SPA-3000 Review/Guide: Affordable Home PBX

Kerbo writes "Seems every few days there is another news item about Asterisk PBX or Asterisk@Home, the open-source PBX system and associated installer package. You may have even been wondering what equipment you need to get started. The Geek Gazette has posted a review of the Sipura SPA-3000 ATA/Gateway with a complete setup guide on configuring it to work with Asterisk. This makes a very cost-effective way to get started by using your existing phone line as a trunk into the PBX."

Comments

The Cost Savings Here Could be Major

[ultimabaka]

Assuming the software works as well as private PBX systems, (which it doesn't yet seem to, based on the websites linked), it could save major dollars to larger corporations. My own company (Arch Insurance) easily spent thousands on our hardware PBX system, and we're not that big a company. I can imagine what, say, an AIG might spend every year just on this. Definitely worth exploring further.

Re:The Cost Savings Here Could be Major

[walt-sjc]

Um, Asterisk IS a PBX. It already works BETTER than most any other small-business PBX out there for a fraction of the cost. I've been running it over a year and it has NEVER crashed.

Digium (the company behind Asterisk) is obviously targeting the "larger than SOHO" business market - 18 ports and up. They sell a 4-port T1 card that gives you 92+ voice channels (depending on your circuit type.) Sangoma also is getting into the Asterisk / voice market with their own T1 cards.

Telco is it's own little world. You can be a really good networking / server person and be a fish out of water when it comes to deploying a PBX. Some people really don't understand that, then get all frustrated when they try to deploy an asterisk system all by themselves, have problems, then start bad mouthing it. But you don't have to go it alone. There are lots of consultants that can help. You wouldn't buy a $750K Nortel phone system and install it all by yourself would you?

For SoHo people, google for "asterisk at home." It can be fairly easy.

Re:ignorant question

[Nos.]

Now imagine a setup like this for a salesperson. There phone rings... as normal (PBX, Asterisk, whatever). Now, as the phone rings, an app on their computer takes the Caller ID and runs it through their database of existing customers. As our salesperson answers the phone, they can see every piece of information about that client. If they're not in the database, it could do a 411 lookup or something to pull any information it could. I thought about setting something like this up, but have just never got around to it. Wouldn't be that hard though.

fxs from voice modem?

[Anonymous Coward]

Would it be possible to create a fxs easily out of a voice modem? Voice modem is basicaly a fxo. So I figured that if it was possible to somehow 'add dial tone', it might be possible to build a fxs expansion card from a dirt cheap voice modem.

Anyone got an idea if it could be done?

Costs Might Not Scale Like You Think

[theManInTheYellowHat]

I have been checking out PBX's and phone systems for a while and I manage a couple of them right now.

The real cost of the phone systems are in the desksets which vary in features and cost but in a medium small office the PBX is a small percentage of the cost.

Consider a 30 station setup with 8 lines. The 30 phones would be somewhere between 6000 - 12000 depending on model. (you probably would not do elcheapo $75 ebay phones).

The {insert brand name here} PBX would be more but the asterisk would be probably $2000 (including cards). And then, no matter what system you choose, comes the programing, which should be about the same no matter what.

The thing that asterisk provides is the ability for everyone to use it. It is also exteremly accessable.