computer looking up the website and signing up. Obviously I ended up taking the unlimited plan for only $15 a month. This I had to try out.

So I go on with my day. I go on with my next day. Pushing buttons, sending emails, making calls when all of a sudden the mail dude finds my doorbell.

The package arrives.

The unlimited phone deal thing arrives. My answer arrives. The box arrives. The box with the thing inside arrives. You get the point.

Now what?

Eagerly I open the box only to find a small silver device within it. It’s called the Sipura! Exciting.

I see it has some places where I can connect things to, so being the type of person that does not read manuals, I start plugging things in. One connection is obviously to my high speed internet connection. Another connection looks like a phone connection. Last one would be the power to give it juice. Done.

Now what?

I look around the box looking for software, but see none. Something is wrong. Now I dig out the manual and look to see what I do next. Apparently nothing, start making calls. Ok, this is way too simple. I pick up my phone receiver and hear a dial tone. Now, I could get in to what that meant to me and how it made me feel, but we won’t go in to that right now. I call my friend only to find I have a connection and I can communicate. It’s that simple. I call another friend who is 3 hours in a different time zone, works just perfect. I more people and my working day is now corrupted calling friends and family with whom I haven’t talked to in ages. Another new wonder in my life.

What I did find out after the fact was that I also had all these cool features included in the price of my plan. Voicemail, caller ID, call forwarding, 3 way calling and more. Yikes, I would be paying how much extra with the phone or cellular companies just to have them. When you do you research, you find that most, if not all, VOIP service providers have these features included in their plans. Another benefit and star for VOIP.

Something I did like right away was that the adapter is about the size of my wallet. I can easily stow it away in my laptop bag and take it with me wherever I go out of town and still make call without paying long distance – day or night.

On to the technical part … we’ll keep this brief.

VOIP is short for Voice over Internet Protocol. Some companies will call this technology broadband phone service, digital phone service, voice over IP, internet phone service and other variations on this name. Basically what it means is that is allows you to send and receive audio, such as your voice, back and forth over the Internet. IP is the acronym for Internet Protocol and is the standard for sending and receiving information over the Net. The adapter that you receive from you VOIP company in most cases is called the ATA adapter (Analog Telephone Adapter) and this will convert your analog audio signal (which is your great voice) and to a digital signal so that it can be transmitted via the internet. By doing this, you are bypassing the local telephone company and making and receiving call over the internet. Hence the name Voice over IP. For most providers, it’s as simple as taking the ATA adapter out of the box, plugging your phone in to the device and start making phone calls. There are also IP phones which are dedicated VOIP telephones. Instead of having the standard RJ-11 connections, they have a RJ-45 Ethernet connection. Once again, take the phone, plug it in and off you go.

Where to get this voip unlimited long distance service?

There are a number of voip providers out there from offering various services, deals and promotions. Explore your options, determine your needs, and ask questions.

At the end of the day, I ended up getting a few of my friends and clients signed up with VOIP. They’re happy, especially when some of them opted for the service provider that offered 2 months free unlimited plans.

Anyways, it’s getting late here and I should be off to bed. Then again, someone out in New York is just getting up and really deserves an early morning call from me to let them know I’m thinking of them.

Article written by Michael Anthony Jones who manages various websites, one of them being http://voip.shopbuydeals.com/ deals on VOIP products and services.

Shop VOIP ShopBuyDeals for current deals on Voice over IP services.

Next Gen Mobile Broadband Will Be Stiff Competition for Fixed Line, Says Report

Mobile broadband is set to catch up with its fixed-line counterpart; and there will come a time soon when it could even surpass it, according to a new report.

Analyst firm Frost & Sullivan’s catchily titled “European Mobile Broadband Melee between 3G LTE and Mobile WiMAX” report predicts there will be around 22.4 million 3G LTE subscribers by 2013. Users are already downloading six to fourteen times more data across mobile broadband networks now than they were a year ago, while average users are said to be downloading in excess of 5GB per month – which is also set to rise.

The company suggests the advent of the next generation of mobile broadband – and here the analysts are not picking sides between LTE and the alternative solution WiMAX – will eventually lead operators to move to an ‘open’ access, where any device can connect to any network, rather than just being able to use the one network, as we see at the moment.

However, Frost & Sullivan join the chorus of those suggesting mobile broadband pricing structures need to change. Luke Thomas, programme manager at Frost & Sullivan, said: “Rather than providing flat-fee unlimited contracts or traffic data download caps for 3G LTE and Mobile WiMAX, operators need to be more innovative with their pricing strategies to differentiate themselves from the competition but, at the same time, ensure that it is not too complicated or non-transparent for the user to understand”. For all the information you need on mobile broadband, take a look at Mobile Broadband Genie; it offers information, articles comparisons and advice on all that’s new in mobile broadband such as the latest pay as you go mobile internet deals.

He went on: “Furthermore, operators need to put in place effective management tools to manage traffic using quality-of-service policies, prioritised access and flow-based processing.”

US Wireless Service Providers to Pay Spectrum Licence Fee

The United States is currently facing a budget deficit of around $1.7 trillion, and President Obama and his administration have decided to rectify the situation through a host of measures, including an additional spectrum license fee to be charged from mobile broadband service providers.

Earlier, when the US Stimulus Bill was passed, the mobile industry had received a grant of a whopping $7.2 billion, so that broadband services could be made available even in the rural areas. This move has direct benefits for the broadband providers as their infrastructure expansion will be funded by the federal government. However, after the announcement of the spectrum fee, a strong opposition is expected from the influential mobile industry in the US, as they would see this move as the government paying through one channel and charging through the other. The fee is in addition to the licence charge that mobile operators had paid earlier at the time of spectrum auction.

As spectrum available for auction is scarce now in the US, the government seems to have no other option, and the only constant flow of income that the government can expect from the use of spectrum is the new fee. It is expected that the proposed plan could play a significant role in reducing the wide gap between the government’s expenditure and earning.

In spring, the government’s complete budget plan will be released, and more details of this proposal are expected to come along with it, but before implementation, a good deal of resistance can be expected from the mobile industry against the new move.

Uncover Good value Broad-band Offers for your Apartment

Broad band might well loosely be defined as eye-opening high-speed net & has all but taken over from slow dial-up wordlwide web access. old fashion dial- up internet connections, which are the very first web connections to supply accommodations with worldwide web access through a dial up modem, use all of the available telephone line and usually run at only 56 kilobits per second. Broadband technology, that uses ADSL (Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line) technology through conventional copper telephone lines, is capable to provide at least twice over that dial up modem speed which is brilliant and as if that wasn’t enough it will traditionally not trigger any trouble to the phone line. Find fantastic broadband deals with compare broadband

Quick broadband has become increasingly cheap and very accessible over the past 5 years or so and 2 now regularly used by the majority of apartment net users in the Great British Isle. There are a enormous number of www providers who suggest broad band services, every supplying several priced promotions with types of benefits. One of the main current focus points for Fast broadband is its speed with people nowadays becoming ever more concerned in buying the best ever connection available as online games, music and videos become more and more preferred & widely possible on the www. The speed of a broadband internet connection depends entirely on a number of things, the most vital being how near the home is the to the nearest telephone exchange box & the quality of the copper cable between the box and the home.

One of the ways Super quick broad-band dial up modem speed can be hugely improved is with the use of fibre optic cables, 2 do not suffer from speed reduction over large distances. Many other countries in the entire world have large distances. fibre optic networks & some, like Japan and South Korea, are bringing in Fast broadband speeds of up to 100mbps all this is really fantastic. The United Kingdom. is keen to bring itself in line with all these countries & you may be thrilled to know that British Telecom recently released plans to lay a considerable fibre optic network throughout the entire country at a cost of 1.5 billion pounds, reaching up to 10 million flats by 2012 & providing top speeds of up to 100mbps in a lot of locations, with an average of 40-50mbps.

VoIP Problems?

Well of course there’s VoIP problems, although I think problems is too strong of a word. Instead I would call this VoIP issues. (Just semantics? maybe, read on!)

Some may be old enough to remember making long distance calls where there was static or crackling on the phone line connection. Maybe you remember having to speak LOUDER in order to be heard on the line. Was that a problem? Maybe to you it was but to the companies providing the service, it was a merely a technical issue that needed to be addressed. The issue was addressed and resolved. Now you expect this high quality service right?

Ok, what about cellular phones? Maybe you’re old enough to remember when calls were dropped or barely audible. Maybe you
remember lugging around those heavy phones. This was a time when a cellular phone was just that, a phone! Was this a problem?
Maybe to you it was but to the companies providing the service, it was merely a technical issue that needed to be addressed.
The issue was addressed and resolved. Now? Well, there’s not too many cellular phones that are ‘just’ phones. You can surf the internet with them, take pictures, record short video clips, change the ringers, store your address and phone numbers, etc.

For both these ‘problems’ above, it was a relatively short time frame between ‘issue’ and resolution. We can draw comparison
after comparison between technology and technology issues. I could start talking about echo cancellers, VoIP gateways,
multiplexors, etc. and the current circuitry vs. the research and new circuitry on it’s way, but that’s not the point of this
article. The point is simply that ‘yes’ there are issues with VoIP but also, ‘yes’ issues are to be expected and ‘yes’ issues
will be resolved.

Some of the most common quality issues are echo and delay. I myself use VoIP over my residential broadband connection and
frankly I think it’s just fine. I like the service and quality of calls, but yes, at times, the echo and delay can be annoying. This is usually infrequent and not worth me canceling my service. The point I’m trying to make here is that, for me, it’s acceptable. Why? Because I understand that this is ‘relatively’ new. I understand that equipment manufactures are building better technology to address these issues. I understand that the popularity of VoIP will expedite the issue resolution. I’ve worked in information technology for over 20 years now and certainly understand this progression in technology.

Other issues are in the E911 service and of course there’s issues with most residential DSL subscribers. Both these issues are directly with the existing phone companies. The FCC is already involved in both these cases and I believe it will be sooner rather than later for these to be resolved as well.

I for one do have E911 service and I am not a DSL subscriber. So E911 for me is a non-issue and using cable access eliminates
having to keep my local telephone company for my primary phone service.

The bottom line, for me, is the cost savings. The cost savings over shadows the occasional echo and delay. E911 has already
made its way into my area and using cable internet access removes my dependency on the local telephone company.

VoIP can be a great way for you to save money on your phone service, but don’t go into this blindly. Most consumers are
intelligent enough to understand the progression that occurs with any technology. It’s pretty good as it is and yes I would agree it needs to be better. I also know, heck I’m confident that the quality of service will continue to improve.

So what’s the bottom line? Go for it. Find a service that will provide you with a free trial period. Take it for a test drive, kick the tires, etc. The higher your existing monthly phone bill is, the sooner you should try out this service.

It’s ok to demand perfection, but perfection takes time. Change is hard and change takes time. Change is upon us and VoIP, in
my humble opinion is here to stay. Give it a try, be realistic. Get the information, get your quote, get your free trial period, you really have nothing to loose and quite possibly money to save!

Provided by the http://www.FullService Broadband provider. Our free service is possible through Try Right Technology, Inc. We provide unbiased and informative information on broadband and communication products and services.

You can get a Free Line Rental Deal

Free line rental deals are a fairly new type of contract and are therefore not properly understood by the general public. 12 month free line rental packages remain the hidden gem above all the packages being offered currently.

In principle a 12 month free line rental contract wont cost anything to run. That assumes the consumer is rigorous in making their request for for 100% cashback. This is not quite as simple as customers are lead to think as mobile phone sellers stick in a lot of sneaky tricks in the fine print of free line rental deals so they can cut back on the amount of successful customers.

A free line rental phone contract is a type of one hundred percent cashback contract. This means you must remember to pay the bill as normal for the initial months. At a later date in the mobile deal you are allowed to to clam your money of the mobile cell phone back from the company who offered you the mobile cell phone.

The most serious problem of free line rental deals is that if the worst happens and the retailer stop trading you will be unable to get your money back. 12 month free is unnavoidably going to be a trade off, due to the fact they are only available on cheaper handsets.

Despite the complicated nature of free line rental contracts they are absolutely genuine and customers are able to get a 100% free mobile cell phone for 12 months.

By far the most competitive way to purchase a free line rental phone contract is over the web. As free line rental packages are somewhat obscure product it makes sense to find a good a mobile phone comparison site to see the best packages at that given moment.

Are you confused by wireless networking?

According to polls from YouGov the majority of UK consumers are equipped with wireless residential networks. The survey, which enlisted over 2,000 subscribers, found that 59 percent of people have networks in place. Of those people, over 87 percent had set up a wireless system which was used for connection on PCs and laptops. 20 percent employed these networks for use with game consoles, such as Playstation 3 and Xbox 360.

Even with this significant amount of network owners, it seems that many users do not understand how to set them up or utilize the facility. Wireless networking has established itself as an accepted communications platform, and needs to be catered to all users, rather that merely those who are tech savvy. Many consumers are not all that interested in complex technology, but would like to be capable of network application. The facility of mobile broadband networks should be readily accessible to all, not only sophisticated users.

Of surveys conducted among network holders, it was shown that 69 percent owned their own digital media player. Many even acknowledged their familiarity with broadband technology. Accordingly, studies show that wireless broadband users are more technologically aware, in comparison to users who remain with noncomplex technologies.