techie08 Posted July 1, 2015 Posted July 1, 2015 Hi everyone We are looking at changing our aging phone system to a VOIP system and wondered what systems people are using? Does anyone use SIP trunking rather that traditional ISDN lines with theie VOIP System? Im not really that clued up on all the different systems out there. Thanks
FN-GM Posted July 1, 2015 Posted July 1, 2015 (edited) We use FreePBX with SIP trunks. For the phones we use Cisco 6941 works really well. We use it at all our Academies. Used it for years. No complaints. Edited July 1, 2015 by FN-GM
Meldrew Posted July 1, 2015 Posted July 1, 2015 We use 3CX. Very easy to learn and maintain. Currently using ISDN, but will be using SIP trunks early next calendar year. Meldrew
techie08 Posted July 1, 2015 Author Posted July 1, 2015 With 3CX and Freepbx, are you running them on a VM or physical?
FN-GM Posted July 1, 2015 Posted July 1, 2015 With 3CX and Freepbx, are you running them on a VM or physical? Virtual Machines all the way!
localzuk Posted July 1, 2015 Posted July 1, 2015 With 3CX and Freepbx, are you running them on a VM or physical? Currently physical, after summer, virtual with a Sangoma Vega 50 as the FXO gateway.
techie08 Posted July 1, 2015 Author Posted July 1, 2015 Which reseller did you go with? did they do the install and which handsets have you got?
localzuk Posted July 1, 2015 Posted July 1, 2015 For the system, we did it entirely in house. We run Grandstream GXP-2000 handsets and a few of their newer models. However, I wouldn't advise buying Grandstream anymore, they aren't as stable as they used to be.
FN-GM Posted July 1, 2015 Posted July 1, 2015 Which reseller did you go with? did they do the install and which handsets have you got? All in house for us. However these guys are pretty good - Home
techie08 Posted July 10, 2015 Author Posted July 10, 2015 Do you need layer 3 switches for the IP phones and phone system or will layer 2 be fine? Im not sure if you wanted to make use of the network port on the phones, you need a L3 switch? Our core switch is layer 3.
localzuk Posted July 10, 2015 Posted July 10, 2015 I've got layer 3 on core, layer 2 everywhere else. So long as you can set up VLANs and QoS it'll work fine. 1
Blue_Cookeh Posted July 17, 2015 Posted July 17, 2015 (edited) Installed an Avaya IP Office 500v2 system the other day with Avaya 1616 handsets all round. Brilliant little system, VERY powerful and not at all expensive! We got the right cards for both POTS and ISDN lines, but the system has SIP capability for when we finally get a half decent Internet connection. We went down that route because we didn't want to run or maintain a server/VM, very much set and forget. Just make sure you have power fail provision. Remember your SIP trunks probably won't be working in a power cut unless you're fortunate enough to stick your entire infrastructure (inc PoE switches) on UPSs... Edited July 17, 2015 by Blue_Cookeh
Geoff Posted July 17, 2015 Posted July 17, 2015 I hate Avaya with a passion. FreePBX with Polycom phones.
CAWJames Posted July 17, 2015 Posted July 17, 2015 Single Dell 2800 running FreePBX distro, Asterisk 11, 1 ISDN30 PRI card(OpenVox D115) and Gamma SIP trunks(we receive calls on the PRI and make calls on the SIP, and until we are out of contract on the PRI, this is how it will work, BT were worried when we stopped making calls!!). Phones are mostly 69XX series Cisco running in SIP mode. We run all our desk phones, here and at our 3 other centres, all over the VPN back to the single server. While this has worked great for a few years, it does mean in the unlikely event of a lights out at our main centres, the other centres lose their phones! So we are currently in the process of installing some s/h DL360 HP servers at each site to run Asterisk 13 and its own SIP trunk, and back over the VPN to other centres for internal calls.
DGardiner Posted July 17, 2015 Posted July 17, 2015 (edited) Installed an Avaya IP Office 500v2 system the other day with Avaya 1616 handsets all round. Brilliant little system, VERY powerful and not at all expensive! We got the right cards for both POTS and ISDN lines, but the system has SIP capability for when we finally get a half decent Internet connection. We went down that route because we didn't want to run or maintain a server/VM, very much set and forget. Just make sure you have power fail provision. Remember your SIP trunks probably won't be working in a power cut unless you're fortunate enough to stick your entire infrastructure (inc PoE switches) on UPSs... I have the same system and its a nice solid piece of kit. i use the 9608 phones now as my go to... but have 1616s everywhere, they only support POE and require you to setup the DHCP options to auto configure the phones which was a pain to find when i first got them BUT the big screen on it means people don't write on the label bits over and over and over when staff move around/leave Edited July 17, 2015 by DGardiner
ITGURU Posted July 17, 2015 Posted July 17, 2015 We changed from old analogue system about 5 years ago. We have 3 ISDN boxes (6 lines) into the server room and then into a Siemens OpenScape VOIP unit, with Openstage 15 phones on separate VLAN. Only issues we've ever had is storms taking out the ISDN boxes (The BT bloke told me last night when they wake up in the night after a storm they know the next day will be busy), but other than that all works fine.
MatthewL Posted July 17, 2015 Posted July 17, 2015 Avaya very powerful for the money and very reliable. Had this in a number of call center environments and NHS environments, can do lots with it.
Jobos Posted September 21, 2015 Posted September 21, 2015 The school has had a quote for VoIP but it's came back very expensive so I've been asked to put some prices together for an in-house system. As I know next to nothing about VoIP I've spent the morning reading through the forum and 3CX pops up time and time again. The 3CX website looks good and I like the how it can be managed using a GUI which always helps someone like me! So at the moment we have 15 NTL/Virgin Centrex lines, 9 of which see very little use. My brief is to price up a system which had auto attendant and will also reduce costs from the current Centrex system. I'm still not quite sure what SIP trunks are and if we need them at all as others have said they use a separate broadband provider or even use the spare capacity on their current broadband. We use KCom here if that helps. If we were to go down the 3CX route and run the software on a VM we would need the numbers porting over. Who would we contact for that, and how would the VM connect to the outside world? Is it just a matter of connecting the VM to the network via the Ethernet? I expect these questions are very basic and I will probably laugh about them this time next year but as said I know nothing about the subject!
manc_techie Posted September 21, 2015 Posted September 21, 2015 I'm using Skype4B business here over Gamma SIP trunks, this uses Exchange Online UM features for voicemail and auto-attendant. Most staff are using Logitech Headsets and the Skype4B client being in business now we do a fair bit of international dialling but going from a Nortel BCM40 using ISDN to this is saving around £24k a year which is a huge saving as any calls between our sites now go over SIP.
john Posted September 22, 2015 Posted September 22, 2015 The school has had a quote for VoIP but it's came back very expensive so I've been asked to put some prices together for an in-house system. As I know next to nothing about VoIP I've spent the morning reading through the forum and 3CX pops up time and time again. The 3CX website looks good and I like the how it can be managed using a GUI which always helps someone like me! So at the moment we have 15 NTL/Virgin Centrex lines, 9 of which see very little use. My brief is to price up a system which had auto attendant and will also reduce costs from the current Centrex system. I'm still not quite sure what SIP trunks are and if we need them at all as others have said they use a separate broadband provider or even use the spare capacity on their current broadband. We use KCom here if that helps. If we were to go down the 3CX route and run the software on a VM we would need the numbers porting over. Who would we contact for that, and how would the VM connect to the outside world? Is it just a matter of connecting the VM to the network via the Ethernet? I expect these questions are very basic and I will probably laugh about them this time next year but as said I know nothing about the subject! So SIP or ISDN is your choice for phone lines, SIP comes over internet either the current line or a dedicated one. KCOM may sell SIP trunks. If you move to SIP from ISDN (or Analogue) you can usually port your numbers over. If you are not confident in this area be careful when phones are down SLT will shout very quickly so you should look at geting some help if you want to DIY it I would say to save your backside from being roasted. We use ISDN and/or SIP Trunks into Asterisk which we then pass off to Lync 2013 en-premis and use Enterprise voice through that and its great and works perfectly, the Asterisk boxes are physical where we have ISDN lines to integrate as they have a Digium card in them to connect to ISDN and where its SIP its a VM in some cases on VMware. 1
ITGURU Posted September 22, 2015 Posted September 22, 2015 When we went to VOIP we have 3 ISDN boxes installed (6 lines) only issue we've ever had it lightning strikes taking out the ISDN boxes as apparently they are sensitive. At most we've had 2 boxes go at once, luckily still leaving us 2 lines. A quick call and as we're a school (classed as business) usually here within 4 hours or next day to just replace the ISDN boxes. 1
localzuk Posted September 22, 2015 Posted September 22, 2015 The value of SIP trunks depends how many lines you need. If, like us, you only have a very small number of lines, then SIP may well not work out the best price-wise. We only have 3 analogue lines here. The cost of putting ADSL on one of them and the paying for SIP lines on top is higher than simply continuing to run 3 analog lines. Its a PITA to run analogue (crackle crackle, issues with gain adjustments etc...), but its also cheap. 1
Jobos Posted September 23, 2015 Posted September 23, 2015 @john I know what you mean about DIY and it's not something I fancy doing unless someone is on hand to answer any questions. As it stands I feel like I'm swimming through treacle. We have had a quote in so I wanted to see how they planned to do it but so far I've not been able to get my hands on the quote and I can't get a figure on what the budget is either. I was impressed with 3CX but as our server is on it's last legs and no money to replace it till next year running 3CX on a VM is out for this year at least. Half the problem is they want the system fitting ASAP and I've not had time to physically look at how other city schools have done it an as the saying goes 'Fail to plan, plan to fail!' which sums it up really
localzuk Posted September 23, 2015 Posted September 23, 2015 If you are going to run VOIP on your network, you really need to run it at least in its own VLAN. So, if you're going to host the back end in a VM, your virtualisation setup should also handle VLANs. It isn't a lot of hassle to organise, but it can make the process longer and more complex to set up overall.
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