[asterisk-biz] case study on switching to Asterisk

Tue Mar 20 19:50:32 MST 2007

This site has a comparison chart which includes Asterisk Business Edition,
Fonality, SwitchVOX as well as proprietary solutions.  It's not exactly
apples to apples and I question the prices they came up with but it's the
best I've found so far.  They have 2 or 3 other comparison charts and some
good whitepapers as well.
http://www.voip-news.com/whitepaper/pdf/small-business-cpe-pbx.pdf

  _____  

From: Byron Pile [mailto:bpile at hotmail.com] 
Sent: Tuesday, March 20, 2007 6:22 PM
To: Commercial and Business-Oriented Asterisk Discussion
Subject: RE: [asterisk-biz] case study on switching to Asterisk

Once I get a better idea of what the telecom here provides in their contract
it might be easier to see what I should include in the Asterisk based
system.

Is switchvox a proprietary system? Or are they based on Asterisk? They don't
mention asterisk on the site anywhere. I've also noticed Digium offers
a support service plan. Perhaps this with an estimated initial setup cost
would be a good comparison to the telecom offering.

I really want to highlight the flexibility and also feature set of Asterisk.

Thanks again for your comments!

  _____  

> Date: Tue, 20 Mar 2007 20:34:22 -0400
> From: stotaro at totarotechnologies.com
> To: asterisk-biz at lists.digium.com
> Subject: Re: [asterisk-biz] case study on switching to Asterisk
> 
> The bottom line is that you will save money or at the very least, over 
> the course of a year or two, break even. Considering some proposals I 
> did on NEC IPK systems several years ago, an eight port conference 
> bridge card was $5,000, another $5,000 for an eight port VoIP card MGCP, 
> $3,000 for a four port voicemail card, add some other feature and you 
> get the point. Also, support contracts were something to the tune of $4 
> per port per month, that includes all ports (concurrent voicemail access 
> + phones + PSTN + conference bridges). So lets say that "whatever" 
> company has 4 FXO, 16 FXS, and 4 voicemail, that is a total of 24 ports 
> X $4 = $96/mo X 12mo = $1,152 and that only included very specific limits.
> 
> This is all free in Asterisk. You could purchase a Switchvox (or some 
> other turnkey) system pretty cheaply, have all of those costly add-on 
> features included, they offer support via SSH and over the phone, and 
> with IP, MACs are a breeze. A low level A+ tech can do it, unlike a 
> traditional system where a telephone guy has to come out with a butt 
> set, toner, and punch down tool. Most proprietary systems are not 
> exactly easy to program even in a "Turnkey" solution.
> 
> You have many variables to look at but I think that your paper will be a 
> very interesting look into a paradigm shift. 
> 
> Thanks,
> Steve
> 
> Byron Pile wrote:
> > I was going to assume that yes, there are Linux people on staff and 
> > that they could be taken away to set up and support asterisk. But 
> > because I was comparing it to a turnkey solution that most likely is 
> > including service as part of the contract, comparing it to a similar 
> > contract based asterisk setup makes more sense. However, I guess when 
> > starting this I was hoping to eliminate "license" fees from the open 
> > source solution, but if I'm using a small company, I think its more 
> > realistic to assume they don't have a support department ready to 
> > devote man hours to an asterisk system when they were using a turnkey 
> > solution before.
> >
> > Thanks for clarifying the handsets, I was considering using SIP phones 
> > in the case study, but thought it might be possible to "reuse" some 
> > existing equipment. This is also a technology upgrade in this case.
> >
> > I was going to assume that the workers were just as productive as 
> > before, but the ROI would come mostly from reduction in operating 
> > costs (hopefully). If they don't have any "linux people" on staff, 
> > this makes it harder to include some of the open source benefits like, 
> > fixing bugs, adding features and the other flexibility that Asterisk 
> > would provide over using the Norstar.
> >
> > Thanks for the response Steve, I have more research to do obviously!
> >
> >
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > Subject: RE: [asterisk-biz] case study on switching to Asterisk
> > Date: Tue, 20 Mar 2007 18:59:03 -0500
> > From: stotaro at asteriskhelpdesk.com
> > To: asterisk-biz at lists.digium.com
> >
> > For several varying quotes, one could go to www.buyerzone.com
> > <http://www.buyerzone.com/> and put in exactly what you
> > specified. You will get several vendors proposing different
> > systems, prices, and most importantly, service contracts. It does
> > cost each vendor about $25 dollars to buy your "lead" so be aware
> > that you are costing them money by doing this. Whether or not
> > that is ethical, is your decision. I am just pointing out that
> > "one could do it". Make sure to include that you need a
> > conference bridge that can handle unlimited callers, also
> > unlimited voicemail ports, support SIP, and also consider
> > scaling. That should freak them out.
> >
> > 
> >
> > Does "whatever" company have people on staff that know Linux and
> > have time to learn and support Asterisk? What is the cost of
> > taking them from what they usually would be doing to work on the
> > Asterisk system?
> >
> > 
> >
> > I would suggest going with SIP phones and a four port FXO board. 
> > You could run both systems side by side until you are ready to cut
> > over and then just switch your four POTs lines. 
> >
> > 
> >
> > Most proprietary systems use digital sets so you cannot use a
> > mutiport FXS board. I have used proprietary handset gateways such
> > as Citel and my person experience was very very poor. 
> >
> > 
> >
> > How much ROI is going to depend on increased worker productivity
> > which is fairly hard to figure out and also ongoing average costs
> > of MACs (cost of Moves Adds Changes) as well as support contracts. 
> >
> > 
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Steve Totaro
> > http://www.asteriskhelpdesk.com
> > KB3OPB
> > 
> > ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > *From:* asterisk-biz-bounces at lists.digium.com
> > [mailto:asterisk-biz-bounces at lists.digium.com] *On Behalf Of
> > *Byron Pile
> > *Sent:* Tuesday, March 20, 2007 5:28 PM
> > *To:* asterisk-biz at lists.digium.com
> > *Subject:* [asterisk-biz] case study on switching to Asterisk
> >
> > 
> >
> > I thought the biz list was most appropriate for this. Hope I'm not
> > wrong!
> >
> > I'm trying to write a term paper on adopting an open source
> > solution over a commercial solution and comparing the cost.
> > Specifically if a legacy system is in use already, when will the
> > initial investment of hardware for an asterisk based system pay
> > off against the licensing fees of a proprietary system. After
> > reading a good chunk of the free Asterisk book "Asterisk:The
> > Future of Telephony" I think that Asterisk is an excellent topic
> > for the paper. 
> >
> > I'm new to telephony stuff so bear with me if my questions are a
> > bit dumb, I've tried to do quite a bit of research and reading
> > before posting to the mail lists. So my idea was to use the fake
> > company "whatever" and they have 15 telephones and are currently
> > using a Norstar ICS with 4 incoming lines and 15 internal lines
> > and I would like to switch this over to an asterisk based system.
> >
> > The reason for choosing the Norstar as this is a turnkey solution
> > provided by a large local telecom so I will be able to get some
> > pricing information for them fairly easily and I think it does
> > what a 15 telephone small office might need...I'm open to a better
> > suggestion if the Norstar is a poor choice.
> >
> > My quick questions are...is it possible that the handsets being
> > used with a Norstar could be converted and used with the Asterisk
> > system? (a bit of asset recovery)
> >
> > A system consisting of a suitable linux server running Asterisk
> > and a Digium TDM2441B PCI Card 16FXS / 4FXO would be a suitable
> > replacement and could deliver the same performance/functions as
> > the Norstar system?
> >
> > I'm going to try and be as thorough as possible in assessing the
> > costs in switching to this system. The most obvious being some new
> > hardware, but also, downtime, training, support costs, contract
> > penalties (if there are any) etc....But this is a term paper and a
> > highly hypothetical situation. And I know my questions are a bit
> > general, but the paper will probably be kept quite general. I hope
> > I can learn more about this cool app!
> >
> > Thanks!
> >
> > 
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------------------
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