Isn't it wonderful how a simple idea can become absurdly complicated as 
soon as more people become involved?

For example... We are currently forming a plan for how our company will 
move to the new building that's being constructed just round the corner. 
As part of the move, I thought it might be nice to buy some shiny new 
Gigabit Ethernet switches. (Our current ones are 10/100 only.)

OK, only a few nodes actually support gigabit speeds, but it would be 
nice to have it. Additionally, it would mean we can have a functioning 
network in the new place and the old place at the same time, which is 
useful. On top of that, we probably don't need as many seperate boxes as 
we have at present, since there will only be 1 building instead of 3.

Checking online, it seems I can get to 24 or 48 port switch with gigabit 

depending on which make and model you go for.

Then the guys in the USA got wind of this idea. "Oh, don't order 
anything until we check it out. We've been trying to standardise on this 
particular model from Cisco and it would help tremendously if we had the 
same product company-wide."

Erm... well OK.

Hmm, well if it's going to say Cisco on the box, it'll be at least 2x 
the price. (Performing an actual check shows me that what I want will 

with justification that Cisco actually make the best products on the 
market. And there's even some danger of actual product support. And it's 
only a one-time cost. So, OK.

So I ask what model they're going with. Eventually I get back a reply. 
They don't know what model, they haven't decided what purchase route 
yet, and it won't be gigabit because that's too expensive. But they'd 
like to get something with PoE on it so that "in the next year or two" 
we can implement a complete VoIP system and we'll already have PoE in 
place when that happens.

Erm... what the hell?

(0. So it won't be gigabit, which is virtually the entire point of 
buying new switches in the first place, so I should probably stop here.)

1. Since when does VoIP require PoE?

2. For that matter, since when does VoIP require any special hardware of 
any kind?

3. You want to use VoIP? Um, *why*?? Do you just enjoy extra complexity, 
or is this because VoIP sounds all shiny and new and sexy and we should 
get with it?

4. So, let me get this straight. We're currently arranging a contract to 
spend tens of thousands of pounds to have our existing ISDN digital 
phone system moved to the new building, but "in the next year or two" 
you want to throw all that in the bin and move to VoIP? Are you mental?? 
You're telling us all this *now*?!?

Somebody correct me if I'm wrong, but last time I checked, VoIP is still 
an immature and very experimental research technology that isn't yet 
usable in the real world. (Unless you have absurd amounts of resources 
to throw at the problem, in which case almost anything can be made 
feasible.)

I can't *begin* to imagine what advantage VoIP would offer us as a 
company. (Apart from the obvious benefit that next time our Internet 
access fails, I won't be able to contact our ISP to notify them, and 
next time our VPN goes down, I won't be able to contact HQ to get it 
fixed...)

Well anyway, I'm moderately certain that our building intrusion alarm 
won't work without a real telephone line, so I guess we still need at 
least a few of those. ;-)

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