Astribank 24 port channel bank?

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igorportugal

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#745803 16-Jan-2013 16:41

You may want to also consider Grandstream

http://www.grandstream.com/index.php/products/ip-voice-telephony/enterprise-analog-gateways/gxw4024

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techmeister

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#745890 16-Jan-2013 19:41

Yep, I will probably go with one of those, I can get them for a reasonable price.

sbiddle

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#745897 16-Jan-2013 19:58

Even though I've played with plenty of Grandstream gear (and planning on ordering one of their new Android desk phones next week to play with) I would never deploy their kit in a production enviroment due to the historic product failings and issues.

You would pick Audiocodes kit quality wise over a lot of other VoIP kit out there any day of the week, the MP124's are a very nice unit.

Regardless of the brand of hardware the biggest limitation of the Xorcom is that you're tied to an onsite Asterisk box. Ethernet offers so much more flexibility when it comes to a hosted PBX solution.

igorportugal

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#745938 16-Jan-2013 21:00

I would never deploy their kit in a production enviroment due to the historic product failings and issues.

We have plenty of Grandstream kit in production and it performs better than many other brands. Grandstream had issues in the past, however every other brand had similar issues with hardware and way worse issues with firmware, with an exception of perhaps Polycom.

Grandstream had a few issues:

One issue was with their firmware. This was about seven years ago. They've fixed the firmware six years ago and have been improving it ever since. Most of the bad rep is still around since that time.

The other issue they had was with power supplies for New Zealand with one line of phones (GXP2000). However that never affected phones deployed when connected to POE switches and we normally advise deploying phones with POE. I also wouldn't touch Grandstream little PABX.

However, their ATA range has not been affected by power supply issues and the firmware inside them is way better than most other ATAs available on the market. I'd recommend Grandstream ATA over Linksys for example any day - they are much better quality.

I do agree that Audiocodes kit is good though, if you can afford it.

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techmeister

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#746048 16-Jan-2013 23:52

sbiddle: Even though I've played with plenty of Grandstream gear (and planning on ordering one of their new Android desk phones next week to play with) I would never deploy their kit in a production enviroment due to the historic product failings and issues.

You would pick Audiocodes kit quality wise over a lot of other VoIP kit out there any day of the week, the MP124's are a very nice unit.

Regardless of the brand of hardware the biggest limitation of the Xorcom is that you're tied to an onsite Asterisk box. Ethernet offers so much more flexibility when it comes to a hosted PBX solution.

I have heard some bad things about Grandstream but I'd hoped that was some of their older stuff.
The MP124 looks quite good and not to badly priced.

I do realise that IP is more flexible but USB is very good as a integrated Asterisk solution and in fact may become the preferred analog/GSM/hardware addon solution for Asterisk, no PCI/PCI-E slots needed enabling very small form factor x86 PC,s, prices need to come down though.

It often comes down to price unfortunately, especially when insurance companies are involved.

igorportugal

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#746071 17-Jan-2013 07:10

I have heard some bad things about Grandstream but I'd hoped that was some of their older stuff.
The MP124 looks quite good and not to badly priced.

I do realise that IP is more flexible but USB is very good as a integrated Asterisk solution and in fact may become the preferred analog/GSM/hardware addon solution for Asterisk, no PCI/PCI-E slots needed enabling very small form factor x86 PC,s, prices need to come down though.

It often comes down to price unfortunately, especially when insurance companies are involved.

The bad things you heard about Grandstream are definitely about their older stuff, especially in relation to analogue termination adapters (ATA) and / or IP gateways.

Those IP gateways are well integrated with Asterisk, don't require PCI/PCI-E either. I personally can't see much benefit in a USB solution - although happy to be convinced otherwise by anyone out there who had experience with both.

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sbiddle

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#746120 17-Jan-2013 08:59

igorportugal
Those IP gateways are well integrated with Asterisk, don't require PCI/PCI-E either. I personally can't see much benefit in a USB solution - although happy to be convinced otherwise by anyone out there who had experience with both.

The main (and really the only) benefit of the Xorcom's is they use DAHDI meaning configuration is dead simple and removes the need to have any sort of SIP provisioning for them.

I've used them and would again if I thought it was the best solution, but analogue phones are going the way of the dodo now.

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techmeister

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#746538 17-Jan-2013 19:24

dodo lol

I agree analogue phones should go the way of the dodo, but it is difficult when you have one of the incumbents
(Telecom) actively discouraging VOIP telephony to my potential customers, that's all I'm sayin.

sbiddle

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#746544 17-Jan-2013 19:36

techmeister: dodo lol

I agree analogue phones should go the way of the dodo, but it is difficult when you have one of the incumbents
(Telecom) actively discouraging VOIP telephony to my potential customers, that's all I'm sayin.

It's not so much that Telecom discourage VoIP, but their solutions revolve around POTS and BRI. That should be all the selling point you need to push a superior VoIP based solution. I've got numerous 100+ extension multi site deployments that simply wouldn't be able to deliver anywhere near the functionality or capabilities in the legacy world.

On the reliability side however nothing comes close to Telecom's NEAX's and there is still plenty of life in them, especially with all the VoIP cards that have been installed in recent times for all the existing customers already technically using VoIP via the VMUX / Baseband IP solutions and upcoming UFB voice deployments.

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