Question 3
II. Explain how Internet faxing works and why it is often preferred to using traditional fax machines. (10 marks)

INTERNET FAXING
Internet Faxing or e-Fax is the process of sending and receiving facsimiles through the Internet rather than using modems or fax machines and traditional phone lines. The process involves the conversion of documents from their hard copy format to Adobe Portable Document Format (PDF) or Tagged Image File Format (TIFF) and combined with the body of an e-mail (i.e. acting as cover sheet) and sent to the recipient. How the message is handled on the receiving end varies depending on the method of transport. Websites such as eFax.com, Faxzero.com & Efaxcorporate.com are examples of Internet Fax implementations which allow its users to send faxes via e-mail and have those faxes forwarded via their telephone lines to any standard fax machine that is connected to a telephone line. These are referred to as Internet Fax Servers/Gateways and the following represents how the flow of data is handled via this process:
Sender’s Computer Internet Fax Gateway Provider Phone Line Recipient Fax Machine Another implementation exists where there is no telephone line as either the recipient, sender or both are equipped with fax software residing on the computer or standalone devices that have been configured to send/receive faxes over the internet via e-mail. In this deployment the flow of data looks like this:
Sender’s Computer/Internet Fax Device Internet Receiver’s Computer/Internet Fax Device The third implementation utilizes a mixture of old technology and new technology whereby the user sends the fax using either a computer equipped with a fax modem or a standard fax machine however the standard phone line is replaced by a Voice-Over Internet Protocol telephone line which is considerably cheaper than the traditional phone line. This allows the sender to reduce their cost or in some cases completely eliminate them if all calls are included within a fixed rate schema. The model looks like this:
Sender’s Fax Machine Voice-Over Internet Gateway Internet Receiver’s Fax Device Since its inception, the main reason why Internet faxing is preferred to conventional faxing is the drastic reduction in cost. As it relies on the Internet framework for which fixed costing has more or less become standardized there are no incremental costs associated with sending additional faxes. Through the advances in technology and lowering of broadband costs, this method has also proven more robust and reliable as traditional fax machines are limited to 14,400 bps or 14.4Kbps maximum. This meant multi-page documents would take a considerable amount of time to be transmitted from one end to the other in addition to the high cost already associated with printing the copies that you wanted to send via fax in the first place. However, using Internet fax, a scanned document can be sent to the recipient within seconds. This presents a huge advantage when dealing with books and other larger publications. As a result, consumers of today are able to experience huge savings in ink, time, maintenance fees for those machines, parts and other intangibles.

SOURCES: http://www.efaxcorporate.com/resources/How-It-Works http://home.efax.com/s/r/efax-brand12?VID=33675&gclid=CKSvtrjO660CFRJR7AodqlMJ7g http://www.savetz.com/fax/ http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-internet-fax.htm
http://www.maxemail.com/r/Making-A-Change-For-The-Better-With-Internet-Faxing.html