Who else thinks VOIP sucks?

Status
Not open for further replies.
Originally Posted By: fdcg27
We have network outages at least one day out of twenty, which is where I pulled the 95% figure from.
We had one last Friday and we fortunately had a tech on site to fix it, although this took more than an hour.
These things happen exactly when I or my three peeps need to get something done.
Since virtually everything we do requires access to an online application of some sort, not having access is a real killer.
The irony is that twenty years ago, the network was both more reliable and much faster. Of course, it also handled far less traffic and had none of the protections against malicious software that we now have, but then there were also fewer hazards a couple of decades back.


The protection should have zero impact on speed, Cisco's threat defence system has no effect on overall throughput and next to none on latency, assuming you guys are using something like Cisco's FirePower system properly sized for your environment footprint and traffic.

Scale should also have zero impact on reliability. This stuff should all be planned based on anticipated use and equipment selection should reflect that. I don't care if we are talking 2960's or one of the Layer 3 products including the chassis systems, the same process applies.

When you say outages, do you mean the WAN link goes down, the LAN link goes down, an Interconnect goes down or do you not know? Just curious. I have a large clinic that I manage that has a relatively inexpensive network (HP Aruba switches, Cisco ASA 5510 WAN-facing a cable modem) and they've had a few issues with their cloud provider for one of their hosted services recently but it is a virtual instance resource issue with the provider, nothing to do with their equipment, as everything else soldiers along normally.
 
HATE
HATE
HATE
LOATH ENTIRELY
UGH...

We have it here at work, and it just SUCKS! This is with expensive equipment and a decent connection. Drops, static, digitized sounds, not reliable, just HATE IT!
 
Originally Posted By: DriveHard
HATE
HATE
HATE
LOATH ENTIRELY
UGH...

We have it here at work, and it just SUCKS! This is with expensive equipment and a decent connection. Drops, static, digitized sounds, not reliable, just HATE IT!


VoIP doesn't need a "decent" connection, it needs dedicated bandwidth because it is incredible sensitive to latency. This is the primary reason our SIP trunk provider uses a dedicated link for the service with its own slice of bandwidth. QoS on my side of the system takes care of the phones.

It shouldn't drop if the link is reliable. It should not have static or digitized sounds if traffic is properly prioritized and it should be on-par reliability-wise to POTS if setup with good equipment and a dependable link to the provider.
 
Wow, your cisco solution was implemented the wrong way.

I admined a Nortel/Avaya system for about 500 users for a few years as part of my job, now I admin a Cisco phone solution as part of my job.

You need a high availability virtual server setup, and you need a fiber connection with some kind of a cable backup.

Also on top of that you need cisco network gear hooked to a single analog line to allow for 911 calling, as well as emergency phone calling if everything goes down.

In theory, if the network goes down, the cisco system will use a single pots line to allow users to make calls.

Larger companies have phone admins whos only job is to do voice and chat servers.

Cisco phones are not cheap either, neither are the licenses that go with them. I think its the cadillac of enterprise voip.
 
Originally Posted By: JustinH
Wow, your cisco solution was implemented the wrong way.

I admined a Nortel/Avaya system for about 500 users for a few years as part of my job, now I admin a Cisco phone solution as part of my job.

You need a high availability virtual server setup, and you need a fiber connection with some kind of a cable backup.

Also on top of that you need cisco network gear hooked to a single analog line to allow for 911 calling, as well as emergency phone calling if everything goes down.

In theory, if the network goes down, the cisco system will use a single pots line to allow users to make calls.

Larger companies have phone admins whos only job is to do voice and chat servers.

Cisco phones are not cheap either, neither are the licenses that go with them. I think its the cadillac of enterprise voip.


thumbsup2.gif


It varies location-to-location as to the requirement for analog failover, it's not required here in Canada, we can use cellular failover through the same provider (Rogers) but I agree, your points are similar to mine with respect to this setup
cheers3.gif
 
My VOIP costs less per year than Ma Bell charged me per month and I don't get charged extra for calling out of my zip/area code. AND...I don't get junk calls all the time.
Now I don't call much and nobody calls me so the quality isn't all that important.

Smoky the Grump
 
Well, I talked to one of our techs today and it appears that the implementation imposed upon us was really half-arsed and we were already seriously taxing bandwidth capability.
I have noted that online application now run noticeably slower. If we lose the main server, we also lose any phone service as well.
Better yet, we're paying a per phone user fee each month which will mean that this whole cluster-(you know the word) will save us little or nothing.
What possessed those who decided on this migration is beyond me.
Maybe things will improve over time? Yeah, right.
 
I have Ooma voip and it best assest is $4.83/month.

Always works but quality is okay to mediocre. If someone is on worst line at other end it is dreadful.
 
Originally Posted By: fdcg27
Well, I talked to one of our techs today and it appears that the implementation imposed upon us was really half-arsed and we were already seriously taxing bandwidth capability.
I have noted that online application now run noticeably slower. If we lose the main server, we also lose any phone service as well.
Better yet, we're paying a per phone user fee each month which will mean that this whole cluster-(you know the word) will save us little or nothing.
What possessed those who decided on this migration is beyond me.
Maybe things will improve over time? Yeah, right.


That's a travesty, sounds like they contracted it out?

On the installs I've done, we buy everything, the only thing you pay for is the monthly service at that point, which is very inexpensive. We went from around $900/month with Bell for our one office to $146 for a Rogers SIP trunk with the same number of sessions that we had lines before.

How big is this facility you work in? Would help me to get a handle on the infrastructure that should be in place.
 
We have probably two hundred phones on our site, more or less.
 
Originally Posted By: fdcg27
We have probably two hundred phones on our site, more or less.


That's relatively small, making this even more sad. Are you guys gigabit or 100Mbit?
 
What kills me is that when you break out the putative cost savings over the number of staff, it's very little per head.
This reminds me of the nineties, when PC performance was improving really rapidly.
You pay someone a decent buck and then leave them with an obsolete desktop that hampers their productivity.
Penny wise and pound foolish when you consider that even at mid-nineties PC prices, the cost of a new desktop was nothing compared to what you were paying the users.
In our business, most of the cost is in personnel expense, so anything that reduces personnel productivity by adding to the time required to complete a task represents an incremental cost, although one that is not as easily quantified as any minor savings in landline expense.
 
Originally Posted By: OVERKILL
Originally Posted By: JustinH
Wow, your cisco solution was implemented the wrong way.

I admined a Nortel/Avaya system for about 500 users for a few years as part of my job, now I admin a Cisco phone solution as part of my job.

You need a high availability virtual server setup, and you need a fiber connection with some kind of a cable backup.

Also on top of that you need cisco network gear hooked to a single analog line to allow for 911 calling, as well as emergency phone calling if everything goes down.

In theory, if the network goes down, the cisco system will use a single pots line to allow users to make calls.

Larger companies have phone admins whos only job is to do voice and chat servers.

Cisco phones are not cheap either, neither are the licenses that go with them. I think its the cadillac of enterprise voip.


thumbsup2.gif


It varies location-to-location as to the requirement for analog failover, it's not required here in Canada, we can use cellular failover through the same provider (Rogers) but I agree, your points are similar to mine with respect to this setup
cheers3.gif



Interesting. I have a few LTE setups on small offices off the main campus, but never thought of doing LTE as a failover. We just pay ATT for a single pots line. The costs may be similar, I think we pay 40 for a VZW LTE connection. Pots phone line is probably similar.
 
Originally Posted By: JustinH
Originally Posted By: OVERKILL
Originally Posted By: JustinH
Wow, your cisco solution was implemented the wrong way.

I admined a Nortel/Avaya system for about 500 users for a few years as part of my job, now I admin a Cisco phone solution as part of my job.

You need a high availability virtual server setup, and you need a fiber connection with some kind of a cable backup.

Also on top of that you need cisco network gear hooked to a single analog line to allow for 911 calling, as well as emergency phone calling if everything goes down.

In theory, if the network goes down, the cisco system will use a single pots line to allow users to make calls.

Larger companies have phone admins whos only job is to do voice and chat servers.

Cisco phones are not cheap either, neither are the licenses that go with them. I think its the cadillac of enterprise voip.


thumbsup2.gif


It varies location-to-location as to the requirement for analog failover, it's not required here in Canada, we can use cellular failover through the same provider (Rogers) but I agree, your points are similar to mine with respect to this setup
cheers3.gif



Interesting. I have a few LTE setups on small offices off the main campus, but never thought of doing LTE as a failover. We just pay ATT for a single pots line. The costs may be similar, I think we pay 40 for a VZW LTE connection. Pots phone line is probably similar.


All the POTS here is owned by Bell, I think it is roughly $50/month for a Bell line, which Rogers would need to lease from Bell. So they generally recommend using their cellular network as failover, which is a bit cheaper (albeit not much).
 
My Republic Wireless cellular phone (Moto X 2nd gen) defaults to VOIP when connected to any WiFi, works great. The phone monitors call quality and if it degrades below a certain level it will automatically hand the call over to cellular tower, and this occurs seamlessly in the background w/o any interruption of the call. You can manually handover a call from WiFi to cellular (and vice versa) at any time as well.

At work we're on Cisco CP-7841 VOIP phones, the call quality is actually very good.
 
So we experienced a huge downside to VOIP at work today. We had multiple power outages from the fires in Ventura County and our work phones went down every time. Took a long time to re-boot and then the power would go out again.
 
Originally Posted By: bdcardinal
So we experienced a huge downside to VOIP at work today. We had multiple power outages from the fires in Ventura County and our work phones went down every time. Took a long time to re-boot and then the power would go out again.


The switches that power them should be on a big UPS, with a generator that kicks in at some point before the UPS dies. It would be the same for any of the old Nortel phone systems where the phones are powered by the main unit (though they are a bit quicker to boot).
 
Originally Posted By: OVERKILL
Originally Posted By: bdcardinal
So we experienced a huge downside to VOIP at work today. We had multiple power outages from the fires in Ventura County and our work phones went down every time. Took a long time to re-boot and then the power would go out again.


The switches that power them should be on a big UPS, with a generator that kicks in at some point before the UPS dies. It would be the same for any of the old Nortel phone systems where the phones are powered by the main unit (though they are a bit quicker to boot).


UPS, thats funny. There is only one on site and that is for the computer that runs our security cameras.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top