[asterisk-users] Cisco AS5400XM

[Andreas Sikkema]

On 10/6/11 11:25 PM, Kyle Sexton wrote:
> I'm looking at the Cisco AS5400XM to convert some incoming T1s to SIP
> signaling.  Has anyone had any experience with these devices?  The
> feature cards that Cisco sells can be a little confusing.  I'm
> thinking something like below is what I need.
> 
> (1) AS5400XM, AS5400XM Starter Kit (inc Chassis, MB, Def Mem)
> (1) AS54-AC-RPS-PWR, AS5400 AC Redundant Power Supply
> (1) AS54-DFC-8CT1, AS5400 OCTAL T1/PRI DFC Card
> (2) AS54-DFC-108NP, AS5400 108 Voice/Universal Port Feature Card
> 
> Any thoughts would be appreciated.  Thanks.

I've used them in the past and still use the little brother (AS5350XM).
I have no experience with T1s, but I used them to convert EuroISDN E1s
to SIP. They were very stable (I don't think I've ever seen one crash)
but can be a pain when you want to set them up.

These machines were originally designed as modembanks for internet
access so the default config has an interface for every B channel. That
is a pain to browse through the configuration. Grouping them solves this.

Make sure you understand how to route calls using dialpeers, and make
sure you understand this before putting them in service. These are very,
very capable machines with lots of useful configuration options.

Make sure you buy enough DSP channels to cover all simultaneous calls
that need transcoding, we generally bought enough DSP cards so we could
transcode all simultaneous calls. If you add it all up we were actually
buying more DSP channels than E1 channels were available, for some
reason Cisco designed the machine like this, perhaps to cover for slow
call teardowns occupying DSPs too long.


-- 
Andreas Sikkema