On Wed, Dec 1, 2010 at 10:28 AM, John Gitau <jgitau@gmail.com> wrote:
Wash,
What wash is asking for makes for an interesting case when evaluating a service for your business. The simple answer is as always it depends or yes and no:-)
Lets start with facts: - No one will give you end to end QOS to the internet. they would be lying. you know this already:-) - 3G/edge..hmm actually lets focus on 3G for a while: the air interface is packet-switched which in essence means that a limited number of high-speed RF data channels are shared across many users. If you work it backwards, this pretty much means that again no one can guarantee you a specific speed without some serious operational overheads. Its an interesting balancing act between not over investing and giving a good service, any one thats worked in an ISP can give you some interesting tales about this sort of thing. With fancy backend systems for telcos (pcrf/ims), QOS can be 'pushed' closer to the user especially if you are on a router/device that can mark packets and you have knowledge of how the telcos 'might' be doing their QOS. - Safaricom has some seriously well designed and redundant capacity to the internet. - TCP as a protocol wrecks havoc on some applications over wireless connections, most not noticeable by users but they are still there. not sure how that will affect your voip, what codec you're using etc etc.... - I could go on and on and on about this but the end result is yes, Wash can run a decent voip service on 3G,Its a perfect backup link and to better manage it a static IP (private or public) + a vpn can be issued/bought, however only he can decide whether or not its good enough for him. If you need guarantees, it will cost you a little bit more, you could go as far as asking for an SLA from any provider and they'll be happy to provide you with one, probably at a cost. in the end there is no clear answer like yes, you will be comfortable with this service for application x,y and z....
My advice , test that scenario you want up there...Im willing to loan you a Huawei E960 (router) so long as you promise to post your detailed results here:-) then you can make a better decision:...
Hello John, Thank you for the detailed response and for the offer of Huawei E960. I already own one, but that will not stop me from posting the detailed results here. Do you reckon I need the static IP as a prerequisite for the test? I just realized that there is a mistake in my sketch. The router behind the Huawei is actually an 1811. I hope it doesn't change the scenario much. PS: I am still a Cisco newbie. -- Best regards, Odhiambo WASHINGTON, Nairobi,KE +254733744121/+254722743223 _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ Damn!!