[Asterisk-Users] Mission-Critical Deployments

[C F]

On 11/17/05, pdhales at optusnet.com.au <pdhales at optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> > I disagree with PaulH on this one. Cheap IP phones makes for *cheap*
> > phone, cheap sound, and cheap features. The cheapest IP phone you can
> > get will come to around $60.00 USD, which multiplied by 150 makes
> > $9,000.00. While a channel bank (ADIT 600) with 6 FXS cards (48 ports)
> > runs around $1200.00 multiplied by 3 (3 * 48 = 144 the closest I can
> > get without overbuying) makes for $3600.00, each QuadT1 card runs
> > around $1,500.00 or $2,500.00 with echo can, multiplied by 2 makes
> > $5,000.00 at the most, Total = $8,600.00 at the most, and you already
> > have the phones, and I'm telling you that it will be cheaper. Also,
> > you might have to rerun wiring for VoIP, beside the fact that for
> > cheap VoIP phones you don't get POE, which also means you need outlets
> > where you are going to put phones, as well as in featurewise; you can
> > do much more in the DP with ananlog phones (or VoIP since it's in the
> > DP), then *any* VoIP phone under $100.00 can do without the DP, and
> > even a Cisco or Polycom cannot do much without some fancy programming
> > from the phone itself with no DP.
>
> Hmmmmm......it's pretty close price wise....I thought the channel banks
> would cost more...
>
> With regards to functionality, I would have to test the two setups side by
> side.
> I know that at a site we setup, the grandstream BT101's came out about the
> same as cheap analogs with regards to quality and functionality...

This is exactly what I disagree with. The BT101's are not worth
*anything* even if you pay me to take them I will *never* install them
for a client. They need babysitting, rebooting, terrible sound
quality, and are very not userfriendly. Going the analog way (vs
BT101) is not close pricewise it is a *lot* cheaper, since it works.
The BT101's don't, it creates tooooooooooooo much trouble for any
office to deal with. Quality wise, an analog phone is the quality
users are looking for, since that's what they are used to. The BT101
cannot offer that. Functionality: what function does the BT101 have
that you like so much? last time I checked the conf button wasn't even
working, xfers you get with features.conf, and ringers sound much
nicer on analog phones, CallerID works much better on analog phones.
Can you please name me one feature that the BT101 has that is at least
as good as an analog phone (besides for the xfer button, which with
any decent analog phone can be programmed if it has dedicated one
touch speed dial buttons)?