Callum99

Do you have any access control system in place? We use Paxton Net2, you can trigger ‘lockdown’ to lock all of the doors on site. Within triggers and actions, you could create an item ‘when lockdown is activated’ then ‘send an email’ which could go to a distribution list as a method to notify the MAT.

This is something that we are looking into for our trust. 18 Schools Primary/Secondary. Not all Paxton yet, but majority are Paxton Net2. We're looking at going down the single server route, and basing it in our Central Trust Office. Most of our primary schools have pretty basic IT infrastructure currently, some not even having any managed switches. Some questions if you don't mind: Have you come across any cons with only having the one server, such as any issues with using the Fire Alarm or Lockdown features? Presumably you have some form of VPN that connects this all together? I was looking into using Tailscale to form the VPN to each site, planning on having a 'Subnet Router' at each school and then the paxton controllers pointing to that as their router. Are there any downsides to this? Thanks

Hello, We've had some strange experiences with our Dell Servers. 2 weeks ago, our main Hypervisor (Dell EMC PowerEdge R640) unexpectedly shutdown during the middle of the day. There was nothing useful in the event log, and the server booted back up fine when turned back on manually after removing the power cables and plugging them back in. A few days later, the same thing happened again - however this time the server would not boot at all. PSU lights were on but nothing else. This ended up being a call to Dell and they came out under warranty as they said their was a problem with the motherboard. Today - one of our older servers had the same thing happen. This machine is a Dell PowerEdge R710 (2010). Obviously this machine is out of any warranty. Each server has 2 PSU's, One going to the main power supply, and one into the UPS. Has anyone got any ideas as to 1, how we can get the R710 back online and 2, what on earth the root cause of this could be? I just can't believe that it is a coincidence!?

Thanks Haroon. We’re not currently using the web client in the schools, but have Fanvil X4U’s, Fanvil X3S and Fanvil X210. Does it display the caller on these handsets? Very much interested in this. Callum

Does this work at MAT level? We’ve got 2 schools, and 3 joining our 3CX server this summer. Will this work for every school or does it have to be individually done per school? We’re not currently using the web client for calls, but have Fanvil X4U’s mainly. Would the parent / student name show up on these handsets?

Another +1 here for 3CX. We’ve just gone with them for two of our secondary schools with the view to roll it out to our other MAT schools. One server for the entire MAT. 4 digit extension numbers. Currently just the two secondary schools on so far. 130 extensions, and 10 external simultaneous calls. 32 overall simultaneous calls. 3CX hosted in the cloud, each site has a SBC. SBC’s are on our hypervisors at each school. I’d definitely approach at MAT level and have one phone solution trust wide.

Voicehost have this feature. You can simply ‘top-up’ your account.

We use Spiceworks for IT and Site. Simple enough and does what we need.

Check out a software called Blue Iris. Seems to work well for us and I personally use it at home too.

We’re looking at using Blue Iris and purchasing Reolink IP Cameras 5MP. Blue Iris can support up to 64 cameras, but of course depends on the hardware of the machine. Reolink cameras are good quality, and fairly cheap on Amazon, they are also often in the lightening deals or have other deals on Amazon bringing the price to around £40.