[Asterisk-Users] New Asterisk user with a goal

[Ryan Coates]

Hi All, I am rather new to the asterisk world, and new to VoIP in
general, my question seems rather simple compared to some of the
topics under discussion here :)

I have done quite a bit of reading and fiddling trying to get a system
set up, to no avail yet
basically myself and a friend (both behind NAT and Firewalls, but able
to set up the firewall rules/port mappings ourself) are interesting in
setting up a PBX each, initially just for IP based calls over the net,
so that we can call each other for free
eventually we will look at plugging this into the POTS system and
repacing all our phones with  IP phones and rouitng the calls
appropriately depending on destination

at present I am trying to test with some software phones and an
asterisk box on a virtual network (no nat, no firewalls) to see if we
can get anything working (client 1 calling client 2), before we splash
out a fair ammount on some decent IP Phones, but am not having much
joy

if anyone could give me some help/advice on the matter I would be greatful

if you need any more details please do not hesitate to ask, ill try to
answer whatever I can
-- 
Regards,

Ryan "Phoenix" Coates
ryan.coates at gmail.com