Successful VOIP Over DSL, Part 2: What is QoS?
You hear an awful lot about “QoS, which stands for “Quality Of Service.” In point of fact it means different things to different people depending upon their perspective, telco or IP networking.
Successful VOIP Over DSL, Part 1: Some Installation Basics
Here are a few fundamental considerations when planning a VOIP implementation using DSL.
- What is your actual available bandwidth inbound & outbound?
- How many simultaneous calls do you need to sustain?
- What voice codecs are you using? And so, how much total bandwidth do you require?
- Do you have managed QoS on your network?
- Can you also implement traffic shaping to reserve bandwidth for VOIP purposes? Especially outbound bandwidth as this is typically the most scarce.
We Like Our HDTV. But Is HD-DVD Finally On The Ropes?
About a year ago we finally moved into HD with the purchase of a 42″ Sharp Aquos LCD-TV and a Toshiba HD-XA1 HD-DVD player. The HD-DVD player was actually acquired using Continental Airlines frequent flier miles in a program that they offer to very frequent fliers late each year. Of course, we got the HD PVR from Time-Warner as well. Given the fact that my employer manufactures HD graphics equipment it was truly a matter of putting my-money-where-my-mouth-has-been.
Sharp Aquos 42″ HD LCD. The first real 1080 set in its size class.
A Little More About QoS
John Bartlett over at CMPs No Jitter has blogged a little reminder that ya really need QoS for VOIP to work correctly, even on networks that are not that busy.
It’s Cold Here In Houston!
I was born and raised in Canada. In fact, I spent a number of years in deep Northern Ontario right about here. I have experienced -53 degrees C although -40 C was much more common. However, I have lived in…
Remembering OS/2
A couple of weeks ago a friend gave me a box that I had not seen in a long, long time. It’s a complete install set for IBM’s OS/2 v3, a.k.a “Warp” I could barely believe my eyes. Never have I seen a product delivered on so many floppies! There are 21 diskettes for the OS and some drivers, then another 14 diskettes for the “Bonus Pack’ which included some basic productivity software, internet access, etc.
Back in the early 90’s I was serious fan of this software, and for good reason. On a humble 486 PC running at 66 MHz it could do some major multi-tasking. It could run in 8MB of RAM, just barely, or do useful work in 16 MB. It could do some truly astounding things in 32 MB or more.