Toshiba Phone System

Do downloads influence the quality of IP telephony?

If I have a DSL internet connexion of 5.0Mbps download and 800Kbps upload capacity, but for some reason my downloads don't go faster than 50Kbps, do I have to worry about them blocking the telephone? I want to make sure to keep the phone line open.

Public Comments

1. IP telephony is sending/receiving data packets the same as downloading any other data. 50kb/s downloads aren't using even 25% of your capacity, so you should have plenty available for IP telephony. If you use a stand-alone phone for your telephony service (or even if you use a service like Skype), you can use Quality of Service to ensure that the phone service has enough data allocated. These settings can be changed in your router (if you use one) and even in the operating system itself; search for 'quality of service' and your approrpiate router and/or OS to find how to change these settings.
2. There are a number of reasons why your downloads do not exceed 50 Kbps, and some of them could very well affect the quality of your phone connection. However, it should not keep you phone line unavailable. You should try www.speedtest.net to see if you are able to receive 5.0 Mbps, if not then you should contact you ISP to find out why.