Suggestions for an 8-line phone system?

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jmroberts70

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How savvy will the you/users/manager be? I'm NOT a fan of the dead Response Point platform. If you're savvy, you can either do a Asterisk system with a pair of Patton 4114s ($250each on fleabay) to support a total of 8 lines. And I've been a big fan of Yealink phones lately. The T26 model is available for around $90ea. Add in a PC/VM for the software and a POE switch or AC adapters and you're ready to install. Another option would be a license for 3CX as a windows based PBX with great performance/ease of use and full provisioning capabilities. You'll find standard-based systems will always beat proprietary systems for flexibility.
 
We've been using 3CX and Yealink phones for the past three years, love it. 3CX is a software based PBX system, it's running on a virtual win7 box w/ a voip provider for the phone lines. We had a box that allowed us to use analog lines, I don't recall the name but I know its common to do that setup still.

www.3cx.com

www.yealink.com
 
Any reason why you want to go with analogue lines today? You're most like better off getting a hosted PBX solution with decent phones.
//Danne
 
Go find yourself an old norstar meridian system, it will NEVER DIE
 
diizzy said:
Any reason why you want to go with analogue lines today? You're most like better off getting a hosted PBX solution with decent phones.
//Danne
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Dude, I'm totally with you. Unfortunately, this office got screwed over by a phone and internet provider and has them locked in a contract they can't get away from. I actually promote hosted PBX services most of the time but these guys are simply trapped.
 
jmroberts70 said:
Does this look like it would be a decent gateway for 8 analog lines:

http://www.amazon.com/Linksys-Cisco-Telephony-Gateway-Spa8000-G1/dp/B000V2PHZA

I think I'll still need to set up a Asterisk box and pick up some phone units but maybe this will at least get me started?
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That cisco unit does the opposite of what you need. It is an ata, voip to pots. You need pots to voip. You should be looking for a fxo card that works with asterisk. A Grandstream GXW-410X can act as an fxo gateway too. You could host the pbx as a vm with that.
 
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The only issue with the older Nortel / Norstar equipment is that it lacks most basic features including Caller ID and Voicemail. The things last forever but are as basic as it gets.
 
and uhh, i've had several die, i have a pile of old phone systems at my office that have all been replaced by a corporate-wide asterisk system and i've got plenty of dead nortel gear...

so, i'm not exactly sure where that stuff comes from...

anyway, for 8 lines, it may actually be cheaper for you to buy a fractional T1, depending on who your provider is and etc...

not that digital interfaces for asterisks PBXs are very cheap, lol
 
I'm already on a T1. The company I'm working with signed a retarded contract with a provider that has screwed them out of money for over a year now and they can't get out of it without severe financial penalties. The T1 is giving them 16 analog lines out and the remainder is for data (although not a very fast data). It's outrageous that they would even offer such a terrible package to them. So I'm stuck making these 8 analog lines work...

The currently have 2 suites -each one using 4 lines (out of the 8). But because of this they can't transfer calls between suites. So I'm trying to find a system that will make use of all 8 lines in a single desktop unit. The only 8 line phone sets I've seen are PBX systems. Otherwise, maybe there's some sort of digital gateway that will take all 8 lines and convert it to a VOIP system that runs on Ethernet?
 
As I said before, you need a Grandstream GXW-4108. That will enable you to use an ip-pbx (like asterisk or pbx-in-a-flash) with your 8 analog lines. From there you could use any ip-phone you wanted.

The advantage of the Grandstream is that you could host the pbx on a virtual machine.

Physcal lines> grandstream> ethernet> pbx> ethernet> ip phones
 
jmroberts70 said:
I'm already on a T1. The company I'm working with signed a retarded contract with a provider that has screwed them out of money for over a year now and they can't get out of it without severe financial penalties. The T1 is giving them 16 analog lines out and the remainder is for data (although not a very fast data). It's outrageous that they would even offer such a terrible package to them. So I'm stuck making these 8 analog lines work...

The currently have 2 suites -each one using 4 lines (out of the 8). But because of this they can't transfer calls between suites. So I'm trying to find a system that will make use of all 8 lines in a single desktop unit. The only 8 line phone sets I've seen are PBX systems. Otherwise, maybe there's some sort of digital gateway that will take all 8 lines and convert it to a VOIP system that runs on Ethernet?
Click to expand...

That's what asterisk or any other PBX does. In this case, you'll need 3 parts. There is no way around this...
1) The PBX - Software + a PC or VM, This binds everything else together and allows the sharing of lines. Either the Freepbx or PBX In a Flash ISOs work wonderfully. For a PC, I've done this on everything from a P3 with 512mb to a VM with a single core and 1GB of RAM and 20-40GB max HDD space. For an assumed max of 8-10 concurrent calls that'll be plenty of horsepower.

2) Away to connect to the analog lines - IP Gateway such the Patton 4114 that I mentioned at the beginning of the post or the Grandstream that bds1904 mentioned are great choices and commonly found on fleabay as well. This is the piece that turns the analog lines into SIP trunks for the PBX to use. The problem here is that finding an 8 line FXO gateway is both REALLY expensive and fairly rare. 4 Line models are much more common. That being said there are 2 types of adapters for analog lines. FXO and FXS lines. FXO's receive dial tone from outside lines and FXS's MAKE dialtone to hook up analog phones to the PBX. In your case, you need to accommodate 8 outside lines for use within the system and therefore need 8 FXO ports.

3) Desktop Phones for each extension. Keep in mind these need power from somewhere so you'll either need a POE switch or AC adapters.
 
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I'd probably go with Avaya or Panasonic for a smaller install like that.
The old Nortel systems are great too.
 
jmroberts70 said:
I'm already on a T1. The company I'm working with signed a retarded contract with a provider that has screwed them out of money for over a year now and they can't get out of it without severe financial penalties. The T1 is giving them 16 analog lines out and the remainder is for data (although not a very fast data). It's outrageous that they would even offer such a terrible package to them. So I'm stuck making these 8 analog lines work...

The currently have 2 suites -each one using 4 lines (out of the 8). But because of this they can't transfer calls between suites. So I'm trying to find a system that will make use of all 8 lines in a single desktop unit. The only 8 line phone sets I've seen are PBX systems. Otherwise, maybe there's some sort of digital gateway that will take all 8 lines and convert it to a VOIP system that runs on Ethernet?
Click to expand...

well....

T1s aren't analog, they're digital.... so....

is there a media converter somewhere that's literally giving you dialtone on wire pairs? this may be more complicated than you think... you may want to have a telephony pro look at your system before you start buying stuff...
 
goodcooper said:
well....

T1s aren't analog, they're digital.... so....

is there a media converter somewhere that's literally giving you dialtone on wire pairs? this may be more complicated than you think... you may want to have a telephony pro look at your system before you start buying stuff...
Click to expand...

They could have a channel block coming off the T1 and not a PRI
 
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