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Network Infrastructure Magazine | Tuesday, October 27, 2020
Implementation of a business-class voice over IP (VoIP) system represents a substantial project and lots of changes to how the employees are doing their work.
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Fremont, CA: The employees will have to adjust to a new way of doing things that is never easy, and a company’s IT department will have to focus its efforts on new management and troubleshooting tasks. Whether they are changing to VoIP or is already running a VoIP-ready network, getting the best performance needs planning, active management, and monitoring.
While there are many different kinds of VoIP networks and providers available, and also a vast number of platform solutions, such as AT&T Collaborate, Intermedia Unite, and RingCentral Office, there are still some common factors that all VoIP providers share.
[vendor_logo_first]Validate the network architecture- Ensure that the network infrastructure will work with the chosen VoIP system, and be prepared to make the changes, possibly significant ones, to see the best performance. Not every switch, router, firewall, or security appliance will function with all VoIP providers. Sometimes they might need to reconfigure or update a device, but it’s not uncommon to find that VoIP software won’t work unless they swap out some hardware.
Plan the handset deployment- Check to see if a company’s physical infrastructure will support their VoIP plans. While a few VoIP phones will let them daisy-chain their workstation, this isn’t a good idea. Instead, they must plan on dedicated Ethernet runs to every VoIP phone. Having a dedicated switch for VoIP is unnecessary, especially on smaller networks, but it is a good idea. Besides, the VoIP switch will need to support Power over Ethernet (PoE) unless they plan to run electrical power for every phone.
Check with your ISP- Call the internet service provider (ISP), and confirm that the broadband provider will support VoIP and prioritization. The internet at large doesn’t support QoS, which is one reason to keep their voice traffic away from the internet as much as possible. This might need leasing a dedicated line, which is probably a good idea considering that voice communications are about as mission-critical as it gets.
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