Phoney Phones

[xoxoxoBruce]

Well not really phoney...just different....maybe better.

In support of a new Boeing technology standard, the Philadelphia site will implement Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIP) beginning in mid-May when approximately 50 Bldg. 3-28 employees will participate in a month-long pilot program. Bldg. 3-28 will be fully operational by mid-July, followed by the campus’ remaining buildings throughout 2005.

VOIP, which combines voice and computer data into one line, will replace a 20-year-old telephone system that has become increasingly costly and difficult to maintain and repair. The new system also eliminates the costs associated with moving traditional phone equipment.

With VOIP, employees who move to new on-campus locations can simply unplug their phone, take it to their new location and plug it in. This allows employees to remain productive and eliminate the time spent requesting and waiting for logistic support.

It sure sounds like a great idea but the powers that be have a habit of making disasters sound like the best thing since sliced bread, in the runup.
Anyone used this stuff?

[richlevy]

Why I don't trust VOIP.

How many times has your phone line been dead?

How many times has your network/Internet connection crashed?

[Happy Monkey]

They also can't call 911, which may not be an issue in a corporate setting (Boeing could catch 911 calls and transfer them to a hard line at the server).

[BigV]

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

Well not really phoney...just different....maybe better.

It sure sounds like a great idea but the powers that be have a habit of making disasters sound like the best thing since sliced bread, in the runup.
Anyone used this stuff?

Yep.

[Gwennie!]

The company I work for switched to VOIP six months ago. We have had phone outages, voice mail outages, etc. I wouldn't have chosen it; I don't like the bleeding edge for infrastructure. The bean counters liked the price, but didn't understand the full cost including down time.

I think the worst phone outage was 8 hours, because of the provider's network problems.

Good luck, you'll need it.

[SteveDallas]

It depends on what you mean by "voip".

You can use voip (vonage, et al.) to hook you up from your place over to the outside world.

Or you can use it inside the building to connect the telephone sitting on your desk to the central PBX phone system at your office, which is then connected to the phone company via more traditional means.

While I personally haven't seen a compelling advantage in situation B (except for one thing, the potential to connect remote sites, buildings, or individual phones into the PBX over the network), if installed in a competent manner, it should be pretty reliable. When I put in a new PBX at work last summer I picked one that we could use VOIP with just by enabling some software licenses so I'd have the flexibility if I ever felt like it, but so far, I haven't.

[xoxoxoBruce]

I believe the reason they feel it'll pay is they're always moving people around. This way you take your phone with you and plug in at your new location. Bada bing, you're back in business without a phone tech moving your number to where you move.
I think it will all tie into a pbx onsite.
They don't seem to be aware of outages. Everything I need and all interaction is online now. The other morning I was the first one in and it took me 16 minutes to "clock in".

[SteveDallas]

I guess maybe so if you really move people around that much--but considering it takes just a couple minutes for an entry-level helpdesk geek to tell the system that extension 3104 is now on port 97 instead of port 62, you'd have a long way to go to convince me that the extra you spend on voip is cost-effective for that reason. (There are some neat computer hookups you can do. For example almost every system that shilled me last summer had the capability to do a "screen pop", where caller information comes up when you get a call from a person you already know. "It pulls the information right out of Exchange!!" "That's nice, but we don't use exchange. All our donors are in a proprietary SQL database. Can your system talk to it with ODBC?" "Uuuuhhhhh . .. . .. " But IMO they are "neat" but not worth what you usually have to pay for them.)

[xoxoxoBruce]

For some reason with the current set up, it usually takes two days for someone to come out and wire a phone into a new location so the number moves with the phone. It's a labor intensive process. I've seen times when it took the guy all afternoon sorting through bundles and climbing ladders.

[jaguar]

when we have phone-level reliable IP networks it'll be a good idea, until then as your only phone it doesn't seem so wise.

[glatt]

Well, my firm moved into a new building 4 months ago, and we got these fancy new VOIP phones. They are not perfect, but they work pretty well for the most part.

Towards the beginning of those 4 months we had a few firm-wide outages that lasted an hour or two each. Not good. I don't know what the problem was, but they seemed to be getting the bugs out. Now the phones are pretty reliable.

I was told by the head of our phone department that these phones are something like $200-$300 each. Cisco IP Phone 7940 Series. That's amazing to me. I am using a 4 year old computer, so that means my phone costs more than my PC does. Nevermind that my phones at home were $20-$80 each.

I can check the news and weather on the LCD screen on the phone. I changed the ringtone to an old bell style ring. So it has lots of bells and whistles. I don't really need bells and whistles.

When my wife calls me from just across the river in another state, the sound is sometimes kind of hollow at first, like talking in a storm pipe. Then it's normal again. Otherwise, it's OK.

So I guess the verdict is still out on these phones. The reliability is a real issue.

[Clodfobble]

I just remembered the weirdest bug that used to happen with the VOIP phones we had at my last job. When the caller ID displayed for an incoming call, the 6th number in the series was always one digit lower than the number was supposed to be.

So for example, my friend would call from her house, 555-1234, and my caller ID would display 555-1224. And if that sixth number was a zero in the original phone number, it would leave a blank space, 555-12 4. It was the strangest thing.

[Queen of the Ryche]

we have it at home - you CAN call 911, they just won't know where you are.
unfortunately cable co sux in our neighborhood, so whenever cable goes out (religiously on saturday mornings) we have no phone, and cell service sux there too cuz we're against the mountains, so I can't call the cable co to tell them it's out, and I can't e-mail them because we're on hi speed internet connex -
IMO, I'd wait until it's been around a while and they work out the bugs - either that or I need to move. (Can you believe my addy is actually in Los Angeles, and I am experiencing technical difficulties? Remind me again why my cost of living is freakin outta whack?)

[headsplice]

We use it for intra-office communications (we spend a lot of time talking to each other) and one production facility uses it all by itself. We had to add a couple of cards to our PBX's to get them to work, but once we got the kinks worked out of the firewall and router, they work like a charm.
NOTE: The firewall and router are managed, so we don't actually worry about them.

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by Queen of the Ryche

we have it at home - you CAN call 911, they just won't know where you are.

I think there's movement now to fix that, just in the last week or so.