VoIP

One of the biggest industries in the world today is the telephone
industry. Between sales of physical telephone units, sales of local
calling plans, sales of long distance calling plans and sales of cell
or mobile phone plans there are billions of dollars exchanging hands
on a regular basis within the telephone industry. Because of this people
are always being solicited by companies claiming to be offering the
next greatest thing in telephone technology.

In many ways it is rather ironic that telephone companies solicit
customers long distance in order to offer them economical long distance
plans and many customers have now become so jaded, that they simply
do not respond to that type of sales method anymore.

If however, the product being offered is new and innovative and at
the same time the product is able to do a lot for the people that are
buying it, then the product will survive.

In today’s world, things tend to survive more on their own merits
rather than on the hard selling done by people looking for their own
commissions. One such technology that has taken the telephone communication
world by storm is the patented VoIP technology.

VoIP

VOIP is an acronym that stands for voice over internet protocol. It
is a piece of technology that allows customers to actually chat with
other people through the use of their internet connection rather than
a conventional telephone line. The quality does not suffer at all in
a good VOIP connection and even the long distance connection is able
to maintain the same high quality that a customer has come to expect
from their current long distance provider.

The only real difference between VOIP connections and their conventional
telephone counterparts is that the VOIP connection maintenance costs
tend to be quite a bit cheaper. The reason for this is that the internet
is being utilized in order to help the consumer facilitate their telephone
needs. To a large degree, the consumer is already paying for most of
the technology used in VOIP services with the internet monthly payment
they are already making. The bottom line for this is that the internet
service provider providing the VOIP service does not have to charge
as much for it and those savings usually end up being passed on to
the customer.

VOIP Setup

You don’t really need much in order to set up a very good VOIP
uplink. First and foremost you need to have a broadband internet connection.
In other words, you need to have fast internet along the lines of a
cable or a DSL connection. Once you have this then all you need is
a phone to utilize with the VOIP service and you are good to go. Once
you sign up with the VOIP service from one of the many companies around
that offer it, you will receive very detailed instructions on how to
arrange the cables around your computer and modem in such a way as
to facilitate the VOIP service. Once you’ve done that you can
pick up the phone and start chatting right away; it is quick, easy
to setup, very cheap and the height of convenience in the world today.

Wireless Networks & Network Security

Networking and wireless networks are an important part of business
and personal electronic computing solutions nowadays and because of
this, more and more people are putting in more hours to research, and
corporate companies are funding such initiatives in a scale never seen
before.

The act of being able to share information between computers without
having to save that information to a disk, CD or DVD device and then
manually transfer it over to the other computer has allowed users to
save a lot of time during the transfers themselves as well as to save
a lot of money in not having to purchase large amounts of removable
media in order to facilitate smooth file transferring.

There are many different types of networks available for consumers,
some of which are more recent in their development ladder than others.
The old stalwart networks such as the local area network (LAN) have
been around for a while and are very reliable in terms of the support
and the versatility that they provide.

When you add this to the fact that many of them are very cost effective,
they are a very good networking solution for most people. However,
for users who prefer much more flexibility, the younger concept of
the wireless network is one that could definitely help them in their
networking endeavors.

Wireless networks have been around for just a short time on comparison
to their wired counterparts and for this reason there isn’t as
much technology and research available for them. Nevertheless, they
offer amazing amounts of flexibility to their users, one of the other
reasons they are becoming more popular by each passing day.

Advantages of Wireless Networks

Firstly, wireless networks provide a large amount of flexibility to
their users. The idea of not having to be connected to another piece
of equipment with a wire in order to network with that device is a
very powerful proposition and one that allows for maximum flexibility
in setting up your wireless network.

In addition to that, wireless networks usually require fewer components
than wired ones simply because there aren’t any wires, nor are
there any bulky hubs involved either. This allows companies to save
space in setting up their network and dedicate that space to other
parts of their business, ultimately saving them money in the process.

Disadvantages of Wireless Networks

However, there are two big disadvantages in having wireless networks
in your business. Firstly, they are relatively young and because of
that the technology is not as developed as it is with wired networks.
If the network is not arranged properly in order to allow the signals
to permeate properly, there might be frequent service disruptions which
might be very frustrating for individuals trying to access the network.

Also, wireless networks tend to be more expensive to set up than their
wired counterparts, meaning that any money saved (as mentioned in the
second advantage in the previous section) from the less space taken
up will most likely be cancelled out by the extra money required to
set it up.

Conclusion

Wireless networking continues to get better and more reliable with
each passing day and many businesses already use them heavily in their
operations. If you are looking for more flexibility than your current
network setup provides, a wireless network might just be right for
you.

Network London provides wireless security and wireless
networks for companies acroos London and the UK.

Blackberry Pearl

Blackberry Pearl is one of the latest GSM handheld from Research in Motion
(RIM). It is also the smallest of the smart phones marketed by RIM.

Straight into its specifications, the Blackberry Pearl is quite compact
unlike the earlier RIM models. And the biggest trade-off happened in
this process is the inclusion of the new SureType system, the keypad
in which each button handles two letters, replacing the old and better
looking QWERTY keyboard. It might take a bit of practice to get used
to the keypad, but it is not cumbersome either.

Another change that RIM had introduced in its slimmest smart phone
is the track ball in place of the scroll wheel in its older versions.
In comparison, it is far easier with the track ball to make the selections,
to zip through the menus in all direction, than with the scroll wheel
that used to lie on the side of the device.

On its overall design, the Blackberry Pearl weighs 90.7gm and has
a physical size of 107 x 51 x 15 mm. In rough comparison, it will be
as thick as two iPod Nanos stacked together. Dedicated volume keys,
a pair of programmable keys, and the key atop to silence all forms
of alerts in one press, makes the phone flexible and easier to use.
The call quality is reasonably good when compared with its immediate
competitors, the Nokia E62 and Motorola Q, if not better.

Like all smart phones in its category, the Blackberry Pearl comes
with a set of multimedia features, which include music and video, ring
tones, and images. The 1.3 mp camera offers good enough performance,
but the video quality is just ok. If you want to exploit its multimedia
features fully, you might need a microSD card as the internal memory
is too small for mass storage requirements (64 MB only). Blackberry allows
users to expand the external memory up to 2 GB.

Blackberry Pearl supports EDGE and quad-band GSM/GPRS networks with
reasonable enough data speed. The web browser it has is quite reminiscent
of its earlier models, with less or no improvements. For moderate browsing
needs, like looking up scores or specific data, however this seems
quite enough.

Regarding email, setting up an email account with Blackberry Pearl
is quite easy. Up to ten addresses are supported, the Blackberry
Enterprise Server, BlackBerry Internet Service, and Exchange options
being the major corporate tools. Attachments - images, documents, and
PDF files –
however are only viewable and cannot be edited. In that respect, it
is more like in RIM’s 7100 series phones.

The most valued feature of any business phone is its different organizer
features; Blackberry Pearl offers a variety of those, and that includes
Outlook, Outlook Express, Lotus Notes and Organizer, Novell Groupwise
and Sage ACT! Software. Using the Desktop Manager, the Blackberry user
could synchronize the memos, calendar, tasks, and contacts with the
relevant organizer tools such that every relevant piece of info will
be updated in the required applications simultaneously.

To sum it up, Blackberry Pearl is a feature filled smartphone
with more pros than cons. Its battery life is also very much ok, and
the price tag, the cheapest amongst any Blackberry models! On a whole,
it is a good business phone to start with.

Network London provides a hosted Blackberry mobile service
for enhanced communications, efficiency and security.

Blackberry Solutions

Disaster Recovery

Disaster recovery is one of the most important factors for most businesses,
yet it is often overlooked or considered too expensive to implement.

Disaster recovery solutions enable a business to continue working in the
event of fire, theft, malfunction or terrorism. By preparing for disaster
recovery, your business will not lose any valuable data, configurations
or time, saving you money in the long run.

By backing up data, applications, and settings continuously, to a secure
location, your business will be ready for any disaster situation.

Any proven IT company can provide these services, but at what cost, and how good
is it?

Since the introduction of Citrix and Microsoft's Terminal Services, it has been possible to provide these disaster recovery services at a much lower cost, with greatly enhanced security
benefits.

Switch your IT system to a corporate-level, Terminal Services environment
and what you get is a complete disaster recovery solution for a much
lower cost than you would expect.

As well as having your data and applications held in secure data centres,
your data could be continuously backed up, providing total disaster recovery.
The ultimate solution is to have complete redundancy for your IT system
and this involves not having any single point of failure within your
IT infrastructure.

Imagine having your company's entire data, software and structure housed
in two separate data centres, spread across two different ISPs, and having
all your systems and data held on servers that have their own backup
servers to automatically switch on, in the event of failure.

Most corporations do not have this level of redundancy, but for a fixed,
monthly fee, this and more is possible for companies with anything from
two uses to a thousand users.

Apart from all the mentioned benefits, you could also get the power
of hosted Microsoft Exchange, Outlook Web Access, easy Blackberry
mobile integration, hosted Microsoft CRM, and for the ultimate peace of mind, you can have portable security keys as used by major companies around the world to secure data,
where password-only protection fails.

These systems and solutions put companies back in control of their IT,
as systems are centrally managed, updated and supported from outside
company offices, providing a completely outsourced solution that will
save you money, instead of costing more.

Some companies get nervous by the prospect of their entire data being
held offsite, but this can be the safest option as multi-million pound
data centres have all the facilities to safeguard and protect your data
24 hours a day.

With high-powered backup generators, security patrols and fire suppression
equipment, your data and applications will be in complete safety, giving
you a powerful remote system with disaster recovery to take your business
to the next level.

Network London provides remote access systems and disaster
recovery to businesses in London and Europe.

Disaster Recovery Solutions