T1 Lease Costs Reduced Again

T1 lines were once expensive connections reserved only for major corporations and the telecom industry. It's no secret that prices came down from the stratosphere due to competition. But now they've plunged again. What's that about?

A T1 line is a telecommunication circuit that is based on a telephony standard called the T-Carrier system. It was originally intended only for telephone companies to use as trunk lines between their central offices. But later, corporate telecom departments were allowed to order them to support PBX telephone systems and Internet service. For a long time T1 lines were the backbone of local Internet service providers. They were particularly popular with dial-up service providers. In fact, wireless Internet providers called WISPs still use T1 lines as their backhaul connection to the Internet.

But why are they suddenly so cheap? Because suddenly just about every business needs digital telecom services. That quick service restaurant you like to zip into for lunch? They don't write your order down on a little pad. They use a computerized point of sale system that also keeps track of inventory and accounting information. Many people pay with credit cards. Nobody runs those through the mechanical card crusher anymore. They swipe them on the cash box terminal and in a couple of seconds your card is accepted and your order transferred to a CRT screen in the kitchen. What you don't see is the automatic ordering data going back to headquarters. You may not even notice the IP security cameras that let management keep an eye on the store and parking lot after hours.

Most every restaurant, insurance branch, car dealer, coffee shop with a WiFi hotspot, big box retailer, grocery store, architect's office and other small to medium size businesses have gone digital. Computers are everywhere, PBX phone systems manage incoming and outgoing calls, security cams keep watch.

OK, but shouldn't increasing demand mean higher prices? If the world wasn't transforming to digital communications everywhere that might be true. But it is, and there is another technology boom underway right now. Many new companies are entering the digital communications business to take advantage of the burgeoning demand for voice and data services. They offer wireline, wireless and fiber optic services in all bandwidths from basic DSL up to Gigabit Ethernet. As these new companies proliferate, they get into each others territories and, all of a sudden, there's competition for your business.

Great, but with all these new service offerings how do you get the best deal. It's getting to hard to research it on your own. If all you do is check the phone book or spot an advertisement, you may miss some of the better offers. Your best bet is to use a specialized search engine that is designed specifically to find the best prices on business bandwidth. That tool is called GeoQuote (tm). You simply enter some basic information about your business and its location and run a search. In seconds you'll find the best offers on T1 lines in your area. If you are in a city of any size, it's likely going to be a long list.

It's also going to have price quotes that you may find startling. Like I said, T1 lease costs have really come down lately. Moreover, there are other services, such as Metro Ethernet, that weren't even available a few years ago. For higher bandwidth users, Ethernet is often cheaper per Mbps than competing services. How much cheaper? Run a GeoQuote business bandwidth search for your location now and see what you've been missing.

Vote MPLS & Ethernet for Better Bandwidth

The 2008 campaign season is in full swing. Which candidates have your best interests at heart? We're endorsing the MPLS / Ethernet ticket for "bandwidth you can believe in." They promise better performance and lower costs over a 1, 2 or 3 year term. Have a look at their platforms and see if MPLS and Ethernet can count on your vote.

The party on the ascendancy these days is IP Networking. Once strictly in local offices, IP has made the jump to WAN networks on a state, regional and national level. In fact, nearly all new network designs have IP or Internet Protocol at their core.

What accounts for this sudden rise in popularity of this technology? IP in general, and Ethernet in particular, represent the overwhelming majority in local area networking. They serve their constituencies with high reliability, low cost and near universal connectivity. It stands to reason that this success at the local network level should translate into even wider success in metropolitan areas and long haul networks. Consider that the interface is as simple as an RJ45 connector and you can see why new carriers are embracing IP core networks in their designs.

MPLS or MultiProtocol Label Switching reaches across the aisle to bring consensus to both the aging TDM (Time Division Multiplexing) networks with their tightly synchronized channel slices and the newer packet switching networks. Packet networks, under the IP banner, include Carrier Ethernet and the chairman of national and international networks, the Internet itself.

MPLS offers the benefits of private sector networking with availability to the business community at large. MPLS is a uniter, not a divider, when it comes to interconnecting your diverse locations. It offers class conscious bandwidth that gives voice, video and data the transport they need with a minimum of latency, jitter, and dropped packets. Because the cost of the MPLS cloud is spread over many users under the tight regulatory control of the network manager, the cost to connect each of your locations to the others is minimized.

Access to MPLS networks is most often provided by T1 lines with their dedicated bandwidth and high reliability proven in business applications. Each location is connected to the MPLS cloud through its own T1 access line. Interconnectivity with the cloud is provided by the MPLS network itself.

Ethernet is a competing technology to T1 lines when more bandwidth is needed in the first mile or across town in the metro area. Look to Ethernet when you need leadership at the 10, 100 and 1,000 Mbps level.

The reason that MPLS and Ethernet are running together is that they represent change for the future. Change meaning high bandwidths in more increments and lower lease prices per Mbps compared to administrations of the past, such as Frame Relay and SONET. Is this the sort of change that could benefit your business? If so, then cast your vote now for MPLS Networks and Metro & Carrier Ethernet. No need to wait till November. These services are available to serve you right away.

Would You Eat This Cell Phone?

We know that electronic equipment has recently been fingered as a major source of toxic waste. So much so that communities have started recycling programs to collect old TVs, computers, VCRs and smaller electronic devices. You can send in your old cell phones to online recyclers who will even pay you for recent models. But the real solution may be to clean up the problem upstream.

We love our electronics. Fat chance that we'll ever go back to a pre-technology world. Who really wants to trade their PC and Blackberry for a horse and plow? You can get tired just thinking about it. But we really do need to face the fact that those billions of plastic cases and circuit boards are going to poison us right off the planet if we just keep tossing them when a newer better model comes out.

Recycling is certainly a good way to start addressing the problem. Making things that aren't so toxic in the first place is even better. A few years ago, Motorola came up with polyvinylalcohol polymer that can be used as a plastic cell phone case. Researchers at the University of Warwick in Coventry, England then devised a front cover embedded with a sunflower seed. No, you don't get a vine growing into your ear even if you talk all day. But when that cover is planted in the garden, the seed extracts fertilizer from the plastic and... upsy-daisy. Well, upsy-sunflower.

Now Sony Ericsson is out to see what it can do to save the planet. Their concept is called GreenHeart. They start with disposable bio-plastic housings but go on to use recycled plastic keypads, electronic manuals, environmentally conscious packaging, and a charger with a very low standby power.

That's another bugaboo with electronic equipment. It looks off, but it's really on. The standby power ranges from a few watts to dozens of watts, each device sipping off the power grid like a tiny vampire. Add them all up and you need to build more generating stations just to power stuff that isn't being used. Even cell phone chargers draw some power while you're off using the phone. That is, if you don't unplug them when you're done charging. And who remembers to do that?

Perhaps one answer to our world's growing need for both food and technology is to make equipment not just degradable, but actually digestible. You've seen the ad on TV where people eat five dollars. Well, why not five cell phones? If electronic chips went well with salsa, you'd have a hard time not devouring the TV before the game was over. On second thought, perhaps we better just stick with biodegradable materials in the future and recycling for now. I really don't want a monitor that might be mistaken for a pizza.

Virtual Office Hosted Telecommunications at Half Price

If you want to upgrade your business telephone system but wince at the cost of buying a PBX system and trying to make it work for your situation, hosted telecommunications could be your solution. Even better, Packet8 business services is now offering their Virtual Office solution at half price for a limited time.

Half off, a 50% discount, sure sounds good. But just what is hosted telecommunications and what does a Virtual Office do that regular telephone service doesn't?

Basically, there are two ways to run a business phone system that consists of more than a couple phones. You can buy the equipment that operates your phones and hire the people to set it up and make changes as they are needed. Or you can have a company that specializes in this "host" the equipment and services at their location. All you need then is to put telephone handsets wherever you want them.

Packet 8 Virtual Office is a hosted telecommunications solution. They have the PBX (Private Branch Exchange) equipment at their headquarters. In this case, it's an iPBX or Internet protocol PBX system because they are leveraging the connectivity of the Internet to make the connections. This is a VoIP telephone system, but without the need to buy and manage network voice equipment at your location.

The Virtual Office is more than just a brand name. It also hints at the difference between this arrangement and a typical business phone system. You can locate your handsets wherever you need them and they don't even have to be in the same building, town or even country. That's right, you can set up a virtual company where your colleagues are all over the world. Yet to outside callers it appears that you are all in one big office.

In fact, to people within your organization it will seem like you are all on the same phone system in one location. You can dial by extension number and not worry where those extensions are physically located. You'll park calls, forward and transfer them at will. There's even a conference bridge included so you can host your own conference calls beyond 3 way calling. Virtual Office integrates with Salesforce and Microsoft Outlook to support your sales and CRM activities.

There's a lot more to this system, so you'll want to learn more about Packet 8 Virtual Office. If you choose to order Virtual Office Unlimited VoIP service with a new IP phone (model 53i, 55i or 57i) and you're a new Packet8 customer, you'll need to enter promo code UEIP25 when going through the checkout process to get the limited time special offer of $24.95 per month instead of the standard subscription rate of $49.99 a month for a full 12 months on a one-year contract. Yes it's really half price, but only from now until December 31, 2008.

No Business DSL? Go Wireless

You've just put up a new retail location and you'll be ready to take orders soon. All you need now is to order a DSL line and get it connected to your point of sales system. Oh-oh. You're beyond the range of the nearest telco central office. No DSL. No Cable broadband either. Oh, great. Now what?

One solution that will almost always work is to order a T1 data line. They're fast, highly reliable and available just about anywhere you can get telephone service. But if all you need is an Internet connection so you can process credit card transactions from a few terminals and perhaps upload inventory or accounting data to the home office, the cost and bandwidth of a full T1 line seems a bit much. Isn't there anything lower cost that you can get for nearly any location?

Actually, there is. First of all, don't write off T1 lines as too expensive until you check prices. They've come down a lot in recent years. However, it's true that lower bandwidth applications don't really keep a T1 busy. Have you considered wireless?

Yes, it's true that WISPs or Wireless Internet Service Providers are highly dependent on line of sight transmission. If you can't see the tower, you're probably out of luck. But there's another type of wireless service now available that covers 99% of locations where you're likely to put a business. Think cellular.

What Accel Networks has done is to form partnerships with the major cellular carriers to use their 2.5G, 3G, 3.5G and 4G data networks. As you already know, cell towers are everywhere. But did you know that some of their channels are used to transmit broadband data instead of phone calls? The iPhone is a good example of a cell phone that uses both voice and data channels. Most smartphones do. But if you use a standard flip phone you may not be aware that there is broadband Internet service available in most locations.

Each carrier has its own coverage footprint. Accel uses them all so that they can offer broadband wireless service just about anywhere. This is fixed location service, mind you. Your equipment comes setup for your location and should be up and running in about 15 minutes from when you unpack it.

How about access speeds? It's very similar to DSL business service, with 768Kbps - 1.4Mbps download speed in many areas and 140Kbps download in less populated areas. That's better than ISDN BRI and far superior to dial-up, even with the slower 2.5G data rates. Accel claims 2-4 second response speed for cashless transactions on service that meets or exceeds PCI compliance standards.

Don't fret about lack of DSL service. They may be doing you a favor. For about the same money you can have reliable private data service in as little as 3 days. Does that sound good to you? Find out more about the highly competitive wired and wireless data service available for your business location now.

How Many T1 Lines Do You Need?

When your business is small and you're frustrated by DSL or Cable broadband services, you may aspire to a professional grade T1 line. The high reliability and dedicated bandwidth of T1 lines has made them the preferred voice and data line service for business. But one day your business will be much larger and you'll be hitting the bandwidth limit on that once spacious T1. Now what?

Another situation is the high technology business, such as a Wireless Internet Service Provider (WISP) or video production company. You may look at the 1.5 Mbps bandwidth spec on a T1 line and know you need twice that or several times. Now what do YOU do?

In many cases, the answer is simply to order more T1 lines. Yes, you can do that. Multiple T1 lines are not at all uncommon for larger or more demanding business applications.

Let's take a typical example. A small call center has a PBX system with a T1 line interface card. The T1 line is configured for ISDN PRI service. That gives them 23 outside lines with fast call switching and Caller ID for each line. Soon that call center gets more customers and finds that even with 23 lines they are running out of capacity. The answer is simply to order another T1 line configured the same way and get an additional 23 lines. Many modern PBX systems have the capability to handle 2 or more T1 lines on one or more interface cards.

A WISP finds that T1 dedicated Internet service offered enough capacity when they were getting started, but is now getting poky as more and more users sign-up. In this case the answer is to get 2 T1 lines bonded together. Bonding is a standardized way to combine the bandwidth of 2 or more lines so that they behave as one larger line. If you bond 2 T1 lines you get 2x the bandwidth or 3 Mbps. Bonding 4 lines gives you 6 Mbps and 6 lines gives you 12 Mbps.

So why order all these T1 lines instead of just getting a larger service? After all, DS3 will give you 45 Mbps, OC3 provides 155 Mbps, and Carrier Ethernet offers standard speeds of 10 Mbps, 100 Mbps and 1,000 Mbps.

There are good reasons to stick with T1 lines. First of all, you may want a service such as ISDN PRI telephone trunking that requires a TDM based service, not Ethernet. Or, you may want to start small and add bandwidth incrementally as your business grows. Most importantly, outside of major metropolitan areas you may find that it's T1 or nothing. T1 lines are provisioned on standard telephone trunk wiring, which is available just about anywhere. Higher bandwidth DS3, OC3 or Ethernet services may require fiber optic lines that are too expensive to install. That's especially true for wireless backhaul at WISP towers out in the countryside. T1 may be your only affordable solution.

What bandwidth solution is best for your company? It depends highly on where your business is located. Some areas have a wealth of competitive resources available. Others have only a few. The way to find out is to use the GeoQuote (tm) bandwidth search engine and see just what is available and at what cost.

iTelecenter Boosts Real Estate Agent Income

If you sell real estate for a living, you probably think that describing home sales as a disaster is putting in mildly. It's easily the worst market in a generation. But you still need a way to put food on the table. If only technology could provide you with an edge...

Well perhaps it can. iTeleCenter has a toll-free real estate hotline and lead capture system that they designed in 1992 and have been deploying to top agents and brokers worldwide. A few years ago you might have yawned if you saw a story about this. After all, who needs more help when your phone is ringing off the hook already. But today any competitive edge is worth considering, especially if it's already proven itself in the market.

The TeleCenter Real Estate Pro multiplies the value of your telephone. It simplifies communication, increases your productivity, helps you generate more leads and increased listings, and track the effectiveness of your advertising to reduce costs.

This is a telephone tool, right? But not some complicated piece of equipment that you have to get wired up and programmed. The iTeleCenter hardware and software are remotely hosted and managed by professionals so you don't need anything more than the phones you already have. It will add features and consolidate all your different numbers so that buyers and sellers can reach you anywhere, anytime by calling a single number.

Let's look at that calling feature. Forget about having a bunch of different numbers on your business card. You have just one toll free number. Anyone who wants you will call that number from wherever they happen to be and get your message. They push "0" and your phone rings. It could be your home phone, office phone or cell phone. The system will forward the call to you wherever you happen to be.

How about getting more leads? iTeleCenter is also a hotline where you promote information on hot properties. Potential buyers call to hear what's available without feeling pressured to interact with an agent. If they want to speak with you immediately, they can press a button and do so. If not, the TeleCenter Real Estate Pro captures their phone number automatically and, if they are listed in the white or yellow pages of the phone book, it will even provide you with the name and address of the caller. How's that for a hot lead?

Ah, but what if someone want to send you a fax? No problem. They send it to your one published toll free number. They can also get faxes from you automatically. If they are interested in a particular property, all they have to do is push a button and a listing sheet will be automatically sent to their fax machine.

There's a lot more to this and if you are in real estate sales, direct marketing or any other business where lead generation and follow-up is key to your income, you should learn more about the TeleCenter Real Estate Pro from iTeleCenter. It could be just the edge you need in today's tough markets.

Phone Power... To The People

Enterprise VoIP and broadband phone service for residential users is busily chipping away at the hundred year old switched telephone industry. But what makes the tried and true approach vulnerable? Prices!

Traditional telephony is set up on a tariff basis that nickels and dimes you for every little thing. First you pay a line cost. Then there's local phone service. Long distance is extra with charges for every minute called. Features such as Caller-ID are add-on extras. They even want to charge you a monthly fee for servicing the wires in your home or building, just in case some crazed rodent decides to have copper for breakfast. Is it no wonder your eyes bug out when your phone bill arrives?

Large corporations caught on to this game a long time ago and have been steadily upgrading their facilities with in-house VoIP telephone handsets and IP PBX phone systems connected to competitive ISDN PRI or SIP Trunking digital service providers. Smaller businesses and home phone users are headed the same direction. Except that they need something much smaller in both scale and price.

Broadband telephone service allows new highly competitive telephone companies to vie for your business even though they don't own the copper telephone wires that are so jealously guarded by the incumbent phone companies. How to they get around that monopoly? They piggyback on the broadband Internet service that just about everyone has these days.

Phone Power is one of these new generation telephone service providers that has something attractive for both home and business users. Residential plans start at $14.95 a month with a special introductory offer of $9.99 a month for 3 months available as of this writing. That low price gives you 500 minutes of long distance per month plus Caller ID, voice mail and other highly desirable features. I counted 26 of them on the list and they're all included in the basic price. Need more minutes? Low cost upgrades are available.

Phone Power's business service is even more intriguing. It's a virtual PBX system that you order by the line. Each line is $39.95 a month. Start with one or two. Add more as your business grows. You get big company features such as an auto attendant (electronic operator) and hunt groups to tie your phones together. Seems like a great way for small businesses, even home based businesses, to get started with a professional grade phone service.

In addition to low cost local and long distance, international calling rates are also very attractive with this service. Have a look at what Phone Power has to offer.

Use a Telecom Broker Before You Go Broker

Where do you buy your telecom line services? From the local phone company? From a carrier sales executive? OK, then. How do you know you're getting the best deal? After all, every one of them will smile at you and tell you what a good deal you're getting. But without a list of competitive quotes to compare, who's to say if you're getting a good deal, great deal, so-so deal, or taken to the cleaners?

Great. So who's got time to chase down a dozen competitive service providers and get quotes out of them? Who can even find these people? I'll tell you who. A telecom broker, that's who!

You may have never heard of a telecom broker but you'll probably benefit from using one. The role of the telecom broker is to do the leg work that you don't have time for. These people are experts in the telecommunications industry but not employed by any of the service providers. They are independent business people who guard their independence so that they can present their clients with unbiased listings of the best deals.

Think independent insurance agent. The relationship is similar. An independent agent, in this case called a master agency, is a representative of a particular company and licensed to sell their services. They would be just another sales representative except that the independent agent has relationships with many companies. That way they are not bound to present only a single offer. They can show you as many offers as are available for your particular business location.

That sure sounds good, but how much are you going to have to fork over to get these multiple offers. Not a penny. You do not pay for the services of the telecom broker. Their fees are paid by the carriers. Most carriers are happy to do this because they only have to shell out a commission fee when the broker sells one of their services. It's strictly pay for results.

A telecom broker has the latitude to act as a free consultant to your business. You don't even need to know the industry terminology for the service you need. Simply describe what you are trying to accomplish and with what equipment. The broker will scour the available offerings and help you pick the one that gives you the most performance for the least amount of money. Brokers are also aware of new services just on the market and any limited time discounts that happen to be in place.

It's all win and no lose for you, the business manager or owner. You get free help in selecting and ordering the telecom services you need, and at a better price than you can probably find yourself. You'll also have another place to go for support in case your needs change or on the odd chance you have trouble with your service.

So, how do you find such a broker? Arguably the best in the business is Telarus, Inc. They have an extensive group of expert consultants available, with phone coverage 24/7 and easy online inquiries. You'll be able to access them quickly and easily through our T1 Rex GeoQuote(tm) service provided by Telarus. Let them be of assistance right now. Yes, right now!

Ethernet Cuts Costs, Expands Bandwidth

You know what a business tradeoff is, right? That's when you have to decide which of two things you want is more important because you can't have both. But what if you could have both? That's no tradeoff. That's a real business advantage.

Ethernet service falls into that advantageous sweet spot. It's more bandwidth for less money.

You read that correctly. More bandwidth. Less money. How can that be? It's a combination of technology advancement and new aggressive providers who are out to change the nature of telecommunications networking.

Until recently high bandwidth telecom services from T1 lines to DS3 bandwidth to fiber optic connections were primarily under control of the entrenched telephone companies. New carriers have come on the scene over the last couple of decades and spend that time and millions of dollars building regional and national fiber optic networks independent of the telephone companies. These new carriers offer advanced technology and aggressive pricing.

Technology is part of the explanation of how Ethernet can simultaneously cut costs and expand bandwidth. Telco networks have been based on time division multiplexing since they went digital starting in the 1950's. That was the right technology match to transport digitized telephone calls on a circuit switched network. But technology has been evolving since then and, with the dramatic growth of the Internet, packet switching has steadily displaced circuit switching as the network architecture of choice.

The new high performance digital networks are designed for packet switching from the ground up. They are IP (Internet Protocol) based. Some form the backbone of the Internet, of course. Others are kept private so that their quality of service can be carefully controlled. It's these private networks that offer what's called Carrier Ethernet, also known as Metro Ethernet.

Since Ethernet is the universal network protocol of choice for businesses large and small, it stands to reason that the most efficient way to transport network packets over long distance is to keep them in the Ethernet protocol. That's what the new Ethernet services do. They connect to your network switch or router and extend your local area network across town or across the country.

The combination of native Ethernet service and aggressive carrier pricing make Ethernet WAN (Wide Area Networking) the connection of choice for linking multiple locations or bringing in dedicated Internet access at high bandwidths. Service is available in a variety of bandwidth increments from 5 Mbps on up.

At levels of 50 Mbps and below, it's often possible to provision service over twisted copper pair wiring using the latest in line modulation technology. This means nearly any building within a couple miles of the nearest carrier point of presence can get Ethernet service. At higher bandwidths, up to Gigabit Ethernet, fiber optic connections are needed.

Find out if your building is already "lit" for Ethernet service or what might be available in the way of Ethernet over Copper (EoC) service. Check for Ethernet availability using the GeoQuote (tm) service finder.

Voice and Data Bandwidth for Hospitals

Hospitals and medical centers need massive amounts of electronic communications infrastructure to operate efficiently, so to speak. With advances in imaging technology and the move to electronic records, this need could grow perhaps exponentially. Is there any way to keep the rising cost of health care in check with this kind of demand for every increasing telecom needs?

You bet there is. First let's take a look at what types of capability are required. Along the way, we'll see what we can do about the costs.

The most basic need of any organization is telephone voice communications. In any facility with more than a few phones that most likely means a PBX phone system. The Private Branch Exchange has come a long way over the years and may now sit on a shelf or in a rack rather than occupying an entire room. Even with legacy equipment, there is major cost savings to be had in consolidating a dozen or two analog phone lines into an ISDN PRI digital trunk running on a T1 line. If more than 23 outside lines are needed, additional T1 lines can be installed, usually by plugging them into an interface card in the PBX.

It should be noted that ISDN PRI trunk line prices have plunged in recent years and that competitive service providers may be able to provide the same level of T1 service that is currently being used at a lower price. Or for the same budget amount, telephone capability can be expanded to meet a growing need.

For greenfield installations or retrofits, IP PBX systems are popular. They perform the same function as the traditional PBX in being an in-house telephone exchange. The big advantage is that the IP PBX supports VoIP handsets. T1 lines carrying ISDN PRI digital telephone service work just as well for an IP PBX. But you also have the option to employ the newer SIP trunking to keep everything in the VoIP realm. That can translate into potentially large additional cost savings.

The other high demand technology within hospitals and medical centers today is data communications. The combined requirements of high definition imaging equipment, such as XRAY, CAT and PET scanners along with medical records access and normal purchasing activity means that getting information into or out of any facility requires a fairly large "pipe." A T1 line may be adequate for smaller satellite offices or a doctor's office. But larger organizations are needing DS3 bandwidth at 45 Mbps or fiber optic connections starting at OC3 or 155 Mbps.

Like digital voice lines, data communication lines have come down in price the last few years. Competitive service providers may be able to offer a considerable cost savings by simply replacing high cost line services with equivalent services from lower cost providers. But the real excitement comes from the new Carrier Ethernet networks. Carrier Ethernet is a technology that is now competing directly with SONET fiber optic service with savings as high as 50% or more in some cases. Carrier Ethernet, also known as Metro Ethernet, offers bandwidths starting at 5 Mbps and easily going up to 100 Mbps, 1 Gbps and even 10 Gbps. The higher the bandwidth, the greater the savings per Mbps over traditional fiber optic services.

If you are responsible for hospital, medical center, or doctor's office telecommunication expenses and would like to see how much you could be saving on your monthly voice and data line bills, find out quickly and easily with our GigaPackets bandwidth evaluation service. You may be astounded at the results.

Laptop Too Big? Try a Tablet

You'd like to tote your laptop computer everywhere. That is, if it didn't make your arm fall off. Internet enabled cell phones certainly take care of that size and weight problem. But then you have the challenge of dealing with the itty bitty buttons and the teeny tiny screen. It sure would be nice if there was something in-between. What you want is a device that will fit in the palm of your hand, yet have a screen big enough to easily use the Internet and Web based tools. Have you considered an Internet media tablet?

The Archos 7 Internet media tablet is a high end model of the ultra mobile computer. Think of a device that looks like a much larger version of the iPhone. It's all touch screen on front. That way you get a 7 inch color touch display with a resolution of 800x480 pixels. That's big enough to render Web pages directly, so you don't have to slide around peeking at little slices of the page content. Your browser is the Opera Web browser with Adobe Flash 9 video support, just like on a larger machine. You also get a PDF viewer and Email client.

Hmmm. Where's the keyboard? It's on the screen, of course. To continue the iPhone analogy, you use a touch screen keyboard for your data entry. Of course, the Archos 7 has a much larger keyboard because it has a much larger screen.

Connectivity is via built-in Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g access. You also have the option to plug-in a 3.5G cellular broadband adapter with a USB connector to a mini-dock adaptor. That should be everything you need to get on the Internet.

Now, truth be told, the Archos 7 and other members of the Internet media table product line are really targeted for multi-media on the go. Hence, the "media" tablet designation. What types of media? Movies, music, photos. Even high definition video, Web radio and TV, video podcasts, and video recording using the optional "helmet cam."

A helmet cam? It's a tubular video camera that connects to the Archos tablet so you can use it as a camcorder. I suppose you could strap it to a cycle helmet and go zooming down the street. Too bad about anybody subject to motion sickness who happens to be watching the results.

Video support includes MPEG-4, WMV, and M-JPEG. Audio support is MP3, WMA, Protected WMA, WMA pro 5.1 and WAV. There are additional plug-ins to support other formats such as MPEG-4 (ASP 720p) & WMV HD (MP 720p), H.264 up to DVD resolution with AAC, MPEG-2 MP@ML up to 10 Mbps (up to DVD resolution) and AC3 stereo sound (5.1).

How about storage capacity? Forget those little memory cards you plug into cell phones. This Archos 7 comes with 320 GB capacity so you can enjoy up to 400 movies, 3.2 million photos, or 190,000 songs before you run out of room. Battery life is a generous 12 hours for listening to music or 4 hours for watching videos.

If you feel your needs are gravitating toward more multimedia applications on a mobile basis, you might want to think about one of these media tablets to bring along. You'll also have access to the Internet on at least a casual basis. For some users, this could be just the right combination for personal and business use.

Verizon Goes After Blue Collar Cell Phones

When you think of somebody wearing a hard hat using a cell phone, what kind of phone do you suppose it is? The blue collar cell phone field has been pretty much locked up by Nextel, with its revolutionary push-to-talk walkie-talkie service and its ruggedized cell phones. But now Verizon is moving into that territory. You may have seen the ads on TV - The guy with his feet trapped in cement trying to no avail to raise help on his cell phone. So what makes Verizon think they can capture the rugged communications share of the market?

Verizon really has a one-two punch in this regard. They are benefiting from the fact that they are already a much bigger company than Nextel, with a huge customer base and wide selection of phones from entry level to high end smartphones. But what they've added is PTT (push to talk) communications capability and tougher phones.

PTT is a mode of communications where you push a button to talk and release it to listen. Traditional telephone operation has been what's called full duplex. That means you talk and listen at the same time. But two-way radios, including walkie-talkies, have always been half duplex. Only one person gets to talk at a time. That's especially useful when you want to get your message thorough quickly and you don't need to say very much. "Bring me another piece of 4 inch pipe." That's an example of a PTT message.

PTT has the advantage that as soon as you designate your recipient and push the talk button your voice comes out of the other phone. No dialing a long number and then waiting for someone to pickup. Plus, push to talk can let you speak to several different people on several different phones at the same time. It's called "group calling." PTT is an inexpensive add-on service to your Verizon Wireless service plan. But you need a phone that will work in this mode.

The Casio GzOne Boulder line of phones meets the requirements for PTT capability on the Verizon Wireless network. It's also the kind of phone that can take some abuse and not wimp out. The boulder has a waterproof shell and meets military standards for shock, dust, heat and vibration. If you want to make sure you don't lose your phone accidentally on the worksite, pick the orange model. No one is going to mistake an orange phone for a stray chuck of concrete.

As the name Boulder suggests, this phone is also targeted at outdoor enthusiasts. In addition to its general toughness, the GzOne comes with a built-in electronic compass and GPS for navigation. There's a Megapixel digital camera that runs in video capture mode in case you actually spot the REAL Bigfoot in your adventures. Other niceties include on-demand TV and music, Bluetooth wireless, and cellular broadband. Memory is upgradeable to 8GB for plenty of storage capability.

Yes, the GzOne Boulder line does come in black as well as orange. There's also a Motorola Adventure V750 in silver for a more traditional look in a ruggedized phone.

What are the hottest cell phone deals available right now, including free cell phones? Use the Cell Phone Plan Finder to check out the top phones and associated wireless service plans.

Last Mile Connections That Make Sense

Competitive telecom networks have criss-crossed the country and penetrated every metropolitan area. Their modern IP networks, fiber optic bandwidth and dramatically lower prices makes them very attractive to businesses of all sizes. But how do you get connected?

Often, the most important, most expensive and most limiting span of a wide area network is the drop to the customer site. It's widely known as the "last mile" connection. Why last mile? Because that's a typical distance from a business location to the nearest carrier POP or Point of Presence. A POP is equivalent to a telephone company's CO or Central Office. You need a building where the equipment goes that provides a connection or "termination" to the carrier's backbone network. That's the POP.

If you are actually within a mile or even a couple of miles from the nearest POP, you've got options. There are many different ways to span the distance. Traditionally, analog telephone lines and digital T1 service came-in on twisted pair copper bundles that were installed as a matter of course when your building was constructed. They still do. In fact, a T1 line makes a fantastic last mile connection for PBX telephone trunking, VoIP SIP trunking, MPLS multi-point networks, dedicated Internet access and point to point voice and data connections to other locations. T1 lines are highly reliable and can be bonded together to increase bandwidth.

But aren't they pretty expensive? They were at one time. That's why many businesses had to settle for slower 64Kbps and similar connections from their facilities to a much faster Frame Relay network. These days, that's like hooking a soda straw to a fire hose. You can't possibly tap the capability of the core network when you're so bandwidth restricted.

Fortunately, T1 lines cost only a fraction of what they did a few years ago. Just in time, too. You need at least 1.5 Mbps for many business applications and multiple line telephone systems. The copper pairs that transport T1 service can also be reconfigured to carry higher bandwidth Ethernet service directly from a carrier POP to your location. Your connection is via a standard Ethernet jack for bandwidths from 5 to 50 Mbps. Once on the network, your connectivity can run across town or across the country, even the world.

If your needs exceed the capability of Ethernet over Copper, you need the big daddy of last mile connections: fiber optics. All the metro and long haul networks are now fiber-based. The bandwidths available go up to a Gbps, called GigE, and even on to 10 Gbps. Prices per Mbps of bandwidth can be half what you're paying for non-Ethernet service now, or even less. But you'll need to have your building "lit" for fiber optic service. Is it already lit and you just don't know it? Find out with this Ethernet service locator.

Are there any other options for last mile connections? Yes, and one of these might be just the right service at the right price. In some major cities you can get wireless delivery up to 45 Mbps. The trick is that you need to have line of sight to the carrier's transmitting tower. For lower speed applications, like point of sale terminals in small retail locations, wireless connections using cellular broadband works well and is very affordable. At distances of only a few hundred feet to less than a mile, laser optics equipment can "beam" your connection across highways, lakes and other areas where fiber optic construction costs are astronomical.

Still scratching your head over what last mile connection makes the most sense for your business. Let our team of experts help you sort it out so you can get the best deal on the bandwidth you need. Simply call the toll free number or put in a quick online quote request using our MegaTrunks bandwidth service.

No Company For Old Ideas

One of most amazing success stories of the last 5 years has been the rise of Telarus, Inc. as a telecommunications marketing powerhouse. For veterans of the telephone and data line industry it may seem like this upstart has come out of nowhere to become a major player overnight. In a field where service options and prices have been slow and measured in their change, how can could this happen?

It's all in the innovation. Well, it's mostly in the innovation. The rest can be attributed to the energy of the two founders, Adam Edwards and Patrick Oborn.

I should mention that I've known both Adam and Patrick as an affiliate of their Shop For T1 program over the last five years. During this time I've been an eye witness to the light-speed change that has taken place in the competitive telecom services field, thanks to Telarus. Before I got involved in the program, marketing T1 lines was largely the purview of the telephone companies and industry veterans who broke out to start their own consulting firms. Then, instantly, businesses users could enter their address and phone number into an online form and get a list of competitive T1 prices in a couple of minutes.

What changed the game was a now patented software tool called GeoQuote (tm). The brains of the system is an online application that hooks-up with carrier databases to calculate line spans and their related lease prices. But the brains behind the brains is Patrick Oborn. A electronics engineer by trade, Patrick cut his Web marketing teeth by building a storefront and agent back office for Cognigen, the forerunner of today's Commission River. His next project, Telarus' Shop For T1 service with its groundbreaking GeoQuote engine, was an order of magnitude more sophisticated. It's still a work in progress. One of the latest features of GeoQuote is mapping out Ethernet service routes by just inputting a business address.

Adam Edwards has complemented Patrick Oborn's skills by being the brains behind the business. Technology, no matter how good, can wither on the vine unless it gets out there in the marketplace and grabs hold before something else moves in. The Telarus business model is unique in its teaming arrangement of lead marketing affiliates, professional sales consultants, carrier channel managers and independent value added resellers, all tied together by an automated infrastructure. It's a system that turns prospective leads coming in by phone or the Internet into customer consultations, service proposals, signed contracts and turned up line services and/or equipment installation. All while making sure nothing slips into the cracks.

This designed-in efficiency has been there from the beginning, and makes it relatively easy to layer on new services such as MPLS networks, wireless point to point, SIP trunking and whatever comes next. This proven model is now being used in an almost recursive way to re-engineer the old Cognigen marketing business into the next generation affiliate marketing company called Commission River. Cognigen was the pride and joy of the late Kevin Anderson, who stunned the consumer and SOHO telecom marketplace with automatic self-replicating storefronts that enabled hundreds of thousands of individuals worldwide to make money with their own Internet-enabled businesses.

Commission River is expanding on Kevin's dream with a suite of new tools, training resources, and updated websites that maintain the focus on residential and small business telecommunications. What started as alternative switched long distance is now VoIP, cellular phone, Web hosting, Triple Play TV/Broadband/Phone, and related services.

What hasn't changed is the affiliate opportunity that enables ambitious individuals with a business or technology background to launch their own small businesses. It's just expanded into a wider range of technology offerings, even including the high commission business services sold by Telarus.

The last generation has been known as the era of Gates and Jobs. Could the next generation be known for Edwards and Oborn?

The Cheaper T1 Line is a T1 Line

Your telecommunications infrastructure is really the heart of your business. You've been using T1 lines for both PBX telephone and dedicated Internet access. They work great. But business has slowed and every manager is scouring the expense reports for line items to cut. Of course you can't just cut off telephone and Internet access. Everybody might as well go home. But isn't there a cheaper solution? Can't you get roughly the same service for less even if performance and reliability might take a hit? I mean, it's crunch time. Right?

Don't go there. At least not yet. Yes, professional grade business telecom line services can stick out on an expense report like the proverbial sore thumb. But before you start fantasizing about cutting your telecommunication expenses by 20% to 50%, consider these 2 important points:

1. Those "consumer" grade broadband phone and Internet services won't have the performance or reliability that you're accustomed to now. Garbled phone calls. Outages that last hours, even days. How are your customers and suppliers going to react to that?

2. There is no need to downgrade service when you can keep the same service level but just pay less.

Point number one should give you serious pause. Point number two needs some explaining.

You see, the cheaper T1 line may still be a T1 line. How is that possible? It's because there are competitive service options out there that you probably have never heard of.

Think about how you acquired your original line service contract. It was probably a long time ago and your only real option was to call up the local telephone company and read them a list of what you needed. An account executive dutifully looked up the tariffs and prepared a service contract for you to sign. Next thing you know, all the phones have dial tone and all the computers have Internet access. After that it is just a matter of having the accounting department pay the monthly bill.

That was then. This is now. What's different now is that the competitive landscape has changed. Where once there was only the phone company, now there are a few dozen competitive service providers offering a wider selection of options and for a lot less money. But unless you've gotten wind of this somehow and taken the initiative to seek out those competitive providers, you'll never know how much less you could be paying.

T1 lines are a good example. Only a few years ago, spending a thousand dollars a month for a standard T1 voice or data line was just the cost of doing business. Today the same line service level may be available for half that or less. It all depends on where you are located and how much telecom infrastructure building has been going on in the area. But even in rural areas prices have come down noticeably. So, how much less can you really pay for the same service?

Glad you asked. Every situation is unique, so the only way to know for sure is to run a competitive quote for the exact business address and main telephone number in question. Thanks to development of the GeoQuote (tm) search engine, this process is now automated. In fact, you can submit your location information in one minute and have a list of competing line prices the next. Want to see how it works? Run a T1 line service automated quote right now!

Your Business Website is $7

Business websites are as ubiquitous as, well, businesses. In this connected age, any business without some sort of online presence is really behind the curve. Websites are a definite marketing advantage, but at what price? Custom sites can easily run into the thousands and tens of thousands of dollars. Even cheesy local sites designed by the owner's kid can cost a hundred bucks or more per year just for hosting. But what if you could get a professional looking site and domain for under $7 a year? Would that sound interesting?

Don't keep blinking. That price is correct. For $6.99 a year, the world's largest Web host will register your domain and give you a 5 page site builder. It's hard to find domains priced that low. But with online site building software and hosting included? Incredible.

Over the weekend, I got an idea for a business recruiting site I wanted to build. Normally, I'd just register a domain and then use the tools I've got to build-out a site on my reseller hosting account. But when I saw the deal that 1&1 Internet was offering, I got second thoughts. First of all, the domain name registration itself was priced $2 less than I could get it at the usual haunts. I didn't know if their Starter WebBuilder feature was any good, but thought it worth a try just in case. If it takes a couple of days to code up a site from scratch, there could be considerable time savings using the builder tool.

I'll let you judge the results for yourself. I bought RiverSuccess.com late Saturday night. Then let the DNS propagation settle out overnight and started working with the Web tool after the Indy race on Sunday. It was ready to be posted less than 5 hours later. Immediately upon publication, this "weekend wonder" was open for business.

This particular domain, called River Success, is being used as a recruiting tool for the Commission River affiliate program. Commission River is something like Commission Junction, except that the emphasis is on telecommunications and related technology programs and they have a strong training program in place to jump-start new affiliates. With unemployment numbers skyrocketing, it seems like a lot more people should be interested in building at least a side income to get some control over their future. The program works best for those who have a serious business interest rather than just a passing curiosity. That's why I chose a serious B2B theme rather than something more lightweight. You do get a choice of templates, images and color themes.

I mentioned that the 1&1 WebsiteBuilder limits you to 5 pages. For many small business applications that's plenty. If it becomes a limitation, they offer an upgrade program for $9.99 a month that gives you unlimited pages. You'll also need the upgrade if you want to install any of your own code. With the basic package you're limited to hyperlinks.

The tool is actually pretty simple to use and if you've done any site building you'll be up to speed in literally a matter of minutes. A nice feature is that you can define titles and meta tags page by page. That makes you findable and unique in the eye of the search engines. Perfect for a business site.

So if you have a small business and haven't wanted to get caught up in the learning curve and expense of creating a related Web site, here's your chance. Seems like this is also good for anyone who just wants to try something online to see if it will work. You can start off with the domain name and free builder. If what you're doing proves promising you can always upgrade to the larger package or build-out a big, big site using Adobe Dreamweaver or other design software and then host it with 1&1 Internet.

GoPhones For Hurricane Gustav

One interesting story to come out of the Hurricane Gustav disaster preparations was that AT&T was handing out more than 2,000 of their GoPhones pre-loaded with $15 worth of airtime to gulf state residents forced to evacuate to safer areas. This generous gesture may have a lot more people wondering what a GoPhone is and if they should go get their own for emergency use.

The AT&T GoPhone is not so much a particular telephone style as it is a complete service option. GoPhone is what's called pre-paid cellular service. A normal cell phone plan requires you to sign a long term contract and pay a fixed amount every month even if you only use a few minutes of airtime. Some plans let you roll over your minutes to the next month, but most don't. The new month starts and the minutes clock starts over. Plus, there's no real accommodation for people who are very light duty users, those who's usage varies greatly from month to month, or anyone who just wants a low cost cellular plan for emergencies only.

It's those non-typical calling patterns where GoPhone service excels. There is no contract to sign, no nosy credit check and no deposit required. What you do is buy a phone specially set up for GoPhone service and then buy your airtime in advance. If you guess wrong and buy too little time, you just buy more when you need it.

How do you buy this time? There are three ways. You can refill your minutes anytime 24/7 online, over the phone, or by purchasing prepaid minutes cards. You'll find the cards at many retailers, so you can just waltz in and plunk down cash for a new minutes card whenever you need one. They come in denominations from $15 to $100. The expiration period varies with the cost of the card. The $15 cards expire in 30 days but the $100 cards last a whole year.

Let's say you just want an emergency phone that you'll keep in the car or on your person just in case you need it. A good strategy is to buy a GoPhone and a $100 minutes card. While you pony-up $100 for the card, you don't have to worry about reloading for a full year. The cost amortized over 12 months amounts to a little over $8 a month. Know any cell phone providers who are going to give you a cellular service plan for around $8 a month? Ha! The usual "small" plans are more like $39.99 a month.

What are the hottest cell phone deals available right now, including free cell phones? Use the Cell Phone Plan Finder to check out the top phones and associated wireless service plans.

Audio Interview With Adam Edwards

Arguably the most innovating telecommunications marketing company to come along since the big telecom buildout of the 1990's, Telarus, Inc. has revolutionized the way businesses shop for T1, Ethernet, and other high speed line services.

I recently had the pleasure of sitting down with Adam Edwards, president of Telarus, to ask him to explain what is making Telarus such a powerhouse among master agencies. Rather than transcribe his remarks, I decided to post an MP3 recording so you can hear what Adam has to say for yourself.

To listen to this first edition of our audio reports, simply click on this link to our Audio Interview with Adam Edwards, Part I. It should start playing in whichever audio client you have selected for MP3s on your computer. Or you can listen using this built-in audio player:


You can access any of the services Telarus has to offer through our site at T1Rex.com. Simply call the toll free number you find there or enter a quick online inquiry through the Shop For T1 search box. For T1 voice and data lines, you'll get price quotes instantly online. For higher bandwidth services, a product specialist will be in touch with options and special pricing offers.

GigE Gives OC48 a Run For The Money

Telecommunications infrastructure is rapidly changing from circuit switched time division multiplexing technology to packet switched IP technology. Standard telecom circuits for voice and data services now find their territory being encroached upon by upstart MPLS and Metro Ethernet connections. But this is more about entry level services such as T1 lines, right? There is no real competition for Gigabit bandwidth SONET fiber optic lines... or is there?

Gigabit Ethernet is coming on the scene faster than you might expect. GigE, as it's known for short, is a well established LAN standard. It's used in data centers, workstations and many newer business PCs. Gigabit to the desktop is well on its way. But what about wide area networking?

WAN (Wide Area Network) buildout and pricing lags well behind LAN standards. That can be accounted for by the fact that most corporate traffic is internal. Companies traditionally haven't needed near the bandwidth for communication with the outside world as they require to support dozens, hundreds or thousands of employees accessing company applications and data.

Another reason for lagging WAN bandwidth levels is that metro and long haul networks have traditionally been the domain of the telephone companies. Their digital technology is based on transporting telephone calls on 64 Kbps channels called DS0s. A T1 line, DS3 connection and all the way up through fiber optic SONET services as high as OC-768 with a data rate of 40 Gbps are all collections of DS0 channels. The big trunks were designed to transport thousands, even hundreds of thousands of simultaneous telephone calls. Their pricing has traditionally reflected that.

IP-based WAN networks never had that channelized telephone trunking legacy. They reflect the new reality that nearly all communications is becoming packet rather than channel based. A packet can represent voice, video or data. The higher the bandwidth required, the more packets traverse the network. A 64 Kbps data stream is still good for one or a few digitized telephone calls. But today's WAN network needs are measured in Mbps and Gbps, not Kbps. It's becoming a real-time audio, video and interactive data world. Both WAN capacity and pricing need to meet that current need.

This is where competitive carriers are moving in to fill the gaping demand for lower cost metro and long haul bandwidth. Computer aided engineering, medical imaging, automated manufacturing, e-commerce, and remote data centers have demands that are orders of magnitude above the previous business practices of FAX document transmission and overnight mail delivery of data tapes. Businesses need and will install higher bandwidth line services... if only they can get an affordable price.

Gigabit Ethernet, GigE, has advanced to a level of maturity where it is challenging the long-entrenched OC-48 SONET service for metro and long haul WAN connections. Costs are not merely competitive, they are often dramatically lower for Ethernet versus higher bandwidth TDM-based services. Some of this may be attributed to new carriers coming on the scene with aggressive pricing to establish themselves in the business bandwidth marketplace. But there is also an efficiency improvement based on technology.

Gigabit Ethernet is exactly what it sounds like. It's 1,000 Mbps of bandwidth. OC-48 can also give you 1,000 Mbps by using protocol conversion to allow TDM technology to transport packets instead of channels. But OC-48 has an inherent bandwidth of 2.488 Gbps. When you pull in an OC-48 line to deliver Gigabit bandwidth, there's a lot of excess capacity going to waste. OC-24 would be a better choice at 1.244 Gbps. But OC-24 is considered an oddball optical carrier level and isn't always available.

Is your business hamstrung by too small a WAN pipe for the applications you need to be competitive? If you haven't checked recently, you may be surprised at how much the cost per Mbps has declined for 10, 100 and even 1000 Mbps WAN connections. Take a minute now to find out how little you'll pay for the service you really need.

MPLS Networks for Enterprise VoIP

Medium and larger size companies often have multiple locations with multiple sites around in the metro area, and even branch offices scattered around the country or the world. Traditional PBX phone systems with connections to the PSTN (Public Switched Telephone Network) have provided high quality telephone service for decades. So why risk switching to a VoIP phone system? If you do, what takes the place of the PSTN?

The proven quality and reliability of the century-old public telephone network has made many organizations think twice before embracing newer technology. After all, the legacy of "Ma Bell" is formidable indeed. Indeed, it's not uncommon for companies to gut their internal phone systems and replace them with network voice equipment while leaving the old phone lines in place. An IP PBX with SIP phones on every desk can take the place of the old proprietary PBX design to add functionality and ease of moves, adds and changes. By plugging in a multiple FXO card or T1 PRI Interface card, the existing PSTN connections can continue to be used as-is. There is no need to change this, but there may well be lost opportunity.

Consider the multiple location organization. The simplest telephony solution is to install separate phone systems at each location and route all your inter-office calls through the PSTN exactly as any other outside calls. Therein lies the problem. Every time the public toll network is used to connect from place to place, there is a per minute charge. We expect that when calling customers or vendors long distance. But for internal calls it can get pricey fast. It doesn't seem right to discourage employees from calling colleagues at other sites, but when cost control becomes critical it can become necessary.

The other problem is that you enjoy three or four digit calling within your building but wind up having to dial all 10 digits to get to another location. It reinforces the notion of us (inside) versus them (outside). It feels a lot more like the same company when every call to every desk works the same regardless of location.

A solution to the dialing problem that also lets you avoid toll charges is to connect your various phone systems together via PBX tie lines. These are point to point solutions, so you'll need to either create a star network with all control at a central office or install tie lines from every office to every other office. Oh, but that gets expensive fast.

What you really want is a fully meshed network where any location can connect to any other through a cloud. The PSTN does that on a switched basis. The Internet does the same thing for IP data. But the Internet is iffy as a telephone network. It was never designed to ensure quality of service for real time applications such as VoIP. It can work fine sometimes, not so good at other times, and just terrible when you least expect or can afford it. What you need is a private version of the Internet structure but designed to properly transport packet based phone conversations.

MPLS or Multi-Protocol Label Switched networks do just that. MPLS uses specialized tag switches instead of IP routers to identify each packet and ensure that it gets directly to the proper destination and with enough bandwidth to avoid and delays or corruption. MPLS networks are private IP-based networks that handle a wide variety of voice, video, and data traffic in various protocols. Hence the term multi-protocol. But why are MPLS networks so suited to enterprise VoIP telephony?

MPLS networks offer a meshed cloud structure that each site connects to via a broadband IP service, such as a T1 line. Within the cloud, the tag switches label packets as voice or data and then transfer them to their intended destination. QoS or Quality of Service is guaranteed by the tagging process and adequate resources of the network. The result is ease of connectivity from any site to any other site with call quality assured. It's the PSTN updated for today's packet network technology.

Prior to MPLS networks, Frame Relay networks were another way to provide similar connectivity. But the newer competitive MPLS networks offer considerable cost savings while supporting both voice, video and data connections among your business locations. Could MPLS be the high quality / best cost solution for your company's upgrade to VoIP telephony? a newly introduced specialized search tool makes it easy to find out. Get an unbiased service quote that meets your needs in less than 24 hours with an easy 2-minute online MPLS network query process right now.