Anatomy Of A VOIP Solution – Part Two

Your Network better known as the LAN

I have been amazed at what I have seen. I have seen switches placed under people's desks, cabling run across the carpeting, the use of multiple routers and weird wireless devices, and cables which have been spliced together. I have seen routers which do not work with VoIP deployed in a network and I have seen switches circa 2000 deployed. Typically an investment in the LAN is required prior to deploying a successful VoIP solution. Questions to consider include:

• Will the VoIP Provider deploy a 24x7 managed VoIP enabled router with pro-active intrusion detection? This is critical. This is the device which will give voice a priority in a BYOB environment.

• What is the make and model of your current switch? Does it support PoE? Think of the switch as your super highway. Will your super highway support the required traffic during rush hour?

• Are your internet cables in your office properly terminated to a patch panel?

• What is the condition of your Cat5/6 computer cabling and does it need to be upgraded? Think of the cabling as a road and is that road perfect and smooth? Or does it have a ton of pot holes? Everyone knows what pot holes do to a car.

• Do you have servers?

• Do employee's VPN into your network?

• Do you have a lot of cloud based services in use? This includes employee's streaming of videos and music? We have found that an entire internet connection can be choked-off by employees streaming music, videos etc.

There is a lot to consider when deploying a proper VoIP solution to maximize your profit margin as I have discussed above. The three main areas being the Service Provider, the Bandwidth or ISP (most customers use a BYOB model), and your on-site network or the LAN. All three of these need to be in working order prior to deploying a proper VoIP solution.

For additional information contact Open One Solutions, Inc. at 312-780-1010 or send us an email at info@openonesolutions.com.