Ring of success for internet connection

Western Heights Primary School principal Brent Griffin admits he knows nothing about how VOIP works, but he knows it does work for his school.
Griffin said the school had stuck with the status quo because it simply was not aware of the alternatives.
Rotorua telecommunications and information technology consultant Nathan Willis, of Phocal Communications, told The Daily Post Voice Over internet Protocol would become an even more attractive alternative for businesses, schools and other organisations as the Government's ultra-fast broadband programme was rolled out.
Although cost savings is the main advantage for most organisations, Griffin said the greatest benefit his school got from the move to internet-based phone systems was greater flexibility and efficiency.
"It has opened up an entire world of exploration for the kids. All our senior classrooms have smart phones, which free up lines for administration and kids can get . I'm extremely happy with what we have now."
The school encourages children to find things out for themselves by ringing local organisations and businesses or calling people to invite them into the classroom. But this was causing queues of pupils waiting to use the office phone and clogging the phone lines needed by administrative staff and people trying to call into the school.
"Now everything is far more streamlined and it is so easy for the kids to use. I had no idea these things were available."
But Willis said VOIP would become a more common telecommunications set up for larger organisations as the Government ultra-fast broadband roll-out brought greater service guarantees.
"When set up properly, the existing broadband is currently fast enough and reliable enough to successfully run VOIP and there are a growing number of businesses and other organisations using VOIP successfully, in New Zealand, the Bay of Plenty and Rotorua."
But ultra-fast broadband has the capacity to make VOIP more reliable, increasing the number of organisations willing to make the change.
The technology allows users to make phone calls with a normal telephone, using their broadband connection instead of the regular analogue or digital phoneline service.
"It can reduce your landline rental costs by up to 62-75 per cent. Because the calls are going over the internet, you can get cheaper line rentals, lower costs and free calling features."
The main issue in the current network is that voice data needs to be transmitted in real time for telephone calls and, if usage is high or there are other, more data intensive transmissions at the same time, voice signals could potentially be delayed.
But Willis said this would be very rare and most modems allowed offices to prioritise voice data to make sure other internet activities would not interfere with the phone system.
"It doesn't use as much as many people think. We have customers here in Rotorua and in Tauranga. It works for them and we are getting a lot more inquiries about it."
VOIP can be set up using existing phone systems and he said some firms had opted for a combination of standard landlines and VOIP until ultra-fast broadband arrived.