Latency and QoS for Voice over IP

This paper will familiarize the reader with the fundamentals of a VoIP (Voice over IP) implementation and its effects. VoIP has been a front runner for companies looking to take advantage of IP. There are cost benefits, however with VoIP there are challenges. VoIP is latency driven therefore your Infrastructure must be able to support it. Latency is the delay that occurs when a packet crosses a network connection, from sender to receiver. Quality of Service (QoS) is yet another challenge. QoS challenges derive from different traffic types requiring different service levels from the network. QoS in a network must be adept of; prioritizing traffic types; interpreting traffic types (applications running over IP); and then conveying them over the network so that QoS requirements can be met. We will discuss the technical issues involved with assuring QoS, as well as solutions.