[Asterisk-Users] Re: Polycom Phones

[Walt Reed]

On Wed, Jan 26, 2005 at 10:20:24PM -0500, Cory Andrews said:
> Seshu - the 480i, although a great phones, is quite a bit more expensive 
> than the Polycom IP300 or IP500, it is more comparable in price to the 
> Polycom IP600. 

Hmm. Your own web site has it priced between the 500 and 600. If the
difference is good support versus zero support, wouldn't the $50
difference between the 500 and the 480i be saved in the first 20 minutes
you spend fighting with a problem? Another factor is that one company tests
with * and the other shuns it.

Just the availability of the firmware alone is almost worth the $50.

I have no problem with polycom, and use their non-IP conference phones,
but I'm not going to purchase a product from a manufacturer that refuses
to provide even basic support (complete manuals and firmware.)

It would be Very nice to have a phone platform that is fully documented
that had firmware that was open and "hackable". It seems that people on
this list spend massive amounts of time trying to work around all the
firmware bugs in various products (eg. call waiting on polycom.)

If sayson provided developer documentation for their phones and allowed
us to write our own firmware, they wouldn't be able to manufacturer them
fast enough. They would corner the IP phone market.