

Cisco's Wi-Fi Phone 134
Forbes.com has a quick look at Wi-Fi-enabled VOIP phone. If a company deploys it in more than one location you can take the phone with you, and it acts just like the phone on your desk. Calls across the country or potentially across the ocean can be as free as a call across the office. There's also plans to incorporate support for wireless phone networks.
Backdoor (Score:1)
Re:Backdoor (Score:2)
Re:Backdoor (Score:1)
Link [prweb.com] here
Re:Backdoor (Score:4, Insightful)
Hard to say. I mean, I live in Florida, near the capital, but you don't have to drive far in any direction to be in the middle of the National Forest (read: nowhere). If I'm driving out in the middle of nowhere, get in a wreck and end up mangled I want someone to be able to pinpoint my location if I dial 911 from my cell phone.
What if I barely have time to hit the emergency button on the phone before I lose consciousness? What if I just can't talk for some reason? What if I don't really have a clue where I am or I'm just too addled to describe the location clearly? Around here, it's really easy to be on a 50-mile stretch of road that's just trees and more trees with lots of smaller roads branching off to who knows where.
It's more a case of when and how the location technology is used than whether there should be such technology. It has life-saving uses, but as with so many other things the potential for abuse is huge, especially by an administration that considers accountability, honesty and transparency nothing more than obstacles that must be overcome.
Maybe I'm too cynical
Re:Backdoor, a bit offtopic (Score:2)
they don't just 'tap in' to the landline going to your house, they issue a warrant(or whatever is needed in the country in question) and have the phone company record the calls. as such it doesn't matter if the phone is landline, celly, or whatever in todays world (that is, digital world, the call isn't practically crypted when it's off the air, they can do whatever they please with it). and as a fact most ne
Why would they need to build a Backdoor in. (Score:1)
Re:Why would they need to build a Backdoor in. (Score:1)
War-calling (Score:1, Funny)
More on a previous /. news post... (Score:4, Informative)
Wireless phone networks? (Score:2, Funny)
Comment removed (Score:3, Funny)
This is cool! (Score:4, Interesting)
VOIP (Score:2, Insightful)
but let's face it, with the ammount of data that it requires, a WiFi enabled VoIP call would just eat up the bandwidth that others need to use to do their work. let's focus on bringing sellular technology to the IP network, rather than the other way around.
Re:VOIP (Score:1, Insightful)
I have DSL at my house. Its shitty and only gets max of 384. WiFi starts, well I should say not always, at around 10mb...note the difference in speed???
Vonage is using DSL and etc at people's homes.
I just use my workplaces VOIP phone system to connect to our offices remotely. Its like 12k for a phone conversation. Yeah sure you can run up the codec to take like 65MB...but why the hell would you do that when its crystal clear at 12k.
If you dont know WTF you are talking ab
Re:VOIP (Score:2)
Right now Cellular providers use stickin' it too us for services that should be free (text messaging). If we *do* get it for free over the LAN and we use it, then the market dictates that cellular providers will be forced to lower their prices.
TW
Re:VOIP (Score:2)
Yes but what about all that dark fiber?
Re:VOIP (Score:1)
Re:VOIP (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:VOIP (Score:1)
it was my understanding that the amount of data being transmitted would significantly impact the wireless router's bandwidth capability.
it still seems like that, to me, because of the number of people in each office, that sooner or later one router would get bogged down. but obviously i am just mistaken on that.
But how does it handle handoff/roaming? (Score:1)
Wow! (Score:1)
Re:Wow! (Score:2, Informative)
Traditional Phone Companies (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Traditional Phone Companies (Score:1)
Re:Traditional Phone Companies (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Traditional Phone Companies (Score:1)
Speaking from experience, telco facility equipment is expensive and becomes obsolete far
Re:Traditional Phone Companies (Score:1)
Re:Traditional Phone Companies (Score:2)
It didn't matter whether the traffic had a endpoint in Panama...even traffic passing THROUGH Panama was supposed to be blocked.
Not sure what happened with that.
Wow (Score:4, Funny)
We need everything rolled into one device (Score:5, Interesting)
When at your desk, your wired desk phone rings. When in the hallway/bathroom/break room, your wireless phone rings. When outside the building, calls are forwarded to your cell number on the same device.
You would be able to customize each of the 3 zones (office, building, world) with its own call-handling rule set. Higher-end models would also auto-sense when you were in the bathroom, so you could avoid those embarrasing moments without thinking twice.
Re:We need everything rolled into one device (Score:1)
I can just see my mom trying to 'customize each of the 3 zones with it's own call-handling rule-set'. Abbot and Costello, minus hilarity, plus tears of frustration.
On the other hand, the day has probably already come and gone when the average user should be considered as tech-savvy as my mom. That worries me a little, though. It means the day when I, too, will be obsolete and considered no
Re:We need everything rolled into one device (Score:1)
Re:We need everything rolled into one device (Score:1)
Re:We need everything rolled into one device (Score:1)
Re:We need everything rolled into one device (Score:2)
Oxford Research Labs, the people behind VNC, were doing similar stuff without the mobile technology parts quite some time ago. They had a location system that could pinpoint where an employee was in their buildings. When someone calls you, a phone nearby would ring with a distinctive personal
yikes! (Score:3, Funny)
Wow, that's a costly phone..
"Sir, I think that we can save the company money by NOT buying those expensive phones and just letting employees actually return their voicemails when they get to the office. No need to spend $595 per phone just to bug people when they're on lunch!"
Re:yikes! (Score:5, Insightful)
That $600 is one time cost. There's no recurring fees on the phone, just maintenance of the VoIP network. While that might not be cheap, it's infrastructure, and infrastructure spending is easy to justify in a case like this, where you can show clear cost savings.
A good cellular plan runs at, what, $60 or so a month in the USA. This phone is not as flexible as a cell phone, in that you can't take it everywhere and use it. But at $720 a year, a cell phone costs way, way more than this one.
But, aha! The next year, you've saved all $720 on each phone, sans the support of the VoIP network. If you've got 1000 cell phones on your company account and replace them all with VoIP phones, you've saved nearly $720,000 - let's call it $500k with VoIP support costs. That's one hell of a lot of money.
Not everyone needs the flexibility of a cell phone. If all you want is a comfortable wireless phone to use at work, this is a good deal. In fact, it has a goodly amount of potential for telecommuters, too - imagine patching your home system to your employer's VoIP system via the internet. No more phone bills to justify, auditing, etc.
-Erwos
Re:yikes! (Score:3, Informative)
I just finished a pilot VOIP install in an extremely rural area of Vietnam, about 250 km or so northwest of Hanoi, as part of a feasability study for bringing VOIP to rural areas. The system consists of a few IP phones in three locations (one of which, a high school, had no telephone at all before the VOIP install) and a couple of PCs for Internet access.
The main site has a satellite uplink and is connected to the f
Nice Phone (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Nice Phone (Score:1)
Ha ha... You had to reboot a phone!
What the hell does... (Score:1)
Add vpn to make it complete (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Add vpn to make it complete (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Add vpn to make it complete (Score:2)
Yes, and no. Just like the Cisco 7940/7960 non-mobile line, I'm sure you'll be able to program a public IP address of your "phone server" (in Cisco's product line, a Call Manager). Then you just grab a DHCP address and gateway from whatever 802.11b network you can get on...
Of course, that's if you don't mind having your traffic sniffed, but most folks don't think of that in the first place.
Not a new Idea (Score:1, Informative)
Wi-Fi VoIP (Score:2)
Dropped (Score:5, Interesting)
VoIP is still not a complete solution, at least not for reliable service just yet, IMHO. Unless you go with a dedicated network. Services like vonage are affordable, but they use the net and are vulnerable to the usual traffic issues, etc...
Re:Dropped (Score:4, Insightful)
You're right in your case.
But for many, many organizations, VOIP makes perfect sense.
Many organizations have under utilized gig backbones. I know ours do. The Wan link is never enough, but the LAN backbone load never goes above 5 percent in our case.
VOIP works well in these situation; Saves a lot of money ( they're bypassing phone drops entirely in some locations ), and quality is fine.
VoIP on WiFi, seems like another story. I dunno about that :)
Re:Dropped (Score:3, Insightful)
This is usually much more complicated than just increasing the bandwidth. 8-(
Can get good VoIP without QoS (Score:2)
QoS is the key. You can make voice work in a very congested link if you turn the right knobs.
Even without QoS-capable routers in your enterprise you can still get good VoIP service even when the LAN backbone is saturated.
Just use a separate branch of the net for the VoIP traffic, with a router or switch (rather than a hub) between that and the rest of the LAN.
Yes that means two Cat5s drops to each cube. But you probably have t
Re:Dropped (Score:2)
Drops are the result of networks that are not properly engineered for voice. You need to do that.
That means using appropriate QoS mechanisms at the edges and either using those same QoS mechanisms across the core or being sure to over-engineer the links (your mileage may vary).
VOIP is a tradeoff in this regard. Yes, you don't have to duplicate infrastructure, and you actually do get more efficient use of the ba
Re:Dropped (Score:2)
I've been using Vonage for some time now, and am generally very happy with it.
Don't use Vonage if your 'net connection is running over ~ 50%. You'll start to get skips and stuttering in your connection.
But, for your small business with a few phone lines and an xDSL line, it's a godsend. I use it myself, and love the unlimited m
Re:Dropped (Score:1)
Completely agree. I've lost count a long time ago of neighbors 2.4GHz cordless phones punting my WLAN off the air (like my own 2.4GHz phone does occasionally, too).
Wireless 2.4GHz & 5GHz spectrum devices do NOT play nice with each other. Not good at all.
Symbol Technologies has already done this... (Score:2)
You know... (Score:5, Funny)
Sometimes that's the whole idea.
Could IP phones be the thing that IPv6 needs? (Score:5, Interesting)
J.
Re:Could IP phones be the thing that IPv6 needs? (Score:2)
Second, NAT is a hack and do
Re:Could IP phones be the thing that IPv6 needs? (Score:1)
Anyone with a brain (or not) will have a broadband router at home. Which will act as a firewall, too. And should.
No reason why this can't and shouldn't be a SIP/H.323/whatever proxy. That's probably the most sensible way to demilitarize such traffic anyway.
Bzzzzzzzzzzt Sorry. No score for IPv6 plug, but thanks for playing.
Star Trek style communicators on the way? (Score:3, Insightful)
Right now my company's building a couple of systems and we've got ppl running around all over the place. It's hard to reach people at their desks. It'd be kinda cool if we had a form of walkie talkie with a list of ppl we wanna talk to on it, tap their name and start talking. Beats using cell phones, plus we only bug the particular person we wanna bug. (as opposed to having broadcast convos over a walkie-talkie...)
It's not something we'd spend a whole lotta money on right now as it's not solving that big of problem (small office...) but if we did have it it'd be a huge help. I'd like to call over to the guy in charge of the database just to ask a quick question rather than run to the other side of the office with the error message I'm seeing memorized.
Well I can dream.
Already done (Score:2)
Re:Star Trek style communicators on the way? (Score:2)
how many channels do you need? (Score:1)
Did I mention cheap? I got two in a blister pack at a thrifstore for 5$ once, some sort of scratch and dent/closeout deal. I imagine if you shop aro
Re:Star Trek style communicators on the way? (Score:1)
Right now my company's building a couple of systems and we've got ppl running around all over the place. It's hard to reach people at their desks. It'd be kinda cool if we had a form of walkie talkie with a list of ppl we wanna talk to on it, tap their name and start talking. Beats using cell phones, plus we only bug the particular person we wanna bug. (as opposed to having broadcast convos over a walkie-talkie...)
Ever heard of Nextel? [nextel.com]
VoIP (Score:2)
Granted this is "WiFi" I doubt that it is overall that much of a improvement, seeing as you'd need to make your laptop WiFi on your trips, (or as this article says have WiFi in both locations you go. [And what about air travel then....]) if you planned to take this thing with you.
All in all it seems better to just
Re:VoIP (Score:1)
But then you gotta walk around the office with your laptop in tow, maybe in a backpack, looking like a radio operator circa WWII.
I share your apathy. This is just same-old, same-old except with the new buzzword WiFi attached.
Even WiFi mate (Score:2)
Unless it is ideal to miss those important business calls...
Or more legitimately that call from the ex-spouse.....
Re:VoIP (Score:1)
These CISCO products are targeted for enterprise. With VOIP, companies only have to maintain a data network and not a voice network because the voice is just data. The roi goes up substantially when you have two offices in different area codes which need to be connected. Traditionally, this type of situation is very costly to set up and maintain with high fee's from the carriers if you want to connect them and not pay per minute fees. With this technology it is very possible for a compan
Whoops! (Score:2, Interesting)
1. The router (or gateway or something) dies so no email. Ok, I'll use the phone. Whoops.
2. Have a fire that knocked out power, got to call the FD. Whoops.
I'll wait.
Re:Whoops! (Score:2)
Re: Haven't you heard of the UPS? (Score:1)
commodity product (Score:4, Insightful)
Cisco may be able to make lots of money on corporate accounts with an initial version of this, but if IP telephony catches on, then this sort of thing will just become a commodity, sold at cut-rate prices alongside Linksys wireless gateways (with VOIP) and non-name USB 802.11b dongles.
Re:commodity product (Score:2)
Re:commodity product (Score:2)
The idea is to be at the front of the demand curve where you can demand top prices, plus gain the experience in making and marketing the product so you can shave prices later while maintaining a larger margin than your competitors.
This is kinda business (-)101 stuff.
and it'll be illegal in... (Score:4, Informative)
Delaware, Illinois, Maryland, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wyoming, and Virginia
if not more later this year or next:
Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Massachusetts, Oregon, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Texas.
Check out http://www.freedom-to-tinker.com/superdmca.html [freedom-to-tinker.com] for status updates.
For Tennessee activities against this bill see: The Tennessee Digital Freedom pages [tndigitalfreedom.org]
Cost of implementation (Score:5, Informative)
Granted, compared to a large scale Merdiain 1 implementation it ain't expensive, but it's not quite as simple as buying a $595 phone and a WiFi base station!
-psy
Re:Cost of implementation (Score:2)
Re:Cost of implementation (Score:2)
Granted, compared to a large scale Merdiain 1 implementation it ain't expensive, but it's not quite as simple as buying a $595 phone and a WiFi base station!
No, it's more than just a switch and some software--you need the Cisco CallManager IP PBX servers too.
It's about the same as Nortel solution. Nortel has two options: You can add 802.11 and ethernet VoIP with a
Voicemail (Score:1)
"You've reached the phone of Dave Melee, I'm not at my desk...err...I'm not at the office...errr...I don't want to...talk? Can't I just have a few minutes to hit the john? STOP SMOTHERING ME!!!! [beep]
Phone Phreaking on Wi-Fi (Score:1)
Spectralink has this (Score:1)
In addition, they have several gateways that will allow their phones to work with virtually any PBX out there, analog or digital.
I can testify that their phones are very tough. I've seen them thrown across the room. The battery pops off - put it back and fire up the phone, no problems.
More to it than meets the eye (Score:1)
Re:More to it than meets the eye (Score:5, Interesting)
The real market for these things is in the home. I would love to junk my crappy cordless phones and use 802.11-speaking phones on my existing wireless network. Not only would that reduce the number of boxes I have to plug in, but if it caught on it could really help reduce the persistent interference problems between 2.4GHz cordless phones and 802.11 networks.
But most people aren't going to want to run (and rely on) a PC 24/7 just to be able to make phone calls -- much less a dedicated Cisco VoIP server! And tunneling through some server on some distant network isn't going to work either, given the extra latency and decreased reliability that will introduce.
Cisco phones do speak SIP (Score:1)
Re:Cisco phones do speak SIP (Score:2)
cordless phones (Score:1)
Good timing... (Score:2)
Now they're intent on making VoIP ubiquitous. Not that I'm a conspiracy theorist or anything.
Great for managers, not for developers (Score:4, Insightful)
Oh no! You've MISSED a call! Oh, horrors! Just think, you were discussing unwinding a recursion on a whiteboard in the hallway with a coworker, doing a walkthrough of some code on the lawn, or typing up nearly 500 new lines of code in the last hour while the ringer was muted. And you MISSED a call. Your productivity was dangerously high---just think what your phone could've done to cure that!
I'll just use WiFi for email, thank you.
Re:Great for managers, not for developers (Score:2)
Re:Great for managers, not for developers (Score:2)
All that IP-level hacking I learned in college turns out to be pretty handy after all...
Free? (Score:1)
Calls across the country or potentially across the ocean can be as free as a call across the office.
Sure, because we all know trans-oceanic bandwidth is free, right?
Symbol had this 3-4 yrs ago (Score:2, Insightful)
Spoke H.323 and allowed you to call by IP addr as well as by E.164 address. Spoke 802.11b.
So, this isn't really a new idea. Just Cisco's edition.
Long Distance tariffs??? (Score:1)
So you could be in New York using a phone with a Los Angeles local calling area. Or if your company had offices in both locations, could you expand your phone's local calling area to both locations?
How to most inter-office connected phone systems work now?
How does this relate to cell phone local calling patterns?
-Pete
Been done (Score:1)
Re:AAAAArrrgghhh (Score:2)
Don't be so negative. There are brilliant opportunities here. Thanks to my cell phone, I got to tell the founder of my company I was taking a shit once. Heh. (I'm not kidding...) Opportunities like that only multiply when the calls are easier to make!
Re:I tried it once... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Security? (Score:1)
Re:Security? (Score:2)
Re:Security? (Score:1)
I disagree. Just because it's possible to circumvent security measures doesn't mean that no precaution should be taken at all.
Look at it this way: Once that key is compromised, the attacker has access to your network. Furthermore, they can have access to your network without neccesarily having physical access into the building. At that point, as a node on the LAN, you can observe people's cleartext (telnet, FTP, POP3) passwords, attack internal sys
Re:Where did the numbers go? (Score:2, Informative)
basically what they're proposing to do is use DNS to map phone numbers to ip addresses. if your voip phone is assigned a phone number of 5125551212, you would send a dns query with an address of 5.1.2.5.5.5.1.2.1.2.e164.arpa in order to get the ip address assigned to that number. as far as i know this hasn't been implemented yet, but it's a pretty cool hack nonetheless.
Re:VoIP then why wireless? (Score:1)