These days transferring voice, in anyway, is one of the most important tools a company has in gaining an edge over competitors. Without any form of communication a company has no way to keep in contact with different divisions or groups who belong to it. There are currently 2 more popular choices for transferring voice; analogous which uses the current Public Switched Telephone Network, or digital, which uses the Internet. A company needs to make the decision of which to choose by basing the preferred selection on whether or not a system will be cost effective, and meet the company’s needs.
In order to use the Internet as a medium for sending voice data, a Voice Over IP or Voice Over Frame Relay system must be created. Hardware must take analog voice, then using pulse code modulation convert it to a digital signal, compress it, then send then place it in packet form. Once a packet is created, it is sent out on a network to find its destination. Due to the nature of the Internet, multiple data packets can take completely different routes causing frames to reach their destination out of order or even drop packets. With normal data packets this is acceptable, as a device can arrange the packets in order, but with real-time voice, the varying delay of packets sometimes cause a corruption in the transmission. In the case of dropped packets, a real-time voice transmission is to fast for a receiver to wait for a sender to retransmit and thus quality is lost.
A VOIP system can be beneficial to larger companies. By using the Internet as a medium for transferring voice communications, there is no such thing as long distance calls. The packets of data can cross millions of miles before reaching their destination, while the company only pays the cost of being connected to the Internet. This element is very important to companies who work over seas, or have multiple headquarters worldwide.
On the other hand, voice communication can use the Public Switched Telephone Network. Circuit switched communication is a guaranteed clear connection for the duration of the call. When an individual calls another individual, a dedicated link is established and stays that way for the span of the call. Once a circuit is established, that path is taken by all parts of the transmission. This factor completely eliminates almost every negative drawback of VOIP. There is no lost of packets to worry about so quality is consistent.
For larger companies using the PSTN for voice transfer can be a very unwise decision. As used above in the example for VOIP, a company with locations across the globe could easily be paying out the nose for basic telephone services, as the fees of across seas communication is quite expensive. Contrary, a small chain of businesses all in close vicinity to each other could make good use of the PSTN. PSTN can also become a less cost effective solution due to the necessary need for 2 mediums used for communication – one for data, one for voice. In a VOIP network, voice and data can both travel on the same medium, eliminating costs.
There are a lot of factors to consider before choosing a preferred system, but I feel a large company, especially one with multiple worldwide locations, would benefit from using VOIP rather than the PSTN as it would be more cost effective. The inverse approach relates to small companies that are somewhat close in location.