Planning A Cheaper Phone Service With VoIP

If you do a quick poll asking why people haven't switched to a VoIP telephone system the answer you are most likely to get is that they are unsure of how to set up the technology involved. However for a home installation or even one for a small or office-based business, the actual process is laughably simple and just about anyone with a broadband connection and a computer should be able to manage this with a minimum of fuss.

Of course, you first need to choose your voip service provider. With widespread broadband access for residential areas, there is now a huge range of providers who can supply a competitive rate for home voip systems so you shouldn't have any difficulty in drawing up a comparison shortlist or even getting a retail pack that includes all the elements that you need. It would be a good idea at this stage to have some idea of what your standard phone usage is, and what numbers you are likely to call. This will help you choose the most relevant provider and ensure that any special deals or extras such as free call minutes for special areas aren't wasted. Being able to make free or reduced rate calls to numbers, or even low cost international calls will soon add up to a significant saving each month if this represents your typical call volume.

The physical voip hardware required to set all this up is surprisingly small. The standard installation usually comprises an adaptor to plug into your broadband internet socket, leads and a software disk that installs the softphone application on your computer, allowing you to make calls from a PC. The only thing you will need is a set of speakers and a microphone in order to be heard on your calls. This is usually built into a laptop these days, and if you have a desktop or slightly older PC, you can easily pick up a mike headset from computer suppliers very cheaply. You can also purchase cheap internet voip phone handsets that look and function like a regular phone, but work through your voip connection instead of the regular phone line.