atcomsystems.ca/forum Forums VOIP Phones & IP PBX Cisco Telephones and Systems CISCO IP PHONES

telecomtex,
Good response.
I'm still on the fence. I can see there are some places where VoIP will work, though I can't see how it can be cheaper. Certainly would not be cheaper for me to rip out an existing infrastructure, especially with over 250 analog ports in use.
I did think of one place where all the PBX's I've worked on (Avaya, Nortel, and Mitel) were lacking. Integration of databases. This may have gotten better on the Nortel and Mitel. I have not worked on them in a while. As for Avaya, I have to maintain an employees name in the switch, voice mail, and call accounting. I keep a separate excel spreadsheet to track everyone and make a directory to be passed out every 6 months or so.

Richard

Telcomtex- Cisco and Vertical Televantage are notorious for recurring licensing fees. Anytime I bid against these systems I have the customer make the vendor put in writing what it will cost at current rates to relicense every year. I do have Nortel PBXs under maintence that were installed in 1990 that have never been upgraded because the customer didn't require new features or were forced to. And guess what? No license fees after the initial purchase. Once people factor in the higher cost of ownership because of network upgrades and the recurring fees the playing field starts to get a little more abstract. I sell VoIP where it makes sense. Tying remote systems and teleworkers. No license fees after the initial purchase. Guess I'll have to check what the other VoIP manufacturers such as Shoretel and Altigen require for fees in case I ever run up against them in a competitive bid. I'd be curious if there are any VoIP manufacturers that don't charge.

You know I think all in all it is a balancing act. For instance in the voicemail arena with the big three you are going to pay a substantial amount just to add a 2 port voice mail and as you add ports the price goes up significantly but with the system we install there is no extra cost involved with voicemail and since it is built in there are basically as many ports as there are extensions. You can not outgrow it without outgrowing the system. There are other examples but as you can see its six of one and half a dozen of the other. If VOIP fits then use it...if not...well don't!
I had a huge sell recently because a customer wanted to bring a Nortel up to date. By the time they looked at the cost to upgrade the old equipment the decision was easy. The cost of the system upgrade and a year of MACs and troubleshooting paid for the new system that we just installed.
Don't get me wrong, I am OK with the status quo!

Telecomtex
I dont sell any other IP except Samsung. I dont care to be one of the Guys nor do I need to justify the need for voip. As far as experience, I believe we all have at least a network+ (its required to sell and install some systems) most have a ccna and an mcsd.

The Qos requires voice to take priority over data does it not ? and when you are using 2 or 3 channels for voice how many kbps are in use?

So what happens when there are 30 users or channels being used? and what happens to the bandwidth at that point.

All that said, this quote from ED says it all in a nut shell "Yes, it's true if I run dedicated home run CAT5 or better to a dedicated switch and keep the VoIP running separately, then VoIP will likely work flawlessly, hands-down. It will work as well, in fact probably better than TDM systems. Bandwidth brings a lot more capabilities, that's simple to me. But at the same time, doesn't this contradict the whole concept of IP telephony"


Or maybe I dont have a clue and should stay out of the subject. I think I will leave the voip to the IT guys and stick to my lowly tdm systems.

"Yes, it's true if I run dedicated home run CAT5 or better to a dedicated switch and keep the VoIP running separately, then VoIP will likely work flawlessly"

Sorry guys, we operate on ONE cat 5 drop for both our computer and our phone with powered switches (this way we have power for the phones), and you know what it works 'flawlessly'. Our data runs on one VLAN and our voice is seperate on another VLAN which is set up in the routers, this is about the only seperation we have as far as voice from data.
This is another one of the advantages of Voip, you don't need two drops at each location which I'm sure you guys already know.

I think you should experience Voip all you can, yes there are bad installs, there are bad systems and you'll encounter bad circumstances. But you'll also have good ones as well, you'll learn new things and be that much better in your field.
While some of us hate some of us like it, I still enjoy working on the old stuff still but the new stuff is a nice change once in a while.
Good luck!

You are fortunate to have a site with little issues. New Cisco installs are specing separate runs for voice and data. There are quite a few sites here locally that do the one run and they are the ones having the most problems.

If you use only one run, for both phone and pc, does that mean you are limited to 10/100 connection? I know gigabit uses all pairs, can POE work with that?

Yes, you can run POE devices over gigabit links. Power and data on the same pair is not a problem. I'm not sure there are any phones capable of acting as Gigabit switches, though, so that may be the limiting factor.

Personally, I don't like the idea of a single drop, from a support standpoint. Too many variables. It sure would save on switch rack space, though.

Thanks for the info, Steve.

--Larry

Yeah, Yeah. It works both ways. I dont know how many times a customer with a certain glea in their eyes has asked if what i am selling them will do VOIP. Everybodies knows all the buzz words; dont they.