Ip-telefoni med Skype som ett alternativ till PSTN för privatanvändare
The project is a practical and theoretical test of IP telephony with Skype in
order to form a base for a comparison between IP-Telephony with Skype and the
Public Switched Telephony Network (PSTN). PSTN is the common standard that most
of us use for telephony today. The objective for the study is to simplify the
choice between PSTN and IP-Telephony for the Swedish private customer user
group.
The project is supposed to answer the following questions.
- How easy is it to start using IP-telephony with Skype?
- How is the quality of IP-telephony compared to PSTN?
- Are all services provided by PSTN available and accessible using the
IP-solution?
- How are the usability and the availability of support with IP telephony?
- Is IP-telephony a cheaper solution and in that case under which circumstances?
Within the project a collection of practical and theoretical tests have been
performed to be able to form an opinion on the IP-solution in the following
areas, installation, function, quality, usability, costs, accessibility and
security.
In order to study usability, a test group of ten persons have been used to
evaluate the usability of the system. A practical test of the Skype client has
been committed through a series of test calls to examine function and quality.
Data on accessibility, cost and security of the Skype solution have been
examined in relevant literature and on the Internet.
The study shows that the Skype solution works as well as PSTN considering
function and quality. A certain amount of computer knowledge is required to
install and to used the Skype solution, thereby it is not as user friendly as
the PSTN. Considering the costs, it is only possible to save money for those
who make a large amount of international calls. In other cases the Skype
solution is more expensive. Skype themselves are very clear that they do not
provide the function of emergency calls. This is considered as a large setback
reviewing the possibility of replacing your PSTN telephone with the Skype
solution.
The conclusion based on the facts and arguments in this report is that the
IP-solution is not an alternative for the Swedish private customer user group
in general, compared to PSTN.