Now a company might use the Internet as a means to connect multiple offices using an IP PBX…. but many argue that the internet (although cheaper, and only cheaper because it eliminates the needs to have a secondary voice circuit) is not a reliable method for voice to travel due to many reasons – lack of QoS and latency being the big ones.

This post seems to be selling VoIP and IP PBX without much regard to how the technology actually works…. and this causes a lot of confusion about what VoIP and IP PBX actually means.

VoIP can mean a lot of things…. but it doesn’t directly mean cheaper. VoIP means you can use data networks instead of legacy TDM networks (this makes things cheaper)…. VoIP means you can have an IP PBX in your office which may come with great features since you can do a whole lot more with data voice packets than you ever could with analog voice traffic (but IP PBX systems aren’t usually any less expensive than a regular PBX)…. you can even still plug an IP PBX directly into an analog line to terminate your calls to the PSTN.

Now everyone uses Vonage as the prime example for VoIP. Let’s look at Vonage and why vonage is cheaper and therefore why people always confuse VoIP as something which is ALWAYS cheaper. Why is Vonage cheaper? Because instead of having to buy DSL or Cable internet PLUS phone service, you can ditch the phone circuit and use your data connection (which you’re paying for anyway) as the method to connect to a phone service provider. VoIP is the term given to essentially run voice over the internet, the internet being the “connection” from your phone to Vonage’s network. And the Vonage network is IP…. you could even look at it as one giant IP PBX.

So yeah… there are two big factors that need to be clarified when discussing VoIP and that is differentiating and identifying the relationship between a “connection” method and “premise based” hardware.