The Essential Guide: Telepresence and VoIP18.03.2008 16:20 - source: VoIP-News.com Telepresence is a visual-communications technology that promises to revolutionize corporate collaboration by delivering real-time, face-to-face interactions around a virtual table. This is accomplishe... Read more… |
New MegaPath Service Makes Switching to VoIP Easier18.03.2008 16:20 - source: VoIP-News.com SMBs (small-to-midsized businesses) have a lot of decisions to make when it comes to phone systems. Choosing between TDM (time-division multiplexing) or IP is actually one of the easier ones, since by... Read more… |
Could the Spitzer Scandal Save Skype?18.03.2008 16:20 - source: VoIP-News.com When the Eliot Spitzer prostitute story broke last week, most observers were caught up with the seamy details: the Emperor’s Club Web site, the pricey hourly rate, the governor’s hooker&rs... Read more… |
Fonality trixbox Pro With HUD Wins Award18.03.2008 16:20 - source: Voipmonitornet Fonality trixbox Pro With HUD Wins AwardFonality announced that Technology Marketing Corporation’s Unified Communications magazine has named trixbox Pro with HUD as a recipient of its Product of the Year Award for 2007. Read more… |
Infineon Brings VoIP Functionality to Low-cost Mobile Phones18.03.2008 16:20 - source: Voipmonitornet Infineon Brings VoIP Functionality to Low-cost Mobile PhonesInfineon Technologies to offer VoIP functionality for low-cost mobile phones, enabling operators to offer fixed-mobile convergence by integrating Wi-Fi on its mobile phone platform. Read more… |
Godspeed Russell Shaw18.03.2008 16:20 - source: voipgadgets Russell Shaw passed away Thursday night in his hotel room after suffering from a cold. His death was unexpected and certainly a shock to me. I consider Russell a friend and his insights into VoIP were always good often sprinkled with a dash of humor or some political angle since he also wrote for the Huffington Post. Russell is one of the "original" VoIP bloggers along with Andy Abramson, Om Malik, Rich Tehrani, Pulver, and myself. Apparently, Russell had been traveling for a few weeks to various events. I know how having a cold and flying can be dangerous. TMC lost our ITEXPO sales manager Hilary Inman a few years ago after having a cold and then getting a blood cot in her lung after flying home. She was very young - in her low 30s and while there's no proof the airplane flight caused her death, I am much more wary flying when I have a cold. I have to wonder if all the traveling/flying that Russell did while having a cold contributed to his untimely death. But enough of my speculation. I guess I just want to understand how I have lost a friend - someone that I enjoyed hanging out with at ITEXPO reception parties and having some VoIP discussions or political banter. Russell Shaw also wrote the ZDNET IP Telephony blog and the Blackberry Blog. But you may not be aware that Russell also blogged for TMC's RSS - Regulations, Statutes and Standards blog that he was just "ramping up" traffic-wise. I actually configured the blog for him on my blog server, so I still feel a part of Russell lives on within the 'digital ether' of my blog server. Rest in peace Russell & may we meet again... More: Rich Tehrani - Russell Shaw & Frank Macari will be missed Larry Dignan of ZDNet Om Malik - Goodbye old friend! Russell Shaw, RIP Dan Farber Ken Camp Jim Courtney Andy Abramson Another Loss - RIP Russell Shaw Portland Loses a Blogger: Russell Shaw RIP Tags: Russell Shaw Related Entries Iotum looking for Blackberry users to test their app - Jan 05, 2007 Russell Shaw's new TMC blog launches - Nov 14, 2006 IPNetworked added to Gigaom blog family - Nov 06, 2006 Read more… |
Akros Silicon Launches First 802.3at PoE chipset18.03.2008 16:20 - source: voipgadgets 
Akros Silicon is a startup started back in 2005 that is one of the most important VoIP players you've probably never heard of. Akros Silicon develops Power over Ethernet (PoE) chipsets used in VoIP telephones, IP cameras, wireless access points (WAPs), routers, switches, thin clients, LCD displays, Tilt and Zoom (PTZ) capability, new multi-radio 802.11n Wireless Access Points, WiMax Customer Premise Equipment, SOHO Ethernet Switches, Thin Clients and more. Akros Silicon's chipsets are used in popular PoE IP telephones. You probably have or will soon have Akros Silicon's chipset in one of your network devices! Although Akros wouldn't comment who their current customers are, I have several IP telephones in the labs, including ones from Cisco and Polycom. Let's just say, I like taking things apart and it appears both these companies use Akros Silicon chips. (I'll have to take apart a Snom and Aastra phone when I get a chance.) In any case, the current PoE standard, IEEE 802.3af ratified back in 2003 only supports up to 13W (Type1) of power to the Powered Device (PD). The new standard called IEEE 802.3at supports up to 30W (Type2) of power to the PD or more than 2X the power from the old PoE standard. Besides the additional power (30W), Akros Silicon pointed out that 802.3at is improved over 802.3af in that it allows the PD to negotiate power to exactly the power that the PD needs. This results in better power management and low power consumption with superior "green emissions" over 802.3af. Officially, the 802.3at standard won't be adopted until the end of 2008, however, Akros Silicon is heavily involved with the standards body and as such has insights to this new standard. It also allows Akros Silicon to be months ahead in developing products that support this new standard. In fact, Akros Silicon told me that the standard is stable enough that they feel they can launch a chipset today that will meet the 802.3at standard. As such, today Akros Silicon is launching the industry's first 30W integrated Power Device Controller supporting 2-event Physical Layer Classification per the upcoming IEEE 802.3at specification. The AS1135 launched today is the successor to the AS11XX series of PD & DC-DC controllers. The 2-event Physical Layer Classification allows the PD to recognize whether it is connected to a Type 1 (802.3af/13W) or a Type 2 (802.3at/30W) Power Sourcing Equipment (PSE) and vice-versa. Thus, the 802.3at standard allow for legacy 802.3af devices to connect to 802.3at PSE switches and it will negotiate the specific port back to the old 13W specification. Akros Silicon has also successfully completed testing the interoperability of the new AS1135 PD Controller with Microsemi's recently released PD64001 PSE Power Manager. Microsemi acquired PowerDsine, one of the leading PoE PSE products. For some background on PoE PSE switches and mid-spans, you can check out my 2005 TMC Labs review of the PowerDsine PD6024G & PD6548 midspans. One other advantage of the additional power in the 802.3at standard is that it can be used to "trickle charge" laptops. While most laptops require 50-60W to full charge the battery, 30W is enough power to extend a laptop's battery charge from 2hrs to 8hrs or more. From personal experience, I hate taking my laptop to long meetings in the conference room since I also have to disconnect my laptop AC adaptor from my desk outlet and lug it to the conference room. Imagine instead I leave the AC adaptor where it is and instead connected a RJ45 cable to the network port on the laptop and it will "trickle charge" the laptop. I asked Akros Silicon which laptop vendors (Dell, Gateway, etc.) would be embedding PoE network interfaces into their upcoming laptops but Akros Silicon couldn't comment other than to say "big laptop companies are looking at that." This past Friday I asked Amit Gattani, Director of Marketing for Akros Silicon, "There's no issues with the wires melting with this increased wattage in the wires, is there? Especially when these wires run up in the ceilings where it could post a fire hazard?" Amit Gattani laughed and replied, "That's a very good question. At the standard level we spent a lot of time on this issue. Copper wire has a fairly high capability to carry current. However, heating of the cable, especially when these cables run in the attics and you're pulling 50 cables together in a bundle, heating of the cable can become an issue. One, 13W solutions you can use Cat 5 cable. For 30W it is Cat 5e and above and the reason is that Cat 5e and above have lower resistance drops so the heating issue is less." He added, "The 30W power limitation is actually put in place for a high degree of safety margin from the cable bundle heating up." Another advantage of their chipset is that PDs using their chip-set can support both 48V and 12V. 12V is the most common consumer voltage used by AC wall adaptors because they are the cheapest on the market. PoE operates at 48V but Akros Silicon's technology actually steps down to 12V to allow connectivity to many consumer devices that have virtually standardized on 12V. Akros pointed out that many consumer devices are still shipping with AC adaptors, but eventually consumer devices will start to to use PoE exclusively to save on the costs of producing & shipping AC adaptors. Ironically, IP phones is the rare exception in the PoE world with its 48V requirement. The new standard has a more sophisticated handshake protocol between the PSE and the PD and we are the first to implement that handshake protocol which enables better power management capabilities. "Let's say I have an IP phone with a color LCD display, but it's onhook and the backlight it off. A call comes in and the backlight turns on increasing the total wattage. Does the IP phone negotiate the maximum wattage at the beginning and keeps it at that maximum wattage or does it negotiate on-the-fly as conditions change?" Amit Gattani replied, "It can change on-the-fly. The previous standard it couldn't do that, but the new standard it can. But changing on-the-fly also means that now you are dependent on whether the PSE can supply that much power or not. That type of issue is left to the system software design. So you can negotiate up or down your power. At the physical layer is how much power is budgeted to the actual port." I commented, "So if you're not using additional power, the PSE switch isn't going to send it anyway." Amit Gattani replied, "Right. If you use only 4W then you'll get only 4W. Like you said, PSE won't send you anything more than that because you're only trying to draw what you draw. In any enterprise let's assume there are 50 phones with color LCDs. If every phone said I need 20W of power, the PSE that you would have to design would be way over specified. Because you won't have 50 phones in use at the same time, especially requiring 20W, so what will happen is the phone will come up, initially and say 'here's my maximum power need, but here's what I can work with it' in order to make phone calls, but you may not be able to use the video features and then based on that the PSE will allocate power. Instead of 20W x 50 phones which is 1000W, an IT Manager can deploy a 400W-600W PSE because he will know that not more than 20-30 phones will be calling at any given time. But you don't know which ports will need that power and that's where dynamic power allocation comes in." Another new feature is the capability to externally set the switching frequency of the integrated DC-DC controller in the 100kHz - 500kHz range. This gives designers added flexibility to optimize the system for parameters like EMI, power consumption and component sizes. Lower switching frequencies can be beneficial in controlling EMI and improving no-load efficiency. Designers may also use higher switching frequencies to reduce the size of components used in the power converter output stage. These features are additions to standard features found in the AS1100 product family like integrated surge protection and low emissions DC-DC controller, to enable EMC ready system designs. Summary of Features The AS1135 is fully integrated and designed to provide the following features at a system level: • Full support of the IEEE® Std. 802.3af-2005 and pre-standard IEEE® Std. 802.3at (Draft 2.0) power requirements • Support of the 2-event Physical Layer Classification (per 802.3at Draft 2.0 standard), with hardware “AT-Detect” output • Meets the IEC 61000-4-2/3/4/5/6 and IEC 60950 requirements for Surge, EMI and Isolation • Integrated surge protection for board level surge meets > 15kV Air Discharge (IEC61000-4-2), > 8kV Contact Discharge (IEC61000-4-2) and > 6kV Surge (IEC61000-4-5) • Integrated DC-DC converter with reduced EM emission for CISPR22/FCC part 15 Class B applications • Programmable DC current limit up to 800mA • Provides seamless support for local power down to 10V • Programmable frequency 100kHz to 500kHz • Low on resistance Hot Swap FET (0.8Ω typ) • Over temperature protection Pricing and Availability Akros offers reference designs and evaluation boards to help evaluate the performance of the AS1135. The AS1135 is available in a 20-pin 5x5 QFN with a Reduction of Hazardous Substance (RoHS) compliant package. The device is priced at $1.66 for 1kU quantity. Tags: 802.3af, 802.3at, Akros Silicon, Amit Gattani, chipset, PoE, Power over Ethernet Related Entries Read more… |
Sagem-Interstar adds Cisco UCM 6.1 SIP trunking T.38 FoIP support18.03.2008 16:20 - source: voipgadgets Sagem-Interstar, a Fax over IP (FoIP) solutions provider today announced new Cisco UCM 6.1 support using SIP trunking and T.38 real-time fax support. T.38 dead? No way! Today, Sagem-Interstar’s XMediusFAX Fax over IP (FoIP) solution adds Cisco Unified Communication Manager 6.1 support. Check out the news release after the jump...Continue reading Sagem-Interstar adds Cisco UCM 6.1 SIP trunking T.38 FoIP support... Tags: Cisco Unified Communication Manager 6.1, fax, Fax over IP, FoIP, realtime fax, Sagem Communications, Sagem-Interstar, SIP, SIP trunking, T.38, XMediusFAX Related Entries Faxterisk Adds T.38 support to Asterisk - Jan 30, 2008 Is T.38 Fax Dead? - Jan 18, 2008 RightFax Users Group (RFUG) Meets to discuss Fax, VoIP, and more - Feb 04, 2008 T.38 Fax Support, Hype or Reality? - Jan 28, 2008 SIP Trunking Not so Hot? - Jan 25, 2008 CDW offers Bandwidth.com's SIP Trunking Service - Jun 05, 2007 Switchvox SMB 3.5 and AA60 Switchvox Appliance - Mar 18, 2008 WYDE Voice Launches Asterisk-based Conferencing Appliances - Mar 12, 2008 Voiceroute Druid Open Source Edition Launches offering New Open Source Asterisk GUI Front End - Mar 12, 2008 SippySkype SIP-to-Skype Gateway - Mar 07, 2008 Read more… |
The Biggest Loser Week 1018.03.2008 16:20 - source: voipgadgets Continuing my updates for my local gym's The Biggest Loser competition, here's Week #10. Just to recap last week, I "threw the gauntlet down" against my fellow co-workers who were running their own Biggest Loser contest. I did a one way $100 bet against all 5 players that I could beat their weight percentage lost. One of the players who we'll call "J" emailed me, "You threw it down and I just picked it up! Your $100 beans is all mine!" Now that's the kind of smack talk I need to get my butt in gear and lose some more weight! As for the other players, one player whom we'll call "D" sounded quite confident he could beat me. He asked my starting weight and my goal weight. He's a much bigger guy than I am so he can certainly lose more pounds than me - the big question is can he beat my percentage. He seemed confident he could. Good luck with that Big D! Hey wait, that's a McDonald's sandwich! Another player whom we'll call "T" was skeptical he could match my weight loss numbers. He said something to the effect of "It's much harder for me because I have to lose a lot more pounds than Tom does." I guess no $100 for him. Of course, he could be playing coy so I don't try as hard. As for the other 2 players "R" & "A" no comments so far. In any event, here's this week's update including all previous 9 weeks for context. As I told some high school friends via email, I made them a "guarantee" I would lose at least 5 pounds or I would have to give up "something" that I would sorely miss. Fortunately, I knew I would lose at least 5 pounds this week because of the "new challenge" from my co-workers giving me new motivation. Nothing like a little inter-office rivalry to get my Irish pride going. My weight loss this week? A whopping 6 pounds! As Emeril would say - BAM!! This is my largest weight loss since Week 2 where I lost 9 pounds. And now for my next prediction, I predict I will win the next Powerball even if the previous $275 million jackpot will reset to something puny - like $20 million. (Just kidding. I don't gamble.) Here's the full week-by-week recap: Week 1 (Jan 14th) - weighed in at 198lbs (original weight) Week 2 (Jan 21st) - weighed in at 189lbs (-9 lbs) Week 3 (Jan 28th) - weighted in at 189lbs (0 change) Week 4 (Feb 4th) - weighed in at 186lbs (-3 lbs) Week 5 (Feb 11th) - weighed in at 186lbs (0 change) Week 6 (Feb 18th) - weighed in at 184lbs (-2 lbs). Week 7 (Feb 25th) - weighed in at 183lbs (-1 lbs). Week 8 (March 3rd) - weighed in at 180lbs (-3 lbs). Week 9 (March 10th) - weighed in at 180lbs (0 change). This week: Week 10 (March 17th) - weighed in at 174lbs (-6 lbs). Tags: contest, fat, The Biggest Loser, weight loss Related Entries The Biggest Loser Week 8 - Mar 05, 2008 Biggest Loser Week 4 - Feb 05, 2008 Biggest Loser Update #1 - Jan 30, 2008 Joined The Biggest Loser - Jan 17, 2008 The Biggest Loser Week 9 - Mar 11, 2008 The Biggest Loser Week 7 - Feb 27, 2008 Read more… |
Aastra AastraLink Pro 16018.03.2008 16:20 - source: voipgadgets 
Aastra Telecom has entered the IP-PBX game with the AastraLink Pro 160. This is a very interesting move since Aastra Telecom is known for their IP phones used by various IP-PBXs, including many of the Asterisk-based solutions - trixbox, AsteriskNOW, Druid, PBX in a Flash, etc. With the AastraLink Pro 160 Aastra is now competing with IP-PBX vendors that purchase their phones. It will be interesting to see if some IP-PBX vendors, especially the Asterisk-based ones, move towards other IP phones such as Polycom. I suppose in the SMB space you're still more likely to go up against Avaya, Nortel, Toshiba, etc. than another Asterisk competitor. In any event, the AastraLink Pro Model 160 IP PBX is based on open standards (SIP) and is designed for the small business market targeting 25 users and under. "Combined, and fully integrated with Aastra’s existing portfolio of SIP phones, the launch of the AastraLink Pro enables us to deliver to market a powerful and truly cost-effective telephony solution specifically created for small sized organizations," said Yves Laliberte, Executive Vice President at Aastra Telecom. “As a longstanding industry leader in the SMB space, Aastra’s key priorities are to design flexible and reliable products from the ground up to deliver enterprise-class IP communications to all of our SMB customers.” According to Aastra, AastraLink Pro enables users to quickly and easily get phones up and running by simply plugging the system into an existing LAN and it will auto-provision. They espouse the fact that it doesn't have hidden application license and user costs or the need of an installation technician. AastraLink Pro provides all the standard PBX/Key system features and functionality while leveraging a host of new IP-based services – including auto discovering and self provisioning of extensions, visual voicemail delivered via XML, SIP trunking, expanded user control via a web GUI, remote teleworker and the ability to network multiple AastraLink Pro's via IP. Designed to be compatible with select Aastra SIP phones, the AastraLink Pro also supports up to 6 PSTN FXO trunks, 2 FXS Analog ports and 1 SIP trunk plus external paging port and a music input port. Feature highlights: Local SIP extensions, remote SIP users and SIP Trunking Auto fax detection and routing Visual and standard voicemail Voicemail to Email notification with audio attachment Operator Console Auto-attendant (AA) with day/night/holiday scheduling and custom announcements Easy to use soft key management via global or local user templates with the ability to print soft key inserts XML interface to on board Push Button Input Trigger and Relay Output Built in audio in/out circuitry for music on hold and external paging Standard PBX/Key system functions such as: Busy Lamp Filed (BLF), Flexible Call Forward (CFB, CFNA, CFA), 3-way Conference Calls (3WC) and Call Park Key System emulation of SLA (Shared Line Appearances) (FXO ports only) * Enhanced system features such as: Find-Me Follow-Me (FMFM), Directed Call Pickup (DCP), Aastra SIP telephone auto discovery and FXO line monitoring via GUI Up to 6 Foreign Exchange Office (FXO) ports for connection to analogue public telephone lines (PSTN). Each FXO is equipped with on-hook CallerID detection and full G.168 echo cancellation The Aastra AastraLink Pro 160 will be available May 2008. I'm curious if this appliance is Asterisk-based, or if Aastra built this from the ground up using Linux at the core. I'll shoot Aastra off an email to find out more. Stay tuned... Update: 11:06am This from Aastra's PR rep... It is indeed an Asterisk based solution: "AastraLink Pro 160 is comprised of a Linux-based appliance running Asterisk open source call manager embedded software. The product was designed in house by Aastra's R & D department." Tags: AastraLink Pro 160, Aastra Telecom, Asterisk, IP-PBX, VoIP Related Entries Intuitive Voice Technology Calls Out other Asterisk Competitors - Asterisk Clone Wars Have Begun... - Mar 13, 2008 Asterisk 1.6.0 beta5 - Mar 06, 2008 Schmooze the Yiddish Asterisk - Feb 01, 2008 PIKA for Asterisk boards now trixbox CE compatible - Jan 22, 2008 Digium launches Switchvox Free Edition - Oct 31, 2007 Free IP-PBX! - Oct 24, 2007 Avaya #1 VoIP PBX Vendor? - Aug 21, 2007 Digium Acquires Astricon - Jul 11, 2007 Mitel sues ShoreTel - What does it mean? - Jun 28, 2007 Predictive Dialing on Asterisk? - Jun 13, 2007 Read more… |
Nortel unveils new unified communications solutions18.03.2008 16:21 - source: www.topix "By bringing together all of the devices, phone numbers and inboxes, Nortel is simplifying the work environment and allowing more real-time interaction." Nortel is unveiling new unified communications solutions that let today's mobile worker connect more quickly with colleagues, make faster decisions, and increase responsiveness to customers while helping ... via MobileTechNews Read more… |
D2, Freescale Team18.03.2008 16:21 - source: www.topix "With D2's optimized support for voice performance and delivery, the SoC offers manufacturers a way to economically deliver the additional functionality and faster interfaces required for devices and today's varied business applications." D2 Technologies, the market leader in embedded software platforms that power IP communications, today announced the availability of D2's vPort VoIP software on Freescale Semiconductor's MPC8323E PowerQUICC II ... via Light Reading Read more… |
Extreme Networks Boosts Security for IP Telephony and VoIP18.03.2008 16:21 - source: www.topix Extreme Networks made enhancements to its network solutions that provide behavior-based rules to protect IP Telephony and VoIP traffic. via VoIPMonitor.net Read more… |
P Diddy denies Tupac allegations18.03.2008 16:21 - source: BBC News Rapper P Diddy says a report claiming he was behind a 1994 attack on Tupac Shakur "beyond ridiculous". Read more… |
Game ratings under more scrutiny18.03.2008 16:21 - source: BBC News The classification of games is coming under increased scrutiny following the decision to release Manhunt 2. Read more… |
Leakey backing for elephant cull18.03.2008 16:21 - source: BBC News Richard Leakey, the eminent African conservationist, gives qualifed backing to South Africa's elephant cull. Read more… |
SocGen rogue trader is released18.03.2008 16:21 - source: BBC News Former Societe Generale trader Jerome Kerviel, accused of losing billions of euros, is freed from custody. Read more… |
Officer unlawfully killed family18.03.2008 16:21 - source: BBC News A police inspector unlawfully killed his wife and mother-in-law before killing himself, a coroner rules. Read more… |
Top policeman convicted of murder18.03.2008 16:21 - source: BBC News A senior Indian policeman, Ravi Kant Sharma, is found guilty of murdering an Indian Express journalist. Read more… |
China thanks India for Tibet move18.03.2008 16:21 - source: BBC News Chinese PM Wen Jiabao says he "appreciated" steps taken by Indian authorities in handling protests by Tibetans. Read more… |
Kuwait emir to tackle cabinet row18.03.2008 16:21 - source: BBC News Kuwait's ruler is expected to cut short a private trip to Morocco to try to resolve a growing political crisis. Read more… |
Iraqi asylum seeker numbers jump18.03.2008 16:21 - source: BBC News The number of Iraqis applying for asylum in developed countries almost doubled in 2007, a UN report says. Read more… |
Greek common-law marriage row18.03.2008 16:21 - source: BBC News The Greek Orthodox Church opposes government plans to give more rights to unmarried couples. Read more… |
New Bank of Japan boss rejected18.03.2008 16:21 - source: BBC News The Japanese government's latest nominee to be governor of the Bank of Japan is to be vetoed by the opposition. Read more… |
Trial of Chinese activist begins18.03.2008 16:21 - source: BBC News Human rights activist Hu Jia goes on trial in the Chinese capital, Beijing, charged with subversion. Read more… |