Hello.
I am going to be putting together my first * system using FXO/FXS
interfaces. All the systems I have set up thus far have been pure VoIP
setups.
The system I need to set up should have 3 FXO interfaces and 1 FXS
interface, as well as several SIP phones. I have noticed people
complaining about Digium's TDM cards - are these isolated incidents or
are these cards unreliable? I intend to get the TDM400P with the
necessary FXO/FXS boards - can I expect the installation to be somewhat
straightforward? Any tips to avoid grief?
Would it make more sense to get 3 cheap X100P's and use some kind of ATA
for the FXS? Will obviously save a whole bunch of money, but will there
be significant added complexity?
--
Nabeel Jafferali
tel: 416.491.9136 (toronto)
646.225.7426 (new york)
fwd: 46990
email/msn : nabeel<at>jafferali.net
> I am going to be putting together my first * system using FXO/FXS > interfaces. All the systems I have set up thus far have been pure VoIP > setups. > > The system I need to set up should have 3 FXO interfaces and 1 FXS > interface, as well as several SIP phones. I have noticed people > complaining about Digium's TDM cards - are these isolated incidents or > are these cards unreliable? I intend to get the TDM400P with the > necessary FXO/FXS boards - can I expect the installation to be somewhat > straightforward? Any tips to avoid grief?I think the best that anyone can estimate at this time is that a problem exits of some sort and it might be related to a combination of factors, one of which seems to involve specific motherboard designs. There are far too many people complaining about the same issues with the TDM card, several of which opened cases with digium support and got no response. It should be fairly obvious from the many postings on this list since that card was announced that something is not right, and at least some of those systems have digiums T1 cards on the exact same pci bus that are operating just fine. If you read through the archives, you'll see a number of people flapping their jaws using adjectives and adverbs about what they think the issue happens to be, but the majority (if not all) don't have a TDM card and apparently wouldn't touch one with a ten foot pole. What is obvious at this point is: a. no one on the -user list is going to fix (or even hint with any degree of authority) the root-cause b. don't ever post anything to the -dev list regarding a TDM card as that is NOT the forum for digium cards or drivers, c. digium support is not addressing the issue, and, d. the amount of effort required to support the TDM card (stop *, restart the drivers, start *) in its present condition is far greater then what any reasonable non-technical customer will endure. Since this has been an on-going battle, I'd suggest avoiding the TDM card totally, or, take the 50-50 risk to see how high you can raise your frustration level.> Would it make more sense to get 3 cheap X100P's and use some kind of ATA > for the FXS? Will obviously save a whole bunch of money, but will there > be significant added complexity?Three x100p's are likely to cause even more issues due to the high level of system interrupts. (Note: digium has removed them from their web site.) Current experience... three spa-3000's are far more stable then a TDM card, and you'll get three fxo's plus three fxs's for less money.
What exactly are people seeing when they have "issues" with their TDM card? Brian Greul Texas Shirt Company www.txshirts.com 713-802-0369 / 713-861-6261 (fax) -----Original Message----- From: Rich Adamson [mailto:radamson@routers.com] Sent: Saturday, January 01, 2005 3:09 PM To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] Qs about FXO/FXS cards> I am going to be putting together my first * system using FXO/FXS > interfaces. All the systems I have set up thus far have been pure VoIP> setups. > > The system I need to set up should have 3 FXO interfaces and 1 FXS > interface, as well as several SIP phones. I have noticed people > complaining about Digium's TDM cards - are these isolated incidents or> are these cards unreliable? I intend to get the TDM400P with the > necessary FXO/FXS boards - can I expect the installation to be > somewhat straightforward? Any tips to avoid grief?I think the best that anyone can estimate at this time is that a problem exits of some sort and it might be related to a combination of factors, one of which seems to involve specific motherboard designs. There are far too many people complaining about the same issues with the TDM card, several of which opened cases with digium support and got no response. It should be fairly obvious from the many postings on this list since that card was announced that something is not right, and at least some of those systems have digiums T1 cards on the exact same pci bus that are operating just fine. If you read through the archives, you'll see a number of people flapping their jaws using adjectives and adverbs about what they think the issue happens to be, but the majority (if not all) don't have a TDM card and apparently wouldn't touch one with a ten foot pole. What is obvious at this point is: a. no one on the -user list is going to fix (or even hint with any degree of authority) the root-cause b. don't ever post anything to the -dev list regarding a TDM card as that is NOT the forum for digium cards or drivers, c. digium support is not addressing the issue, and, d. the amount of effort required to support the TDM card (stop *, restart the drivers, start *) in its present condition is far greater then what any reasonable non-technical customer will endure. Since this has been an on-going battle, I'd suggest avoiding the TDM card totally, or, take the 50-50 risk to see how high you can raise your frustration level.> Would it make more sense to get 3 cheap X100P's and use some kind of > ATA for the FXS? Will obviously save a whole bunch of money, but will > there be significant added complexity?Three x100p's are likely to cause even more issues due to the high level of system interrupts. (Note: digium has removed them from their web site.) Current experience... three spa-3000's are far more stable then a TDM card, and you'll get three fxo's plus three fxs's for less money. _______________________________________________ Asterisk-Users mailing list Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
> Current experience... three spa-3000's are far more stable > then a TDM card, and you'll get three fxo's plus three fxs's > for less money.I have experienced nothing but grief when trying to set up the PSTN part of the SPA-3000. Everything from crackly audio to fast busies. Has anybody tried the Clipcomm CG-410 4-port FXO gateway (http://www.voipsupply.com/product_info.php?products_id=241)? -- Nabeel Jafferali tel: 416.491.9136 (toronto) 646.225.7426 (new york) fwd: 46990 email/msn : nabeel<at>jafferali.net
brian@txshirts.com wrote:> What exactly are people seeing when they have "issues" with their TDM > card? > >I have four of them in service, in everyday use--one R&D, one home, and two small office. None has given us the least problem, ever. One caveat that might be germane, given the complaints of others on the list: mine do station (FXS) functions only. We use all of them on SuperMicro mobos, which allow use of the APIC-style IRQs. My customers are very happy with them. B.
> Except for the little problem I've fought for about a week > without any Joy - no combination of efforts from numerous > sources (wiki, this forum members, my efforts) has succeeded > in a spa-3000/asterisk combination that actually works. If > you have specific spa-3000 and asterisk configs that actually > work with both spa-3000 ports I'd sure like to have you share them.I have managed to get it work, though I don't use it now. You set up some random SIP account on your * server and feed that authentication information into the PSTN Line VoIP settings. You then enable the PSTN-to-VoIP gateway, set PSTN Caller ID Pattern to *, then set call-forwarding under PSTN User to: Cfwd Sel1 Caller: * Cfwd Sel1 Dest: 123 where 123 is an extension in the context that the SIP account on the * server is in. -- Nabeel Jafferali tel: 416.491.9136 (toronto) 646.225.7426 (new york) fwd: 46990 email/msn : nabeel<at>jafferali.net
> Dec 31 12:03:55 NOTICE[7145]: chan_sip.c:7486 handle_request: > Failed to > authenticate user WIRELESS CALLER > <sip:714XXXXXXX@1.0.24.5>;tag=83eaec7dcb80f5feo1Have you tried the "A prefix" trick, which uses Line 1 Call Forwarding as opposed to PSTN Line Call Forwarding (with the added advantage that the SPA-3000 does not pick up the SPA-3000 line until after the extension/* picks up)? -- Nabeel Jafferali tel: 416.491.9136 (toronto) 646.225.7426 (new york) fwd: 46990 email/msn : nabeel<at>jafferali.net
> I have experienced nothing but grief when trying to set up > the PSTN part of the SPA-3000. Everything from crackly audio to fast > busies.BTW I take that back. I spent an hour on this after posting my last email, and with a little tweaking, everything seems to be working well now. -- Nabeel Jafferali tel: 416.491.9136 (toronto) 646.225.7426 (new york) fwd: 46990 email/msn : nabeel<at>jafferali.net
Nabeel Jafferali wrote:>>Dec 31 12:03:55 NOTICE[7145]: chan_sip.c:7486 handle_request: >>Failed to >>authenticate user WIRELESS CALLER >><sip:714XXXXXXX@1.0.24.5>;tag=83eaec7dcb80f5feo1 >> >> > >Have you tried the "A prefix" trick, which uses Line 1 Call Forwarding >as opposed to PSTN Line Call Forwarding (with the added advantage that >the SPA-3000 does not pick up the SPA-3000 line until after the >extension/* picks up)? > > >Yep - in fact the above error message used to have an A in front of the 714 - found out that basically anything in that field would cause the immediate forward...
Rich, I have been wondering if the spa 3000 would make a good PSTN interface for an * box where POTS is the only available (or practical) service. Have you implemented this? Are there any limitations or known issues? The SPA2000 sure seems to work well as an ATA, even had good luck with fax over IP using g.711 and the fax detection in zaptel and the SPA (turns off echo cancel dynamically when the CNG tone is heard I believe). Can you use the FXS and FXO ports at the same time, for two separate calls via * ? The SPA 3000 is small enough that a half dozen of them would be manageable, any more than that and your are usually in the T1 price range for service anyways. Thanks, Damon> -----Original Message----- > From: asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com > [mailto:asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com] On Behalf Of > Rich Adamson > Sent: Saturday, January 01, 2005 2:09 PM > To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion > Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] Qs about FXO/FXS cards ><snip>> Current experience... three spa-3000's are far more stable > then a TDM card, and you'll get three fxo's plus three fxs's > for less money. > > > _______________________________________________ > Asterisk-Users mailing list > Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users > To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users >
I hate to ask the obvious.... But what's your power quality like? Is the system on a UPS? UPS supplied power makes a huge difference in system stability. I wouldn't run a server for anything (including testing) without it. Second, what class of hardware? You do get what you pay for and "flakiness" can often be traced to power issues.>From what I can tell the Digium hardware does some signal processingmagic by relying heavily on system power and cpu power. The first clue here is the 12v plug to provide dial tone/ring to your ATAs. BTW, Ring on a analog phone is typically 90vAC. Dial tone is @48V. So if you put a bunch of analog devices in you are begging for headaches. I learned those numbers after being shocked. I don't strip phone wire with my teeth anymore. Shame on me for being lazy. I'm a firm believer in not running production systems on bargain hardware. I had nothing but grief out of my desktop class and generic trash systems. And yes, Shuttle is generic trash, as is ASUS, and A Open and a host of other Taiwan Special stuff. The way you save money in those systems is by making thinner PCB's which will drive you insane trying to troubleshoot. One tweak of your case and you can "lose" some contacts. At any rate, judge a circuit by it's thickness. Trash is like paper and flexes. Quality is thick and will cut you before it bends. I'm running older, but solid hardware and not seeing any issues. I'm using a Compaq Proliant 1850R Gen1 dual PII 400 with 512MB ram, GB ethernet, and SATA Hardware RAID. Cheap, efficient, redundant. And for a Debian box, good enough. Initial testing with TOP shows that one ATA to VOIP connection costs 4% of CPU to start up and then 2% to carry. Considering we have 10 handsets and 10 employees with 4 lines and normally no more then 2 people on the POTS lines.... I think we're in good shape. If you're planning to run a E*trade call center, you may want more substantial hardware. If you are planning the Mom&Pop Voicematrix @Home you may be just fine with a old Proliant. They have redundant power supplies and they are cheap and indestructible. Although it's a bit loud to keep in the bedroom. :) Don't get me wrong, I'm not trashing your hardware. If you can run cheap bargain hardware and get it to work great. But my experience has been that I lost my A** on generic knockoff stuff when I sold PC's for a living. I spent a lot of time chasing errors that I never could find the cause of. Granted my webservers run Windows... And this is a linux app... But I see uptime in the range of months with Proliant hardware. That *is* remarkable for MSFT products. Anyhow that's my two cents..... I wonder if there is a correlation between hardware class and issues with TDM boards? Brian Greul Texas Shirt Company www.txshirts.com 713-802-0369 / 713-861-6261 (fax) -----Original Message----- From: Michael Welter [mailto:mike@introspect.com] Sent: Saturday, January 01, 2005 5:15 PM To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] Qs about FXO/FXS cards brian@txshirts.com wrote:> What exactly are people seeing when they have "issues" with their TDM > card? > > > Brian Greul > Texas Shirt Company > www.txshirts.com > 713-802-0369 / 713-861-6261 (fax)Since you asked, and since I'm well into this bottle of Merlot on New Year's day: 1. Power alarms. WTF does that mean? Wish I had some support docs. 2. On bootup, "Excessive leakage module x, ProSLIC failed Auto Configuration". Again, WTF? Reboot and it's ok. But, just a reboot after driving 100+ miles to the client site is not a good option. 3. On bootup, a LED won't light. When zapata gets to it, it can't find the channel. Usually means a complete power cycle to get it to work. 4. A TDM card that isn't recognized at all. DOA. 5. Impedience matching to eliminate hummmmmmmmmm? I'm calling Matt on Monday, and hopefully he'll RMA these cards. I hope that everyone that has a life is out enjoying the New Year. Cheers, Mike -- Michael Welter Introspect Telephony Corp. Denver, Colorado US +1.303.674.2575 mike@introspect.com www.introspect.com _______________________________________________ Asterisk-Users mailing list Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
On Sat, 1 Jan 2005 15:52:50 -0500, Nabeel Jafferali wrote:>Hello. > >I am going to be putting together my first * system using FXO/FXS >interfaces. All the systems I have set up thus far have been pure VoIP >setups. > >The system I need to set up should have 3 FXO interfaces and 1 FXS >interface, as well as several SIP phones. I have noticed people >complaining about Digium's TDM cards - are these isolated incidents or >are these cards unreliable? I intend to get the TDM400P with the >necessary FXO/FXS boards - can I expect the installation to be somewhat >straightforward? Any tips to avoid grief? > >Would it make more sense to get 3 cheap X100P's and use some kind of ATA >for the FXS? Will obviously save a whole bunch of money, but will there >be significant added complexity?Here's an option that some might consider, especially in light of the ongoing problems with virtually all small FXO interfaces....the Zultys 4x5 SIP phone. This SIP phone includes an onboard 4 port router wit QoS and an FXO interface. At point of introduction early in 2004 the FXO i/f was only used as a lifeline. The firmware setup allowed the suer to pass local calls to the FXO while passing all other calls to * via SIP. Alternatively, the phone could try SIP calling outboard before falling back to the FXO. However, about two weeks ago Zultys released firmware that makes the FXO available as a SIP reource to *. Calling coming in on the FXO can be routed to * for transfer or VM purposes. It's a little strange since we're accustomed to having the FXO/FXO i/fs on the server. However, you could bring the POTS lines to the desktops and into the 4x5 phones. Then have the call pass to * when required. BTW, the router functions such as DHCP etc can be defeated if desired. Also, the 4x5, unlike some phones, requires only one registration to support multiple call appearances. From on registration the 4x5 support 4 active SIP calls and one on the FXO, at the same time. Michael P.S. - I'm buying one of these from a friend who doesn't need his anymore. I had it on loan for a month back in the summer. It worked well with* but the FXO > * firmware was not yet available. -- Michael Graves mgraves@pixelpower.com Sr. Product Specialist www.pixelpower.com Pixel Power Inc. mgraves@mstvp.com o713-861-4005 o800-905-6412 c713-201-1262
> -----Original Message----- > From: asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com > [mailto:asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com] On Behalf Of > brian@txshirts.com > Sent: Saturday, January 01, 2005 9:12 PM > To: asterisk-users@lists.digium.com > Subject: RE: [Asterisk-Users] Qs about FXO/FXS cards >[...]> I'm running older, but solid hardware and not seeing any > issues. I'm using a Compaq Proliant 1850R Gen1 dual PII 400 > with 512MB ram, GB ethernet, and SATA Hardware RAID. Cheap, > efficient, redundant. And for a Debian box, good enough.[...] I just have to add my $0.02 here. I've got a PIII-550 Proliant 800 that NEVER has any issues like this. It's running Debian woody, and has a TDM400P that never has any of these issues. It's also running 208v from a high quality UPS. As a telephone system should, it simply works. It is forgotten about, and used andused and used. No one has to do much of anything to it, and no one has to make excuses for it ("sorry..it's VoIP"). Anyone who wants to run junk hardware and beta code pretty much loses their right to complain about the results of doing so. Daryl
This has been an interesting discussion. I'll chime in with my experience here. I have two servers. One with the cheapest motherboard and athlon processor I could find on Newegg.com. The other is a 1999 era motherboard with a Via C3 processor, again a bargain basement special. The Athlon system has a decent power supply - 400+ watt, the Via has a very generic PS that came with the case - 300 watt tops. On both system I have TDM cards, the Athlon has a 4 port FXS and two x100p's, the Via has a 2 port FXS. Both systems are in "production" if you could call it that because they handle little traffic - home/hobby systems. I have had no problems at all with the tdm cards or Asterisk. I occassionally lose my network on the Athlon machine - I chalk that up to the fact that I'm currently sharing an IRQ with two ethernet cards and an X100P. I'm thinking of ditching the two x100p's in my Athlon machine for a TDM card with FXO modules to free up a slot and hopefully the burdened IRQ. Based on what I'm reading here I probably should think *really hard* about that.
Steven, If we grant that you are correct and that Digium and friends are making hobbyist products..... Then what are the "serious" installs using? We're serious to the tune of 5 FXO ports and 3 FXS ports and I want to make sure we don't waste time on flaky hardware. I figured that as Digium built the hardware and wrote the original code they probably know it better then anyone else. You just seem to know a lot about the serious installs so I'm curious what you use and how many lines you run with it. Btw, we are a textbook "small office" install according to the docs. Also what the heck is FC? Brian Greul Texas Shirt Company www.txshirts.com 713-802-0369 / 713-861-6261 (fax) -----Original Message----- From: Steven Critchfield [mailto:critch@basesys.com] Sent: Monday, January 03, 2005 2:07 PM To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] Qs about FXO/FXS cards On Tue, 2005-01-04 at 09:06 +1300, Richard Scobie wrote:> > Steven Critchfield wrote: > > > Okay, link this to my rambling above and you would see that by > > thrashing the disk, you are actually keeping the spindle spooled up > > and not measuring the spool up draw. My guess is a spooled down > > machine getting a random incoming call that then must generate ringand spool up the> > HD(s) to start writing logs at the same time on a questionable PSU.> > ??! Who set's up servers with hard drives that are spun down? > > Powered down hard disks are for laptops and specialised setups where > power consumption is critical. These are probably not where people > install serious asterisk servers.And we come full circle to a comment I made before that TDM cards are more for hobbyist than for real serious installs. A real install is probably going to use a T1/E1 interface and bypasses all the troubles listed in this thread. So far I don't trust that many of the people using TDM cards are the ones who will tweak a system into a serious install. Look at previous threads about system load spikes where we have to pull teeth to get people to swap out of a FC kernel and into a generic kernel. -- Steven Critchfield <critch@basesys.com> _______________________________________________ Asterisk-Users mailing list Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
Lousy cordless phones, and some plain phone produce lousy voice quality when the power circuit is used for anything else (especially fluorescent lights). Maybe this is relevant? Using your DSL line for phones without proper filters is noisy too.> -----Original Message----- > From: Steven Critchfield [mailto:critch@basesys.com] > Sent: Monday, January 03, 2005 6:53 PM > To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion > Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] Qs about FXO/FXS cards > > On Mon, 2005-01-03 at 09:20 -0500, Andrew Kohlsmith wrote: > > On January 3, 2005 08:01 am, Bob Goddard wrote: > > > > As I said, I measured the variation on the relevant lines with a > 100MHz > > > > DSO when running under load. > > > > > No you didn't. What was the power load when the modules failed? > > > > The actual current draw I did not measure -- I was looking forvoltage> sags or > > swells on the +5V and +12V lines during load. > > While this has stemmed from my semi-educated guess, I would be most > concerned with current instead of voltage. When I previously abused aPC> PSU it was driving a high torque 12v electric motor. The really high > torque motors would peak out at 5 amps during spool up. That wouldcause> a PC PSU to pulse between something like .5 amps and 4 amps. If the > spool up was controlled, I could keep the motor under 4 amps and thePSU> could drive the motor. I had no interest in the voltage because it was > the current that ran the motor. > > > > That is a simple "find", a better one would be "find / -ls", you > should > > > also try running seti on all processors at the same time. > > > > yes it's a simple find but there would be significant disk/cache > thrashing > > when combined with a kernel complile, as I'd mentioned. > > Okay, link this to my rambling above and you would see that bythrashing> the disk, you are actually keeping the spindle spooled up and not > measuring the spool up draw. My guess is a spooled down machinegetting> a random incoming call that then must generate ring and spool up the > HD(s) to start writing logs at the same time on a questionable PSU. > > > > If your motherboard requires 5amps when your psu can only supply4,> then > > > you're going to have trouble. > > > > Yes I completely agree with you here. > > > > > This IS a problem, just that it may not be in your case. > > > > I am willing to bet that my case is the more general case here --The> TDM > > current draw just is not a big draw, or at least it should not be -- > > certainly no more than a HDD during heavy seeking or a video cardduring> some > > intense gaming sequences or even some of the larger dataacquisition/DSP> > cards I've used in the past. > > As far as I know, with the exception of a couple of video cards that > resorted to an external PSU, all video cards have to draw from the PCI > or AGP bus. This means the TDM card is likely to draw more than the > graphics card. Heavy HDD thrashing uses less power than the spoolingup> of an idle drive. > > I'm also starting to wonder about specific phones now as well. While > this next bit of rambling is not asterisk related, it is phone related > and something to consider. While out at my mothers house, she had a > phone next to her PC that wouldn't ring and when used would cause the > DSL to drop out. I happened to buy a new cordless phone for her and > replaced a phone that was working elsewhere in her home. After putting > the new cordless phone in, the phone by her PC started ringingproperly> and was able to be used without dropping the DSL. > -- > Steven Critchfield <critch@basesys.com> > > _______________________________________________ > Asterisk-Users mailing list > Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users > To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users > > -- > This message has been scanned for viruses and > dangerous content by MailScanner, and is > believed to be clean. > MailScanner thanks transtec Computers for their support.
Why would a system with five analog lines and ten extensions not be considered serious? Every major corporation is starting to target the SMB market. A working solution for this kind of setup is a must. It can help all of us who want to setup asterisk in small businesses.> -----Original Message----- > From: Steven Critchfield [mailto:critch@basesys.com] > Sent: Monday, January 03, 2005 10:07 PM > To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion > Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] Qs about FXO/FXS cards > > On Tue, 2005-01-04 at 09:06 +1300, Richard Scobie wrote: > > > > Steven Critchfield wrote: > > > > > Okay, link this to my rambling above and you would see that by > thrashing > > > the disk, you are actually keeping the spindle spooled up and not > > > measuring the spool up draw. My guess is a spooled down machine > getting > > > a random incoming call that then must generate ring and spool upthe> > > HD(s) to start writing logs at the same time on a questionablePSU.> > > > ??! Who set's up servers with hard drives that are spun down? > > > > Powered down hard disks are for laptops and specialised setups where > > power consumption is critical. These are probably not where people > > install serious asterisk servers. > > And we come full circle to a comment I made before that TDM cards are > more for hobbyist than for real serious installs. A real install is > probably going to use a T1/E1 interface and bypasses all the troubles > listed in this thread. > > So far I don't trust that many of the people using TDM cards are the > ones who will tweak a system into a serious install. Look at previous > threads about system load spikes where we have to pull teeth to get > people to swap out of a FC kernel and into a generic kernel. > -- > Steven Critchfield <critch@basesys.com> > > _______________________________________________ > Asterisk-Users mailing list > Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users > To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users > > -- > This message has been scanned for viruses and > dangerous content by MailScanner, and is > believed to be clean. > MailScanner thanks transtec Computers for their support.
Gosh, you sure are full of yourself. You just shouldn't ASSume that everyone knows all of the abbreviations and when they ask you needn't be rude. Being condescending is the first sign that a consultant is shallow and not worth using. A *good* consultant will take the time to explain things and will never bash the situation that a customer or potential customer is in. Hardware and technology never become obsolete, they simply become outgrown. A customer's given choice in technology is typically made based on the best available balance of money, commitment, and need. Making high handed and unqualified statements is a waste of your time and mine. T-1's are rather unpleasant to move and for most small businesses are completely unnecessary, in my opinion. While you may have the money to burn by having a t-1 at home, most small business owners would rather use what is necessary as opposed to what is extravegant. And as you so nicely put in your other post, customers who come off the dime are a joy to work with. And I suspect most of them wouldn't tinker with * they would go straight to Cisco or Nortel, or a "brand" name that works turn key. While I'm sure we haven't heard the last of your POTS bashing or small business bashing I've got a bit of a request/challenge. Instead of bashing those of us who run small businesses, try to contribute to the list by being open, modest, and professional. Who knows, you might find a new client, and you never know which "small business" will grow into the "medium" client who "has money to drop". I know I'd sure look forward to reading your posts if you were contributing useful information and not just bashing the line mix that works for our company. You see the charm in * for us as a small company is that we can implement big company features, control costs, make better use of people and lines which will probably help us avoid needing 8 or 10 lines that would require a T-1. Regardless of if you like that, that's a cool and powerful thing. That is why * rocks and why there will be more of us that adopt it that you will want to shake a stick at. And while * is a bit of a stretch for a home use, it's a slam dunk for any size business. Best regards, Brian Greul Texas Shirt Company www.txshirts.com 713-802-0369 / 713-861-6261 (fax) -----Original Message----- From: Steven Critchfield [mailto:critch@basesys.com] Sent: Monday, January 03, 2005 2:59 PM To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion Subject: RE: [Asterisk-Users] Qs about FXO/FXS cards You may need more coffee before responding to another message. On Mon, 2005-01-03 at 14:21 -0600, brian@txshirts.com wrote:> Steven, > If we grant that you are correct and that Digium and friends are > making hobbyist products..... Then what are the "serious" installs > using? We're serious to the tune of 5 FXO ports and 3 FXS ports and I> want to make sure we don't waste time on flaky hardware. I figured > that as Digium built the hardware and wrote the original code they > probably know it better then anyone else. You just seem to know a lot> about the serious installs so I'm curious what you use and how many > lines you run with it.Digium makes T1 and E1 interfaces. Take a moment and read what I have quoted below and you will see I said serious installs would be using these T1 and E1 interfaces. If you truely wanted to know what I use and how much I have installed, you only need look at the archives. The company I work for has a T1 fully deployed right now and are expecting a second one any week now. We have extra capacity in hardware reserved for a customer of ours who has expressed interest in upgrading soon and needs more lines. I used to even have a T1 card and channel bank to run my home system till I grew bored of it and decided it was better to spend my time doing other things than managing the phones at home. Currently that system minus the server is with VCCH.com and they use it occasionally for demonstrations.> Btw, we are a textbook "small office" install according to the docs.And barely over the home use of a truely geeky person. I think you actually qualify as sub-"small office".> Also what the heck is FC?Fedora Core, Join that to the obvious question you will ask later, RH =Red Hat. Don't forget how to use google to look things up now. On Mon, 2005-01-03 at 14:07 -0600 Steven Critchfield wrote> And we come full circle to a comment I made before that TDM cards are > more for hobbyist than for real serious installs. A real install is > probably going to use a T1/E1 interface and bypasses all the troubles > listed in this thread. > > So far I don't trust that many of the people using TDM cards are the > ones who will tweak a system into a serious install. Look at previous > threads about system load spikes where we have to pull teeth to get > people to swap out of a FC kernel and into a generic kernel.-- Steven Critchfield <critch@basesys.com> _______________________________________________ Asterisk-Users mailing list Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
My cost analysis showed that * is a slam dunk for the $ per feature. Heck adding voicemail from Nortel is about a $1000 venture by itself (call pilot, used). And that is just the start. Granted, programming text files is vexing... But if you hate that try programming with a 10 key and a 2 line interface on a nortel KSU. And btw, Nortel is one of the better ones for documentation. TDM400 has been reliable, it's just a bit squirrelly to get the options set right. I think in the greater scheme of things Digium produces a nice product and * is hard to beat. I think the quality of the power, system, and power supply can't be underrated when doing telephony. Everything I've read points to less then desirable results with sketchy hardware. Brian Greul Texas Shirt Company www.txshirts.com 713-802-0369 / 713-861-6261 (fax) -----Original Message----- From: Andrew Kohlsmith [mailto:akohlsmith-asterisk@benshaw.com] Sent: Monday, January 03, 2005 2:25 PM To: asterisk-users@lists.digium.com Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] Qs about FXO/FXS cards On January 3, 2005 03:07 pm, Steven Critchfield wrote:> And we come full circle to a comment I made before that TDM cards are > more for hobbyist than for real serious installs. A real install is > probably going to use a T1/E1 interface and bypasses all the troubles > listed in this thread.Unfortunately that makes Asterisk installs for small businesses more expensive than necessary. At US$500 for a T100P and US$300ish for a channel bank (FXS only, FXO is significantly more expensive!) plus your time and system for an Asterisk install it raises the bar for the small business to adopt Asterisk. The TDM400P would fit a very nice little niche if it worked reliably. Let's face it -- most businesses are looking at VOIP to reduce their telephone bills and if the time it takes for the install to pay for itself is raised significantly (like an added $1000 price tag for reliable equipment)... well... the writing on the wall is pretty clear. -A. _______________________________________________ Asterisk-Users mailing list Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
Brian, People are making 100's of excuses for *'s inability to deal with analog lines and extensions, the bottom line is that it is a serious issue that we all hope to see resolved. The best one is "analog lines are for babies" Bottom line, the economics of analog vs. t1 usually work out so a T1 is easily justified when you have about 10+ analog lines, that means that offices with 20 to 30 users are borderline on being able to justify the expense of a T1. As best I can tell * can not really handle more than 50 to 100 calls at a time (on a single box), and then only if there is not a lot of other stuff (transcoding, vmail, etc.) going on. This makes * a slam dunk for environments that handle somewhere between 10 and 100 simultaneous calls, and a not so easy decision for users with less than 10 or more than ~100 simultaneous calls. The best workarounds at this time for small (analog) implementations is to use an external VoIP to PSTN gateway or a T1 interface and a used FXO/FXS channel bank. For larger installations (more than 2 to 4 t1s) there are other scalability issues, such as no SIP reinvite, meaning all of the call data streams must run across the PCI bus of the PC. This can be solved with a proxy like SIP Express Router aka SER and a media gateway like the Lucent Max TNT so * is only in the data stream when the features it provides are needed. Our range of customers and applications spans from 5 or 6 analog lines to a DS3 (672 digital lines), and we have quickly determined that the TDM400 in the majority of hardware combinations we have tried is not 100% reliable. We have tried old Dell PII 500s, New HP Xeon 3.0s, and everything in between, all quality system boards, power supplies, dedicated IRQs, hardware raid controllers, high quality NICs, etc. We have tried machines that can pass real time HDTV video/audio streams across the PCI bus with bit for bit accuracy (translate: no PCI latency). As far as all of the power supply related issues are concerned, it is not really the job of the power supply to FULLY regulate the power, it provides GOOD power to the system board and other components which are then expected to have integral voltage and current regulators suitable for their application. It is my understanding that all of the power for an FXO module comes off of the PCI bus, and only the FXS module requires power straight from the power supply, yet they both suffer from the same lock up issue, and the funny part is the driver has no idea the hardware is not responding. This is clearly a problem with the hardware/driver design. There does appear to be some combinations that work, but that is not acceptable, unless the exact requirements can be quantified and advertised. Find a good PSTN to VoIP gateway and forget the headaches... in time the TDM400 might improve, but not as a result of the long running rants in this forum.> -----Original Message----- > From: asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com [mailto:asterisk-users- > bounces@lists.digium.com] On Behalf Of brian@txshirts.com > Sent: Monday, January 03, 2005 7:23 PM > To: asterisk-users@lists.digium.com > Subject: RE: [Asterisk-Users] Qs about FXO/FXS cards > > My cost analysis showed that * is a slam dunk for the $ per feature. > > Heck adding voicemail from Nortel is about a $1000 venture by itself > (call pilot, used). > > And that is just the start. Granted, programming text files is > vexing... But if you hate that try programming with a 10 key and a 2 > line interface on a nortel KSU. And btw, Nortel is one of the better > ones for documentation. > > TDM400 has been reliable, it's just a bit squirrelly to get theoptions> set right. I think in the greater scheme of things Digium produces a > nice product and * is hard to beat. > > I think the quality of the power, system, and power supply can't be > underrated when doing telephony. Everything I've read points to less > then desirable results with sketchy hardware. > > > Brian Greul > Texas Shirt Company > www.txshirts.com > 713-802-0369 / 713-861-6261 (fax) > > -----Original Message----- > From: Andrew Kohlsmith [mailto:akohlsmith-asterisk@benshaw.com] > Sent: Monday, January 03, 2005 2:25 PM > To: asterisk-users@lists.digium.com > Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] Qs about FXO/FXS cards > > On January 3, 2005 03:07 pm, Steven Critchfield wrote: > > And we come full circle to a comment I made before that TDM cardsare> > more for hobbyist than for real serious installs. A real install is > > probably going to use a T1/E1 interface and bypasses all thetroubles> > listed in this thread. > > Unfortunately that makes Asterisk installs for small businesses more > expensive than necessary. At US$500 for a T100P and US$300ish for a > channel bank (FXS only, FXO is significantly more expensive!) plusyour> time and system for an Asterisk install it raises the bar for thesmall> business to adopt Asterisk. > The TDM400P would fit a very nice little niche if it worked reliably. > > Let's face it -- most businesses are looking at VOIP to reduce their > telephone bills and if the time it takes for the install to pay for > itself is raised significantly (like an added $1000 price tag for > reliable equipment)... > well... the writing on the wall is pretty clear. > > -A. > _______________________________________________ > Asterisk-Users mailing list > Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users > To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users > > _______________________________________________ > Asterisk-Users mailing list > Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users > To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
Steven, I am starting to understand... you actually enjoy being a bully don't you :) Damon> -----Original Message----- > From: asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com [mailto:asterisk-users- > bounces@lists.digium.com] On Behalf Of Steven Critchfield > Sent: Monday, January 03, 2005 9:52 PM > To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion > Subject: RE: [Asterisk-Users] Qs about FXO/FXS cards > > On Mon, 2005-01-03 at 20:14 -0600, brian@txshirts.com wrote: > > Gosh, you sure are full of yourself. > > Looks like you didn't get enough caffeine into your body before > responding. Ohh well.... > > > You just shouldn't ASSume that everyone knows all of theabbreviations> > and when they ask you needn't be rude. Being condescending is thefirst> > sign that a consultant is shallow and not worth using. A *good* > > consultant will take the time to explain things and will never bashthe> > situation that a customer or potential customer is in. > > Boy am I glad I am not a consultant and I don't have to deal with them > very often. And I hope you understand that if all the effort you canput> forth is to ask questions with no research behind the question, you > won't make it very far yourself. > > > Hardware and technology never become obsolete, they simply become > > outgrown. A customer's given choice in technology is typically made > > based on the best available balance of money, commitment, and need. > > Making high handed and unqualified statements is a waste of yourtime> > and mine. T-1's are rather unpleasant to move and for most small > > businesses are completely unnecessary, in my opinion. > > Funny. Obsolete is when the majority of people determine it would be > better to be impaled by a red hot poker than use the technology. Well > actually I think the thresh hold is quite a bit lower. How manyserious> companies are still using PDP's in production? Know of any one still > seriously using 8088's on the desktop? > > T1's aren't anymore painful to move than several analog lines. Add to > that that you don't need a T1 to use T1 interfaces as I'll point out > below. > > > While you may have the money to burn by having a t-1 at home, mostsmall> > business owners would rather use what is necessary as opposed towhat is> > extravegant. And as you so nicely put in your other post, customerswho> > come off the dime are a joy to work with. And I suspect most ofthem> > wouldn't tinker with * they would go straight to Cisco or Nortel, ora> > "brand" name that works turn key. > > Maybe you should read and fully comprehend before starting replies. It > is very helpful to do inline posting so you can see what it is your > responding to. It is possible you might have figured out how much you > missed if it was closer to what you where writing. Specifically Istated> that at home I had a T1 card and a channel bank. There was never a > mention of a T1 circuit. To finish connecting the dots for you, I did > VoIP to the office and had 24 extension capability and about 17 actual > extensions on my system at home. > > > -----Original Message----- > > From: Steven Critchfield [mailto:critch@basesys.com] > > Sent: Monday, January 03, 2005 2:59 PM > > To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion > > Subject: RE: [Asterisk-Users] Qs about FXO/FXS cards > > > > You may need more coffee before responding to another message. > > > > On Mon, 2005-01-03 at 14:21 -0600, brian@txshirts.com wrote: > > > Steven, > > > If we grant that you are correct and that Digium and friends are > > > making hobbyist products..... Then what are the "serious" installs > > > using? We're serious to the tune of 5 FXO ports and 3 FXS portsand I> > > > > want to make sure we don't waste time on flaky hardware. Ifigured> > > that as Digium built the hardware and wrote the original code they > > > probably know it better then anyone else. You just seem to know alot> > > > > about the serious installs so I'm curious what you use and howmany> > > lines you run with it. > > > > Digium makes T1 and E1 interfaces. Take a moment and read what Ihave> > quoted below and you will see I said serious installs would be using > > these T1 and E1 interfaces. > > > > If you truely wanted to know what I use and how much I haveinstalled,> > you only need look at the archives. The company I work for has a T1 > > fully deployed right now and are expecting a second one any weeknow. We> > have extra capacity in hardware reserved for a customer of ours whohas> > expressed interest in upgrading soon and needs more lines. > > > > I used to even have a T1 card and channel bank to run my home system > > till I grew bored of it and decided it was better to spend my timedoing> > other things than managing the phones at home. Currently that system > > minus the server is with VCCH.com and they use it occasionally for > > demonstrations. > > > > > Btw, we are a textbook "small office" install according to thedocs.> > > > And barely over the home use of a truely geeky person. I think you > > actually qualify as sub-"small office". > > > > > Also what the heck is FC? > > > > Fedora Core, Join that to the obvious question you will ask later,RH => > Red Hat. Don't forget how to use google to look things up now.> > > > > > On Mon, 2005-01-03 at 14:07 -0600 Steven Critchfield wrote > > > And we come full circle to a comment I made before that TDM cardsare> > > more for hobbyist than for real serious installs. A real installis> > > probably going to use a T1/E1 interface and bypasses all thetroubles> > > listed in this thread. > > > > > > So far I don't trust that many of the people using TDM cards arethe> > > ones who will tweak a system into a serious install. Look atprevious> > > threads about system load spikes where we have to pull teeth toget> > > people to swap out of a FC kernel and into a generic kernel. > > -- > Steven Critchfield <critch@basesys.com> > > _______________________________________________ > Asterisk-Users mailing list > Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users > To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
Where are mine? I logged 3 cases with digium on this issue and did not hear a thing...> -----Original Message----- > From: asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com > [mailto:asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com] On Behalf Of > Andrei (MPI) > Sent: Monday, January 03, 2005 10:30 AM > To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion > Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] Qs about FXO/FXS cards > > You guys probably don't know what Digium did recently to > address TDM400 > problem: > - they've sent new FXO modules to all customers who were > complaining about TDM/FXO issues. > What I've heard from a Didigum reseller/supplier it might be > a situation with specific telco lines here in US. > > The new FXO modules SOLVED my problem. I have stable Asterisk > system in production for more than 3 weeks now. > I used to have the recurring problem every day, in about 6-8 > hours after server reboot / Asterisk restart / modules reload. > > Andrei > > Andrew Kohlsmith wrote: > > >On January 1, 2005 04:09 pm, Rich Adamson wrote: > > > > > >>b. don't ever post anything to the -dev list regarding a TDM card as > >> that is NOT the forum for digium cards or drivers, > >> > >> > > > >Eh? If you're hacking on the code for wctdm, -dev is most > certainly an > >appropriate place to post. If you're just going there to > bitch about > >it well no, that's not the right place. :-) > > > > > > > >>c. digium support is not addressing the issue, and, d. the > amount of > >>effort required to support the TDM card (stop *, restart > >> the drivers, start *) in its present condition is far > greater then > >> what any reasonable non-technical customer will endure. > >> > >> > > > >With regard to c) I think that Digium's doing their best to try and > >nail down the issue but it's eluding them, and they are > keeping very quiet about it. > >(Head in the sand perhaps?) d) I completely agree with -- I > would love > >to deploy these cards, up to a pair in a system, but I just can't at > >this point in time. > > > >-A. > >_______________________________________________ > >Asterisk-Users mailing list > >Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com > >http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users > >To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: > > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users > > > > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > Asterisk-Users mailing list > Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users > To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users >
> -----Original Message----- > From: asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com > [mailto:asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com] On Behalf Of > Steven Critchfield > Sent: Monday, January 03, 2005 4:55 PM > To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion > Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] Qs about FXO/FXS cards >[...]> For business use, I would suggest you first find a BRI card > you can use here in the states. Hint, bug Kapejod into making > that 4 port card US ready. Then move any business user over[...] That might work out where you do your deployments. In Verizon territory, you can get analog business lines with unlimited long distance and no metered minutes for about $37 a month. A BRI costs you about double that for the loop, with metered minutes and bring your own LD. Past the technology aspects, BRI just doesn't work here. And I'm going to guess that pricing structure is similar in other areas as well. Daryl
Sipura SPA 3000... forget the channel bank and PRI card. Buy a PRI card and ebay the SPAs when you arte ready to move from POTS to PRI, or better yet, forget both and find an ITSP that can offer QoS (private line!!!) and interface with * Talkswitch? Get on the VoIP bus or get run over buy it, your choice.> -----Original Message----- > From: asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com [mailto:asterisk-users- > bounces@lists.digium.com] On Behalf Of Greg - Cirelle Enterprises > Sent: Tuesday, January 04, 2005 9:57 AM > To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion > Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] Qs about FXO/FXS cards > > At 03:25 PM 1/3/05 -0500, you wrote: > >Unfortunately that makes Asterisk installs for small businesses more > >expensive > >than necessary. At US$500 for a T100P and US$300ish for a channelbank> (FXS > >only, FXO is significantly more expensive!) plus your time and systemfor> an > >Asterisk install it raises the bar for the small business to adopt > Asterisk. > >The TDM400P would fit a very nice little niche if it worked reliably. > > > >Let's face it -- most businesses are looking at VOIP to reduce their > >telephone > >bills and if the time it takes for the install to pay for itself is > raised > >significantly (like an added $1000 price tag for reliableequipment)...> >well... the writing on the wall is pretty clear. > > > >-A. > > > With the above said, now you have just entered the realm of the > talkswitch. > > I was speaking with a cable installer friend of mine, who told me he > installs > the talkswitch at all the jenny craig franchises (the franchise, Iassume> pays > for the devices as he does not resell them). His words "talkswitch is > great, > just plug it in and it works, pbx and voip, you can't beat it" He also > wires > them to their pa system. > > List price is 1800 bucks for the top of the line unit. 8fxo, 16fxs, > ethernet > > When you try to sell the asterisk system, you have to compete withthat> and > frankly, all the people want is to make phone calls. > > Mention voice over ip and eyebrows raise, "I've heard of that", but in > reality > nobody cares how their phone calls are made, just that it goesthrough.> > If you can't save them a bunch of money, there is little or no reasonto> diverge > to a more costly system, that will "save in the long run", regardlessof> the > additional feature set, which if they can't touch it, feel it tasteit,> smell it, smoke it, makes no difference at all. > > In reality, I want to off as many boxes as I can, maybe tie in some > service contracts, and be done with it. > > From our experience, most small office/businesses have a bunch ofphone> lines, 3-8, and are leery of spending a chunk of change on a newsystem> and possibly phones as well. > > g > > > _______________________________________________ > Asterisk-Users mailing list > Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users > To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
Andrei (MPI) wrote:> Michael Graves wrote: > >>> That might work out where you do your deployments. In Verizon >>> territory, you can get analog business lines with unlimited long >>> distance and no metered minutes for about $37 a month. A BRI costs you >>> about double that for the loop, with metered minutes and bring your own >>> LD. >>> >>> >> >> Are you talking about residential lines with those rates? Business >> rates for POTS lines are more than that here in Houston. >> >> > Analog line for business is about $50 plus tax with unlimited LD and > all the basic features (Verizon NJ).My business line is $54/mo with no LD. My home phone was 47/mo with no LD. The joys of having no options on the copper. Jeromie> > Also there are middleman companies who buy wholesale from Verizon and > provide it for less to business customers (some limitations do apply). > > Andrei > > _______________________________________________ > Asterisk-Users mailing list > Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users > To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users >
At 12:50 PM 1/4/05, you wrote:>Sipura SPA 3000... forget the channel bank and PRI card. Buy a PRI card >and ebay the SPAs when you arte ready to move from POTS to PRI, or >better yet, forget both and find an ITSP that can offer QoS (private >line!!!) and interface with * > >Talkswitch? Get on the VoIP bus or get run over buy it, your choice.comes with it...