asterisk users - Feb 2007 - Experiences with FoneBridge2 / TDMoE?

I'm scoping out HA for a relatively simple Office/Call Center PBX.  Current
setup uses a TE412P with 4 PRI our telco with SIP hard/soft phones for
users.  Some outbound also goes to a SIP provider.

Active/Active looks to be too much hassle for an installation this size, so
we're looking at adding an extra * in an active/passive configuration with
Linux-HA in between them.

Does anyone have any experience using The Redfone Fonebridge2 in this
configuration?  It seems like it would do the trick, but I can only find the
one testimonial/tutorial on voip-info.org.  Specifically, I'm wondering
about the reliability of the device itself (since you can't seem to pair
them in any way) as well as what extra work the * box has to do in a TDMoE
configuration.  I can't find any mention of EC being done on the Fonebridge,
so I assume you'd have to use software echo cancellation in the zaptel
driver.  Other than the CPU to do that, does zaptel take up more/less CPU
reading frames from a PCI card vs TDMoE?

Any experience or suggestions on other ways to do this are appreciated.

-- 
j.
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Hi James -
> I can't find any mention of EC being done on the Fonebridge,
> so I assume you'd have to use software echo cancellation in the zaptel
> driver.
I can't answer your other questions about the Fonebridge as I haven't
used one either, but I did contact their support about echo
cancellation, and they said it would all have to be done in software.
I asked quite a while before the "fonebridge 2" existed, and it came
out and still doesn't have any echo can features, so I assume they
don't plan on adding this feature.

- Noah

P.S.  If anyone can answer James' other questions, I'll be interested,
too.

Hi, there.  I'm in the process of deploying one at a customer site
so I have a bit of experience with them.  Set up of the unit is trivial...
You create a text file for the config and then use the provided uploader to
send the config to the unit.  Because it *is* TDM, we went with a
direct-wired solution via cross-over cable between the FB2 and a dedicated
NIC on the AstBox;  saves chewing up 1.2Mb constant chatter on the LAN.

	Fail-over is done via "heartbeat" monitoring;  when your first
machine drops, the second machine simply uploads a modified config file to
the FB2 and all traffic then starts pouring to the second machine.  Trivial.

	The FB2 is *dumb*;  there is no NVRAM, so if the power goes for even
a second, it looses its config.  My answer is a CRON job that simply reloads
the config every minute;  worst case senario is 1 min of PRI unavailability.

	Bottom line is this is "KISS"-level kit.  There is nothing to break,
and it just works.  We got one up and running, from the time the config file
was created, in 1 second....   Run config util while dialing PRI on my
cellphone and call went through.

	We do have one odd issue, which is outbound noise on the line...
Sounds like an electronic snake having a hissy fit in the background.
Inbound calls are crystal clear;  PRI E1(T2) in France.  I've no idea what
the issue is, but its also brand new kit.  I'll be contacting RF support
about it.

	The only thing we've found is that on the Asterisk side, the TDMOE
driver is cranky.  Really cranky.  ZTDYNAMIC won't load first try 80% of the
time, ZTCFG fails to configure more than 20 channels 80% of the time, etc.
So, while the FB2 is working fine, it's the Asterisk side that is flakey.

	Best of luck in your installation!

	--Michel