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Cheap and Reliable IP Telephony?
anomalie asks: "I am trying to sell IP telephony to my employer. The idea was shot down once already because of the cost (using a Cisco solution). I would like to find a cheap but reliable IP PBX because everyone liked the idea of IP telephony, just not the price associated with it. I need a system that could initially handle about 80 users at a single location, and eventually handle about 350 users at 7 locations. The two systems I have been looked at so far are Asterisk & Pingtel's SIPxchange IP PBX. I'm not looking here for a final solution, just some starting points for more research. Any feedback/tips/warnings from the Slashdot community?"
"I am looking to have at least the following capabilities:
-Auto attendant
-Handle a PRI (hopefully allow forwarding of old PBX DIDs)
-Handle long distance T1 (we would initially segment off some channels from our current PBX)
-Handle WAN Traffic so we could utilize our unused channels for long distance from other locations
-Forwarding of voicemails to email
Nice optional features:
-Web based GUI for voicemail administration
-GUI call manager
Eventually, we would have relay units at the other locations to handle the local calls and call routing and have 1 central PBX at corporate headquarters."
-Auto attendant
-Handle a PRI (hopefully allow forwarding of old PBX DIDs)
-Handle long distance T1 (we would initially segment off some channels from our current PBX)
-Handle WAN Traffic so we could utilize our unused channels for long distance from other locations
-Forwarding of voicemails to email
Nice optional features:
-Web based GUI for voicemail administration
-GUI call manager
Eventually, we would have relay units at the other locations to handle the local calls and call routing and have 1 central PBX at corporate headquarters."
are the moderators on crack or just don't know what the vonage can and can not do for you?
Parent post wants a PBX. Not a phone company. Vonage is a phone company, not a maker of PBX devices. Nor do they sell PBX devices that are up to the job.
Obviously this poster knows nothing about what the parent poster wants and/or doesn't care. Mod him down. As to the subject at hand, I personally don't know a lot about the subject, but I am an expert on Vonage, having had (and cancelled) their service. They make sense for a 1-number 1-building 3-4 room small business. Anything more is seriously overpimping what they can provide.
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