Which Are The Most Annoying Disadvantages Of VOIP


The technology advances from the last few years have brought with them a revolution in communications, and one of them is VOIP, or Voice Over Internet Protocol. With VOIP, people can make long distance phone calls without the restrictions they encounter when they use traditional lines. Its popularity is a strong reason for which many companies fight for becoming VOIP providers for more and more customers. However, there are certain disadvantages related to VOIP, that any consumer should be aware of.

Because traditional phone technology has already lived a long and happy life, the customers are used to a certain level of quality, which, with VOIP, is far from being standard for all the services. This inconsistency is related to the technology itself, that is based on compression and transmission of compressed data, that, once reaching the destination, must be decompressed and then delivered. For a high quality connection, all these procedures must take place very fast, and here is where VOIP falters in comparison with telephone land lines. You will notice, in a VOIP conversation, an echo occurring from time to time, or that you begin to talk over your interlocutor, as delays in transmission take place.

And here we are talking about delays. Here are some numbers, so you can have an idea about how the traditional land line beats VOIP. A delay of maximum 10 milliseconds occurs in conversations, when land lines are used, while, with VOIP, the delay can get up to 400 milliseconds. The result: a syncopated conversation from which none of the speakers can understand anything in the end. It may not happen all the time, but this disadvantage is real.

VOIP is best used by individual users. For personal conversation, it may work just fine, but todays networks want to take over the business segment. This can become quite an issue, as many companies do not operate networks, without having a firewall installed. Where is the problem? You may ask. The problem is that a firewall does not know where to direct a VOIP call, when it is made, so a lot of confusion occurs.

The more people use the network, the more bandwidth is necessary to keep everybody online, talking to each other. Not to mention that any provider that offers VOIP, also offers a lot of other Internet related services, like video conferencing. They all use a lot of bandwidth, and it is hardly known how much to allocate for VOIP conversations under these circumstances.

These are the most annoying disadvantages of VOIP. Still, the fact that customers can make free phone calls anywhere they want, weighs more. Even of the technology has still issues, it will get better with time and more reliable services will be provided to the customers.

Balva Rudick is the Editor and Publisher of Article Click. For more FREE articles for your ezine and websites visit - www.articleclick.com


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