VoIP is techspeak for "voice over Internet protocol," but it could spell "saving big bucks" for your business! Here's where to get the scoop in plain English. Find out how VoIP can save you money, how voice communication travels online, and how to choose the best way to integrate your phone system with your network at home or at the office.

Discover how to:

Use VoIP for your business or home phone service
Choose the best network type
Set up VoIP on a wireless network
Understand transports and services
Demonstrate VoIP's advantages to management

CUSTOMER REVIEWS (Average Customer Rating: 3.5 based on 5 reviews)

VOIP for the Management

This book is focused on the key elements of telephony and the migration to VOIP - primarily as a cost saving measure. The first 2/3 of the book deal with the VOIP technology - as an adjunct to and eventual replacement for traditional (legacy) telephony. By the 2/3 point, the author is talking about cost analysis, benefits and justification.

I would more likely title this book "VOIP for management". This is not a put-down or insult, as the book's primary objective is to educate the mostly non-technical person on what VOIP is, and how it might best fit into an existing picture, and one moving forward.

Being primarily technical myself, this book was good as a preliminary introduction to a subject that I wasn't familiar with - but I immediately moved on to the O'Reilly books on the subject - "Switching to VOIP" by Ted Wallingford and "Asterisk" (Leif Madsen, et al). Someone who is responsible for managing such a transition would find it much more useful than I did.

September 18, 2008

A book on general VoIP

This book is a non-technical book on VoIP that explains to the reader what VoIP is and why companies and individuals can benefit from it. It talks about cost saving using VoIP. In my opinion there are 2 benefits from VoIP: cost saving and (extra data-voice) features. The author could have written a bit more about (extra possible convergence) features. If you want a technical book for implementing VoIP, there are others more suited to your needs. The gateway part discussed in another review can be found (theoretically, not practically) in Voice over the packet network from Wright. Mr. Kelly's book was to the point, concise and comprehensable. An excellent primer. The review using a lot of abbreviations and technical terms was not to the point, since it just sums some terms whose meaning can be looked up on for instance wikipedia. The basic function of these terms is discussed in general in this book. (The reviewer sums a lot of Voice codecs for instance.)
August 10, 2006

Good Introductory Book

The basic technology of the conventional telephone system has been around since the very beginning. You make a call and you get a dedicated communications channel to the instrument at the other end. And in the beginning that was indeed a physical wire. This wiring circuit was physically switched to your phone and stayed there until you hung up. Later Bell Labs was set up to discover how to get more signals through a wire than just one message at a time. Everyone knew that you could get more signal through a wire than just one phone call. And running all that wire was expensive, especially when it ran underwater across the Atlantic.

Step forward a few decades. The internet isn't circuit switched like this. Instead it's packet switched. A packet of data has it's own address as to where it's supposed to go and is thrown up on the network. It makes its way to the intended receiver. That's the way this message got to you. Suppose instead that that packet was a little tidbit of digitized voice. With the proper instrument on the receiving end (let's call it a telephone) the data is converted back into voice.

That's what VOIP is all about. To learn the details, buy this book. It's a complete description of what it's all about from equipment, procedures, and a bit of the background technology.

Only one last comment -- keep at least one regular, old fashioned, hard wired (not cordless) telephone around. If you have a fire, that knocks the power out, you want something that will let you call 911. Note that the authors say the same thing on pages 44 & 225.

Well, one more last thing. The cost savings on VOIP are difficult to estimate. SBC just came around here and offered 500 minutes a month of nationwide long distance for $10 a month. But if Grandma or the Grandkids live overseas, the cost savings are great. The book talks about this on page 50.
November 10, 2005

VERY High Level Stuff

This book isn't for technical people looking to implement a VoIP solution. It doesn't even define the terms one typically finds in eBay auction descriptions. For example, a typical description for a VoIP phone contains statements like:

- Support popular vocoders including G.723.1 (5.3K/6.3K), G.729A/B, G.711 (a-law and u-law), G.726, G.728, and wide-band G.722 (Model 102D).
- Support Silence Suppression, VAD (Voice Activity Detection), CNG (Comfort Noise Generation), Line Echo Cancellation (G.168), and AGC (Automatic Gain Control)

There is no introduction to this terminology in the book. Only a few paragraphs on SIP and nothing on H.323, SCCP, or IAX. Nothing about setting up gateways or servers. No mention of Asterisk or Digium cards or Skype.

According to the back cover the author is a business professor which is likely the reason for the lack of technical material. I get the impression he is well-versed in traditional telephony systems but his actual hands-on experience with VoIP systems is very limited if it exists at all.

October 22, 2005

Nice read to explore VoIP for organizations...

Businesses and organizations have the potential of saving large numbers of dollars if they move to running their phone system with Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP). But to pull it off, you really do need to have an understanding of how it all fits. VoIP For Dummies by Timothy V. Kelly does a nice job of getting you there.

Contents:
Part 1 - VoIP Basics: Getting Down to Business with VoIP; VoIP: Not Your Father's Telephone Service; Everything You Need to Know About Charges
Part 2 - Taking VoIP to Your Network: Road Map to VoIP Transports and Services; Getting Switched; Going Broadband; We're Dedicated; Going Wireless; Using VoIP on the Internet; Telephones and VoIP
Part 3 - Making the Move to VoIP: Simplifying Cost Management; Locations Galore; Setting Up the Smaller Office; Providing Dollars and Support for VoIP
Part 4 - The Part of Tens: Ten Reasons Why Your Company Should Switch to VoIP; Ten Reasons Why You Should Switch to VoIP at Home; Ten VoIP Myths; Ten VoIP Manufacturers
Part 5 - Appendixes: VoIP Providers; Glossary
Index

I've had the opportunity to read and review a number of VoIP books lately. Many of them have been more geared towards the consumer application of VoIP with services like Skype and Vonage. The business titles have been more into technical details of VoIP implementations in an organization. This book fills a nice niche on the business side. Kelly effectively takes the reader through phone technology, both past and present. Building on that information, he then transitions into how VoIP offers alternative solutions that save a lot of money. The book doesn't go into details on packages like Vonage, but you'll walk away understanding the entire spectrum of phone systems and how to plan for a successful VoIP implementation.

I'd see this book being a good read for a networking or communications professional who wants to explore VoIP for their company. It'd also be a good read for someone who wants to put VoIP to work for them in their house, but also want to know exactly how phone systems work. I wouldn't recommend it to someone who just saw a Vonage commercial and wants to sign up right now. There are better titles out there for those types of consumers.

Bottom line... really good read for the right audience. I don't think I've seen a book this readable that explains telephony in a way that makes it understandable for someone who hasn't worked for Ma Bell for years...
September 25, 2005

SIMILAR PRODUCTS

Telecom For Dummies (For Dummies (Math & Science))
by Stephen P. Olejniczak

Switching to VoIP
by Ted Wallingford

Voice Over IP Crash Course
by Steven Shepard

Voice over IP Fundamentals (2nd Edition) (Fundamentals)
by Jonathan Davidson, James Peters, Manoj Bhatia, Satish Kalidindi, Sudipto Mukherjee

Networking All-in-One Desk Reference For Dummies (For Dummies (Computer/Tech))
by Doug Lowe