[asterisk-users] which phones to use ??

[Michael Graves]

On Sat, 1 Mar 2008 22:26:18 -0500, C F wrote:

>On Sat, Mar 1, 2008 at 9:31 AM, Michael Graves <mgraves at mstvp.com> wrote:
>>  When in doubt there is only one sure answer....Polycom. Without a doubt the
>> best functionality, performance and reliability....even in the lower cost
>> models. Although the lesser models are still over $100.
>>
>
>While I agree with you that once they have booted and are configured
>the way one wants, they are the best. But here are the downsides on
>them:
>1. Way tooooo slooooooooooooowwwwwwwwwwwww to boot
>2. Lack of features, can't reconfigure the buttons to show something
>decent, like BLF, and the buttons you could configure are limited even
>though they are soft buttons. Compare that to the Aastra 480i
>
>Here are the upsides which in my opinion makes it still the best SIP
>phone, and the best for your money even though it's the most
>expensive:
>1. Boots reliable.
>2. LAN side Ethernet does NOT go down on a reboot.
>3. Very reliable and good sound quality, with no tricks attached, just
>works without playing with configuration files to adjust volume etc.
>4. Extremely easy to use, you only have to teach an end user what the
>difference between a blind and attd xfer is, and they know how to use
>it.
>5. They stay on, unless you reboot them manually. Unlike ANY other
>phone out there that I tried, it's the only one that didn't reboot or
>froze when not asked to. The following phones did freeze or reboot out
>of the blue: Aastra, Cisco, Sipura, GS and Snom. Although I have seen
>on certain firmwares that it's not responsive to a certain command
>under certain conditions, I have never seen them lock up completely.
>
>As far as the config files go, at this point I don't consider them
>hard, since what I'm trying to do is doable and they have great
>documentation. The XML files are just confusing because of the layout,
>searching within vi is not that hard.
>However, it's not something that is easy to teach oneself overnight.
>Compare that to Cisco or Aastra config files and you have a nightmare.

For the longest time I didn't even bother with config files for my
Polycom phones. I only had a few so I used the web interface. And I
hated it. Still do.

However, once I came into a situation that demanded that I use the
config files I found the phone was much easier to deal with. Using the
confg files was worth ethe effort. It allowed me to appraciate the
phones more.

I have some Aastra phones are a really like them, especially the
480iCT. I've used some older snom's...they're cool, too.

I'm not sure why people dwell on the boot time so much. I only reboot
the phones VERY rarely. I can't recall the last time I had to. Unlike
some others, the manage to do it on their own periodically. 

I've never used Cisco phones for simple cost reasons although the
colour backlit LCD is enticing. Nor Linksys, but I should get a couple
just to play with. The 942 has a colour screen too right?

I'm not really a Polycom fanboy. I'm very into the snom m3 for
portablility. I just think that when you need someting that works,
reliably, all the time...it's a short list. And for me Polycom is on
the top of it.

Michael
--
Michael Graves
mgraves<at>mstvp.com
http://blog.mgraves.org
o713-861-4005
c713-201-1262
sip:mjgraves at pixelpower.onsip.com
skype mjgraves
fwd 54245