[asterisk-users] Hardware that can ring my phone?

[Linux Lover]

James, thank you for your educating answer.

--- James FitzGibbon <james.fitzgibbon at gmail.com>
wrote:

> 
> This SOHO PBX box won't interop with Asterisk
> because it doesn't speak any
> of the protocols that Asterisk does.  This box
> appears to be a solid-state
> (and I'd assume very feature restricted) alternative
> to Asterisk.  That it
> happens to have both FXO (to the Telco) and FXS (to
> the analog phone) ports
> doesn't mean that it is usable as an analog
> interface for Asterisk.
> 

I tend agree with your evaluation. Still, I was
thinking that since all these el-cheapo SOHO PBX boxes
support manual attendant call transfer, what's to
prevent Asterisk from mimicking an attendant by
sending proper DTMF signals and make this box
"transfer" the call to the single analog phone in the
business? That is, Asterisk will connect (via RJ-11)
to the unit as the "attendant's phone", and my real
phone (only one in the system) will connect via a
second RJ-11 (there could be 4 of them).

Or is Asterisk not capable of sending DTMF signals
over an RJ-11 connection?

Not that I am rushing to buy this cheap box right now,
but I am curious whether this is possible at all -
perhaps to get a better feel of how flexible Asterisk
is.

> 
> The original single-FXO-port card from Digium was
> the X100P.  These aren't
> sold anymore (the TDM400B modular card replaced it),
> but they can be found
> on eBay for $10-$30.  If you can get your hands on
> one, you might consider
> going with a cheap SIP phone instead of a analog
> phone for your business.
> There isn't (as far as I know) a readily available
> cheap single-FXS-port
> card.  If you go with an analog phone behind
> Asterisk, you'll need an FXS
> port.  If you go with a SIP phone, you just need to
> have a network
> connection from the phone to the server, which might
> be cheaper.  A quick
> search on eBay shows a few Grandstream Budgetone 101
> phones (certainly not
> the best available, but they'll do the job) in the
> sub-$50 range.
> 

Do I undestand correctly that with this solution, I
will still be able to connect to my analog Verizon
phone line with the SIP phone? That is, the outside
world will see my phone as an ordinary phone, when in
fact I am using a SIP phone? If so, that means that
Asterisk does all the magic behind the scene, right?

Thanks,
Lynn


       
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