PBX Systems Advice, asterisks yes no?

Question

Hey guys my company already has an old PBX analogue system, that supporting about 75 users, we recently hired about 4 users who will be doing there own specific tasks the software we are giving them requires VOIP compatibility phone systems and our old pbx systems dose not support that, recently was told about a program called trixbox i was thinking of investing on it and just installing it on a server we perches, what I'm getting to is what is your advice on trixbox, good bad etc. and would you recommend another type of PBX thank you.

Answer 1

The 3CX VoIP Client will run from any PC.  That is how I use it.  You can configure it to work with the 3CX IPPBX, or any SIP-based VoIP service of your choice.

I also like the fact that it allows me to pre-configure as many different VoIP providers as I like and switch between services on the fly.

I have my 3CX Client configured with CallCentric, InPhonex, Les.net, and Voip.ms.

The VoIP Client can be downloaded by itself:

http://www.3cx.com/VOIP/voip-phone.html

As far as the IP-PBX software, I believe it will also run on regular PC.

This FAQ indicates it will run on Windows-XP SP2, and Vista Business edition, as well as Windows 2003:

http://www.3cx.com/support/operating-sys...

--------------------------------------...

I use VoIP a lot for personal use, but don't have direct experience with IP-PBX.  From what I understand, Trixbox and a variation on Asterisk and are both well known and used.

Another option to look into is the 3CX IP-PBX system.

I use the 3CX VoIP Client as a softphone on my PC to access my VoIP services.  I understand that the 3CX IP-PBX is available in a free version for assessment use.  Could be worth checking out.

http://www.3cx.com/

Answer 2

It really depends on what you're trying to do.  The problem with going with something like trixbox or asterisks is that you wouldn't be able to connect directly to the PSTN without a sip gateway.  VoIP itself is limited by the fact that you need a special box (called a PSTN gateway ) in order to connect to the public phone network.  

The thing to be aware of a VoIP based phone system vs a PBX is that the connection to the rest of the world usually uses a protocol such as Q.293 over a pri or some sort of POTS line.  With a "traditional" VoIP system the signalling protocol is usually either SIP (simple to set up and support) or H.323 (can be really hard to setup) in both cases you need a specialized box called a PSTN gateway.

Another  thing to be aware of is that with SIP video calling is built in so to expand a voice only VoIP system to include video is usually a matter of adding a video camera to the PC depending on whether or not the client supports it.

And lastly but most importantly the biggest factor which will determine a successfull VoIP deployment is the network.  Even though you might have 75 users, how are they connected?  If you're on a hub based network then the chances of it working are next to nil.  In most cases you will want to also look at throwing at the very minimum of a layer 2 switch capable of doing QoS.