[Asterisk-Users] Asterisk BRI in the USA

[Walt Reed]

On Wed, Apr 12, 2006 at 09:10:09AM -1000, Mark Coccimiglio said:
> I guess what I need to find out first if there is anyone out there using
> Asterisk & BRI in the USA?  If so what hardware have they been able to
> use.  I no longer want to hack around with analog circuits.  BRI has the
> potential of PRI with only 2 B channels.  A great idea for a small
> office such as my own.  VoIP may be an option, but I would need a ITSP
> that would allow calls to transfer from my asterisk box to the remote
> phone set.  My link to the internet is fast, but its pointless to route
> a call into the office just to stream it back out.  More work more work
> more work.....

I'm in a similar situation. Being on the end of a long loop, POTS sucks
- echo / static / crappy calling features.

Paying around $2K-3K for BRI solution is a non-starter though. It needs
to get down to the $200-400 / port level (more ports = cheaper per
port) to be viable. Soho / Very small business (under 12 people) is
definately a 1-2 port market which my guess would be the bulk of sales
for BRI.

It would be awesome to see a Sangoma BRI card. It's hard to say what the
market would be since the US telco companies have really tried to kill
BRI service.

Considering what a full PRI costs, there is also a point where too
many BRI ports no longer makes sense, but that number is probably >4-6
BRI's. I was in a situation where I really only wanted 4 BRI's, but had
to look at a PRI instead which ended up wasting a lot of money in the
long run. POTS was a non-option.