In this paper the authors review the theoretical bibliography of convolutional codes defined over any finite field and introduce a model for evaluating their error correcting capabilities. Until now, the developed models were limited to a binary field with only two elements. However, in this work we focus on the analysis of MDS, sMDS and not MDS codes defined over any finite field. We validate theoretical results of convolutional codes in a more realistic model to obtain the recovering error capability and we compare it with the results obtained simulating binary convolutional codes used currently in common communications systems as GSM or 802.11a. Moreover, implementation complexity in the coding and decoding process of convolutional codes over any finite field are also evaluated and analyzed with the intention of find out what encoder is the most appropriate to be implemented in a real communication system.