[Asterisk-Users] Which IP phone to use in Australia

[Shaun Ewing]

On Tue, 15 Feb 2005 17:13:39 +1100, Rudolf Ladyzhenskii
<Rudolf.ladyzhenskii at opennw.com> wrote:
> Hi, all
> 
> I am in Australia and I have to setup Asterisk in few offices. There will be IP phones in each office and I must be able to call between offices.
> 
> I need actual handsets. I need "standard" handsets to be used by people. Those must support features like CID, call forward, etc. --- your normal office feature set.
> Also I need some sort of more complex handset to be used by receptionist.
> 
> The main problem is that I am in Australia and I need to get phones that can be sourced in Australia. (correct power supplies, certified for australia, etc..)
> 
> I did look at supported h/w list and I am going to go through all of those companies, but I have no idea on how good/bad those phones are. I really need some advise here.

The Cisco 79xx range of IP phones (including 7905G, 7940G and 7960G)
work just fine in Australia, and have an A-Tick. The CP-PWR-CUBE= is
the official power pack, which works with any standard IEC computer
power cable. There's also a cheaper generic power pack available from
some retailers, or if you have a Cisco PWR switch you can use Cisco
PoE.

The three types allow one to match the phone to a person's calling requirements.

I typically buy my phones from Techtopia
(http://www.techtopia.com.au). Buying locally means that there aren't
any issues with power supplies, customs, etc.

I've tried two types of phones - Grandstream BT-101 and the Ciscos.

The Grandstream is useless for any serious calling, and would not be
recommended for a receptionist. We've had it do all sorts of nasty
things including putting a call on hold indefinitely when trying to
transfer. One particular version of the firmware also caused problems
with our network. It's also necessary to press "send" after dialing a
number (or wait for the timeout). No A-Tick either.

The Cisco phones do their job brilliantly - they also look very nice
aesthetically. They're exceptionally easy to use with softkeys guiding
one through tasks such as transfer, etc.

The 7960 phone is perfect for a receptionist - it supports a headset
(as does the 7940), and can have up to 12 simultaneous calls over 6
'lines'. One can also configure a dial plan on the Cisco phones, so
that calls progress automatically when the correct number of digits
has been entered (eg: 0 02 5551 5551).

I spent around an hour testing the Polycom IP500 and IP600 phones
nearly two years ago (when my interest in VoIP was picking up). They
seem quite nice, but i don't have any of these deployed. I refuse to -
Polycom won't sell them to people for use with Asterisk, and I'm not
going to buy products from a company that try and dictate how I use
their product.

-Shaun