ABSTRACT
Many network managers fi nd it attractive and cost effective to merge and unify voice and data networks. A unifi ed network is easier to run, manage, and maintain. However, the majority of today’s existing data networks is Ethernet-based and use Internet Protocols (IP).
Such networks are best-effort networks in that they were not designed to support real-time applications such as Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP). VoIP requires timely packet delivery with low latency, jitter, packet loss, and suffi cient bandwidth. To achieve this, effi cient deployment of VoIP must ensure that these real-time traffi c requirements can be guaranteed over new or existing IP networks.
