[Asterisk-Users] Dell server for asterisk question!

[Steven Critchfield]

On Wed, 2004-05-12 at 17:08, Bartosz Jozwiak wrote:
> Quoting Steven Critchfield <critch at basesys.com>:
> 
> > On Wed, 2004-05-12 at 16:35, Bartosz Jozwiak wrote:
> > > Thanks very much for your reply.
> > > Well this system is going to work in HOTEL enviroment.
> > > So still doual Xeon 2.8 Ghz for two TE405P is not enough ?
> > > yes i could not find any information on Dell's site too. Even could not
> > > find any sales' e-mail address :(
> > > So what do you suggest for HOTEL enviroment ? Still I should use two
> > separate
> > > asterisk servers for each card ?
> >
> > Assuming you are meaning stock normal telephony and no VoIP on a HOTEL
> > environment, you might be just fine as you will just be doing native
> > brides most of the time.
> >
> > What size HOTELs are you planning on rolling out to? 2 TE405P cards gets
> > you 192 channels using T1 or 240 channels under E1. I'm not sure I have
> > seen hotels that have much over a quarter of the phone lines per
> > extensions. So my guess is that the majority of the time the channels
> > sit idle. At that case, you are probably well within what you need to
> > get this done.
> 
> That Hotel need about 96 extensions. I will use 4 channel banks and connect them
> with T1 and I will use 3 E1 lines for connection to TelcoProvider.
> I will create also about 5 extensions for SIP IP PHONES.

Are you sure you want that kind of incoming lines? 3 E1's of PSTN is 90
channels, you would then have the capacity for nearly every phone in the
hotel to be active at once. This is not ideal. Ideally, you probably
only need half to a quarter of the number of extensions in lines. 96
Extensions should need no more than 2 E1's, and probably wouldn't be too
crowded with just a single E1. 

Think about what your fill rate is in the hotel. If you are only full
rarely, you especially don't want to order that much capacity. If you
are regularly only 75% full, I would venture you could get away with a
single E1 without getting anyone annoyed with the outbound wait if any.
Considering that 75% of 96 extensions is 72, and if half of your
extensions that are occupied by clients wanted to use the phone, thats
36 channels. A quarter of the 72 is just 18 lines. 

So the question comes down to one that you need to study usage. If your
hotel is rarely 100% full, don't go for the capacity for your peak, it
is wasteful and at least in the US, when you are at 100% full, the type
of people filling the hotel aren't there for talking on the phone.

Look up some of the information about erlang tables by Agner Erlang for
a good idea of why I am saying you can get away with much fewer phone
lines.

> So I am happy to hear that Dell 2650 with dual 2.8Ghz processor will handle it.
> Of course I would like to run some small IVR system with AutoAttendent.

Please understand that I say it should work. I do not make a warranty on
my statement. I also have not experienced that size of a system yet. But
from your description, the most taxing problem you are going to have is
keeping 2 cards happy, and large amounts of VoIP, you should be fine.

-- 
Steven Critchfield <critch at basesys.com>