[asterisk-users] high capacity analog <-> sip gateway

[Timothy Banks]

I use a lot of FXS SIP gateways for analog phones. Usually it's
because there's no cat5 on site and there's no budget to re-cable.
Other times it's because the customer only needs $10 trimline phones,
or has residents provide their own phones.

I use Mediatrix FXS gateways and highly recommend them.

If you choose to use Grandstream, be prepared for headaches. This is
not uninformed brand-bashing. I have deployed hundreds of Grandstream
gateways in 4, 8, and 24 port models, and they rarely last more than 2
years. They generate so many support calls for us, I no longer use
them. Problems include: losing registration, locking up, failing to
play dial tone, one way audio, strange crashes that pollute syslog.
Rebooting or hard power cycle usually fixes problems for a while, but
I haven't found a good way to script a regular preventative reboot
(yuck). External power bricks seem to fail a lot, and autopsies on
failed gateways show a lot of bad capacitors.

Since switching to MTX a year or two ago, I have not had a single
support call about the units. I have several dozen units in production
now.

I've used AudioCodes gateways as well and they're great, but usually
out of our budget (and more difficult to configure). MTX pricing is
somewhere between Grandstream and AudioCodes. I've found that the
extra money we spend on better hardware is less than what it would
cost to hire another person to take support calls and ship replacement
hardware.