[Asterisk-Users] Systems Admin; Telecom Newbie - What do I need?

[Roland Zagler]

Hi Newbie,

I wonder how you could find the mailing list but NOT the wiki
at http://www.voip-info.org/tiki-index.php?page=Asterisk, that
documents a huge area of how to use Asterisk in many
scenarios.

First of all, take a week or two to read the wiki and to set up
a testing environment and try to get basic things running with
Asterisk (which means os, Asterisk installation and basic calls
between softphones...) to get knowledge of what Asterisk can
do.

i suggest you use debian because i think there are more people
using debain than using os x and maybe you will need some
help ;-)

then try to get a BRI line (Basic Rate Interface, also known as ISDN),
put a BRI interface card like Longshine LCS-8051a, which has a
HFC chipset on it that enables you to use the ZAPTEL functionality.
(http://www.voip-info.org/tiki-index.php?page=zaptelBRI)

and then, read the wiki...

reguarding the costs for the testing:
1 PC: around USD 500,-
1 BRI interface: around USD 40,-

after testing you will have to deside what to do:

- take the T1 out of the cisco and put it into your Asterisk Server
  in a PRI interface (that acts like the BRI but has 23 channels and
  not 2)
- route your traffic to your cisco and let him to the translation to
  PSTN

i would prefer the first choice, i am currenty running several
HP ProLiant DL360 Servers with Fedora Core 3 Linux with Digium's
quad PRI cards TE410P with 4 E1s (30 voice channels each). These
servers are single Xeon 2.8 GHz with 2GB of RAM which is more than
enough. in austria each of these servers is aroung USD 2400,- and
the Digium PRI card is around USD 1600,-.

reguarding your network: at worst case you will need 64kbit of
bandwidth so you can run your voice infrastructure using your
network easily without buying expensive switches from cisco
that are "VoIP capable".

this and everything else can be found by experiencing the search
button on the wiki-site...

best regards,
roland
-----Original Message-----
From: asterisk-users-bounces at lists.digium.com
[mailto:asterisk-users-bounces at lists.digium.com] On Behalf Of Ed Pastore
Sent: Tuesday, July 12, 2005 11:33 PM
To: asterisk-users at lists.digium.com
Subject: [Asterisk-Users] Systems Admin; Telecom Newbie - What do I
need?

Hi, folks. I am planning on implementing Asterisk in 2006, and need  
to budget for it now, so I need to know what I'll need to get. My  
company has about 50 users, and is currently languishing on a very  
old Comdial PBX. All of our client computers are Macs; our servers  
are mostly OS X, with a couple Debians and a Red Hat.

I am thoroughly experienced at systems administration, and can figure  
out most everything I need on the computer hardware and software  
side, but I am a complete telecom newbie and get lost when trying to  
figure out what else I will need.

Here's what I think I need:
- A server, running Debian Linux or OS X (our preferred operating  
systems here)
- A good network. We're on switched 100 Base-T, but will move to  
gigabit next year.
- A T1 or some dedicated channels of a T1
- Gateway PCI cards or devices (in the case of OS X, only devices I  
guess)
- VOIP phones or phone software (I'd like to use software and USB  
handsets)

Here's what I don't get:

1. How do I route between the internet and the telco network? (I said  
I was a telecom newbie, right?) I mean, if someone dials a phone  
number, what tells it to route to my gateway device? Do I need  
service from a telecom company? I need to get the phone numbers from  
somewhere, right?

2. Does my network need to be VOIP capable? I see some network  
switches which route additional layers of ethernet, including in some  
cases VOIP. Do I really need that? Or will any gigabit switches do  
the trick? If so, what's up with those VOIP switches? Is that just  
marketing? They sure cost a lot more.

3. What do I need in a T1? I currently have one T1 from Sprint, going  
into a Cisco router, which then goes to my firewall, then to my  
network. If I want, say 30 channels of another T1 for VOIP... can I  
just buy another Sprint T1? And where does additional hardware fit  
into that route in order to split out the VOIP channels from the data  
channels?

4. Do I pretty much need a vendor for implementation help, if this is  
all new to me? Or is there a path I can follow that will help me get  
through this?

5. What am I not asking that I should be? :)

Any help, input, suggestions, etc. would be welcome. (But please no  
vendor calls yet... I'm in early budgeting, and will just ignore  
vendor input until I know more.)

Thanks!
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