[Asterisk-Users] What business IP phone to use

[Eric "ManxPower" Wieling]

Chris Bagnall wrote:
>> ...or if your 
>> asterisk server is also a file server (which should never be 
>> done)
> 
> I know I'm attracting flames for disagreeing, but sometimes when you're
> dealing with small business customers there simply isn't the budget to have
> separate machines for doing x, y and z, and often one finds the asterisk
> server is the only *nix box on-site. That makes it an ideal box to use for
> light file serving duties:
> 1) linux RAID1 support is pretty good, so you've got reasonable data
> integrity without having to fork out for separate RAID controllers
> 2) samba works fairly well as a domain controller
> 3) you aren't buying another windows licence
> 
> Of course, in an ideal world you'd have a separate box as a file server, but
> even in that instance, the asterisk box makes a good choice for storing
> backups to (especially if they're scheduled late at night from workstations)
> when the phones are unlikely to be in use.

I suspect that having a separate box would be cheaper in the long run 
than buying switches that support QoS and then maintaining them.