asterisk users - Nov 2006 - is IAX required for firewall and router?

I'm trying to understand IAX and whether or not it would solve my
difficulties:

'The primary goals for IAX were to minimize bandwidth used in media
transmissions, with particular attention drawn to control and individual
voice calls, and to provide native support for NAT (Network Address
Translation) transparency. Another goal is to be easy to use behind
firewalls.'

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IAX> 

This sounds good, as I have a NAT traversal problem, as well as others.

I'm not the system admin for my network, and am behind a router and
firewall.  Skype works ok as a softphone, but I'd rather something like
<http://www.grandstream.com/y-286.htm> with which I can use a real
telephone.  Either an ATA or a SIP phone, I'm not sure yet.

In any event, there's no point in buying the hardware until I get the
networking sorted.  Somehow I need to TUNNEL throught the router and
firewall?  I was looking at <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STUN> as one way
of doing this.

The Grandstream FAQ explains how to do this:

'5. How do I setup my Grandstream Phone for go2call network?
typical configuration is:
SIP Server: voip01.go2call.com
Outbound proxy: (Should leave it blank, because it's a GW)
User ID: xxxxx (your Go2Call PIN number)
Authentication ID: same as your User ID
Password: xxxxxxx (Your Go2Call password)
NAT Traversal: YES (WITHOUT setting the STUN server)
6. How do I setup my Grandstream Phone for FWD service?
typical configuration is:
SIP Server: fwd.pulver.com
outbound proxy: 192.246.69.247:5082 (used only when behind firewall, otherwise
leave it blank)
User ID: xxxxxx (your FWD account number)
Authentication/Login ID: xxxxx (same as above, your FWD account number)
Password: xxxxx (your FWD password)
NAT Traversal: No (You need to set up your STUN server if you don't have
outbound
proxy)'

<http://www.grandstream.com/FAQ.pdf>

However, most everything I read on the subject starts with the assumption
that there's physical and administrative access to the router.  Neither of
those hold for me :(

I would like to set this up prior to purchasing the hardware, but I don't
even know that it's possible.  Again, I don't have physical access to
the
router, so the ATA would have to connect through the computer, which
connects to the router.  It's not possible to directly connect any
hardware to the router.  No, it's not possible to use a switch.



thanks,

Thufir

So if your ATA or phone has to connect to your computer, your computer 
then has to bridge its two ethernet connections together to give access 
to to the 'external' network.  Keep that in mind, it's usually not
too
difficult. 

Those phones you provided info on are SIP phones, not IAX phones.

In my recollection, to originate calls (dial out) you don't need your 
router configured.  to receive calls you need the router to forward port 
4569 (for example) to your internal phone.  Maybe the router is a UPnP 
router and you can configure it from your computer?  Just a thought.

Moj
Thufir wrote:
> I'm trying to understand IAX and whether or not it would solve my
> difficulties:
>
> 'The primary goals for IAX were to minimize bandwidth used in media
> transmissions, with particular attention drawn to control and individual
> voice calls, and to provide native support for NAT (Network Address
> Translation) transparency. Another goal is to be easy to use behind
> firewalls.'
>
> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IAX> 
>
> This sounds good, as I have a NAT traversal problem, as well as others.
>
> I'm not the system admin for my network, and am behind a router and
> firewall.  Skype works ok as a softphone, but I'd rather something like
> <http://www.grandstream.com/y-286.htm> with which I can use a real
> telephone.  Either an ATA or a SIP phone, I'm not sure yet.
>
> In any event, there's no point in buying the hardware until I get the
> networking sorted.  Somehow I need to TUNNEL throught the router and
> firewall?  I was looking at <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STUN> as
one way
> of doing this.
>
> The Grandstream FAQ explains how to do this:
>
> '5. How do I setup my Grandstream Phone for go2call network?
> typical configuration is:
> SIP Server: voip01.go2call.com
> Outbound proxy: (Should leave it blank, because it's a GW)
> User ID: xxxxx (your Go2Call PIN number)
> Authentication ID: same as your User ID
> Password: xxxxxxx (Your Go2Call password)
> NAT Traversal: YES (WITHOUT setting the STUN server)
> 6. How do I setup my Grandstream Phone for FWD service?
> typical configuration is:
> SIP Server: fwd.pulver.com
> outbound proxy: 192.246.69.247:5082 (used only when behind firewall,
otherwise
> leave it blank)
> User ID: xxxxxx (your FWD account number)
> Authentication/Login ID: xxxxx (same as above, your FWD account number)
> Password: xxxxx (your FWD password)
> NAT Traversal: No (You need to set up your STUN server if you don't
have outbound
> proxy)'
>
> <http://www.grandstream.com/FAQ.pdf>
>
> However, most everything I read on the subject starts with the assumption
> that there's physical and administrative access to the router.  Neither
of
> those hold for me :(
>
> I would like to set this up prior to purchasing the hardware, but I
don't
> even know that it's possible.  Again, I don't have physical access
to the
> router, so the ATA would have to connect through the computer, which
> connects to the router.  It's not possible to directly connect any
> hardware to the router.  No, it's not possible to use a switch.
>
>
>
> thanks,
>
> Thufir
>
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