Audio Teleconferencing

Or Audio Conferencing. The original technology used for audio teleconferencing was based on PBX conferencing circuits. Setting up conference calls through the PBX is cumbersome, voice quality degrades as the number of people on a call increases and there are capacity limitations. As a result, specialized conference bridges were developed to improve capacity and voice quality. Conference bridges, however, require trained operator intervention to schedule and invoke most features. As a result, individual corporations find the cost of ownership prohibitive, and the market for such products has been concentrated on service bureau providers. Today, PC-based systems combine the freedom of conference bridges. By installing a conference server on your voice networks, you can set up, attend, and manage your own conferences over any touch-tone telephone. Additionally, users can schedule meetings using desktop software from their e-mail systems, or from a Web browser. The latest word in this area is having the endpoints themselves being able to provide local mixing, hence eliminating the need for network based conference servers!

Back to VoIP Glossary →