Determining the Optimal Architectures for VoIP Services

by Storm Rack

Companies offering VoIP services encounter various obstacles in maintaining the quality and dependability of their services. Key challenges include maintaining low latency to prevent call delays, ensuring high availability to reduce downtime, and achieving good scalability to handle a surge in call volume.

We outline five potential structures for VoIP businesses in this article, each having its own pros and cons. These architectures are created to address challenges in diverse manners, providing a range of customizable options to suit individual company requirements.

Under, utilizing its vast knowledge and skills in IT infrastructure, has supported numerous VoIP firms in deploying these setups, striving to find the most suitable scenario and cost-effective solution for each client. Our DDoS protection solution is specifically tailored for this industry, and we have a demonstrated history of assisting clients in enhancing their infrastructures consistently.

A secondary link from another Under operator can provide extra availability when a single zone is unavailable, enabling customers to access more availability in one zone as if they had two zones. It is advisable to have two zones and the secondary link in all situations.

We suggest that VoIP companies consider securing SIP trunks directly through operators with a dedicated link, ensuring physical delivery to their data centers. This enhances the quality of internet connections and provides greater independence.

Infrastructure Designs for VoIP Businesses

  1. Bare Metal architecture in a single zone involves consolidating servers into a single rack for precise hardware control. It features an independent network core with dual stack switches for network reliability and a backup internet link for redundancy. This setup prioritizes high performance and low latency, crucial for VoIP quality.
  2. This solution utilizes a private cloud infrastructure with a high availability cluster. Servers are consolidated into a single rack, and an independent network core is set up with two stack switches. It includes a secondary internet link for redundancy. Virtualization of resources offers flexibility and scalability to meet the changing needs of VoIP.
  3. This architecture uses the public cloud of Under, providing VMs with 2GHz/vCPU reserved processing for VoIP tasks to maintain stable performance. While network resources are shared with other users, limiting network isolation, this setup offers the most flexibility and scalability among the three options for adjusting features based on VoIP requirements.
  4. This design involves spreading the VoIP processing cluster across two zones in São Paulo to enhance resilience. It can be carried out using VMs, Bare Metal, or Private Cloud to maintain service operation even if one zone fails. A load balancer is employed to efficiently manage traffic, with options like Cloudflare for load balancing or keying based on DNS in active-active or active-passive cluster setups. In an active-active cluster setup, VMs in both zones work concurrently to process data.
  5. This structure prioritizes disaster recovery by utilizing Veeam Backup & Replication to maintain a duplicate environment in a secondary zone. If the primary zone experiences an issue, the workload is shifted to the backup zone. This approach is cost-effective compared to a distributed cluster architecture as it minimizes the continuous use of computing resources, activating them only during main zone failures.
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Architectural Comparisons for VoIP Firms

Architecture

Advantages

Disadvantages

Best

Bare Metal in a single zone

Granular control over hardware, high performance, low latency

While backing up using Veeam we can’t use Veeam’s replication feature for not having hypervisor

Ideal for companies that need high performance and low constant latency.

Private Cloud

Flexibility, scalability, high availability

Higher cost, management need, although Under does management

Allows you to use Veeam replication and create a larger number of servers than Bare Metal. A hybrid use between Bare Metal and Cloud is another common use case.

Public Cloud

Maximum flexibility and scalability, optimized cost

Shared network resources, limited network isolation

Companies that need flexibility and scalability. Combining with Bare Metal is also a good option.

Distributed between Two Zones

High resilience, guaranteed service continuity

Greater complexity, higher cost

Suitable for companies that value service continuity above all and can afford additional costs.

Disaster Recovery

Focus on disaster recovery, optimized cost

Use of resources only in case of failure

Companies that want a robust disaster recovery plan without the need for full-time resources.

The design of buildings

Benefits

Challenges

Top

Bare Metal in one zone

Detailed management of hardware, excellent performance, minimal delay

When utilizing Veeam for backup, the replication feature cannot be used due to the absence of a hypervisor.

Suitable for businesses requiring top performance and minimal consistent delay.

Private Cloud – Cloud infrastructure dedicated to a single organization.

Flexibility, scalability, and strong availability

Management needs to address the higher costs associated with the situation.

Enables the utilization of Veeam replication for managing a greater quantity of servers compared to Bare Metal. Another typical scenario involves a combination of Bare Metal and Cloud services.

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Public Cloud

Optimized expenses with maximum adaptability and expandability.

Limited network isolation restricts the sharing of network resources.

Companies that require adaptability and the ability to grow may find that integrating with Bare Metal servers is a beneficial choice.

Divided into Two Areas

Guaranteed service continuity with strong resilience.

Increased complexity leads to higher expenses.

Ideal for businesses that prioritize uninterrupted service and have the financial means to cover extra expenses.

Disaster Recovery explained

Emphasize on recovery after disasters and cost efficiency.

Resources should be utilized only if there is a failure.

Companies seeking a strong disaster recovery plan without requiring constant resources.

The selection of the most suitable architecture for a company depends on various factors such as company size, call traffic needs, budget, and call quality importance. Under is prepared to help choose and implement the most appropriate architecture to ensure the best VoIP service quality possible.

In summary

The selection of the most suitable architecture for a VoIP company relies on various factors such as company size, call traffic volume, budget, and call quality significance. Under is prepared to help in choosing and setting up the most suitable architecture to ensure top-quality VoIP service for customers, offering a range of options to tackle the challenges of delivering high-quality voice services over IP.

About Below

Reference is a data center with over 20 years of expertise, focusing on innovation, dependability, and outstanding service. They provide a variety of advanced technological services, such as dedicated servers and cloud computing, and run two Tier 3 data centers in São Paulo, Brazil, featuring top-notch security and backup systems.

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