[asterisk-users] [POTS/BRI] Neutral comparisons of PCI vs. box?

[David Backeberg]

On Wed, Dec 8, 2010 at 9:06 AM, Gilles <codecomplete at free.fr> wrote:
> Hello
>
>        I need to find a recent and neutral comparison of the major products
> available to connect an Asterisk server to the telephone network,
> whether ISDN (BRI) or PSTN, and through a PCI card or some external
> box. I'm told there are less issues (echo, stability) with external
> boxes compared to PCI cards.
>
> Apparently, the main brands are Digium, Sangoma, Rhino Equipment,
> Patton, and Audiocodes.

I would disagree that there are fewer issues.

I would phrase it as:

* pay somebody else to do it in the form of appliance and lose most
control versus do it yourself and have total control but also the
chance to screw up.

These are the choices you face in much of tech, such as develop
software yourself that does exactly what you want versus buy somebody
else's software that does some of what you want.

If you want to pay somebody else to do it, there's also the middle
road of pay somebody who knows how to do PCI cards to do it for you.
We call those people consultants or vendors. You can try hiring the
vendors directly or ask them for recommendations for vendors trusted
to do a good job.