Over the weekend we installed our latest PBX product called 3CX ! 3CX is a ready made software bundle that's very easy to install service maintain and use . The software is low cost as well as the softphones are part of the package for no cost ! This product can be up and running in probably an hour as it is THAT simple and easy to set up ! Naturally the more phones and equipment you set up the longer it will take but it is really pretty simple ! Get your SIP user and pwd info and add your phones quickly and easily ! SIP trunks are a breeze or set up a known gateway or build your own !!
Although like a good techie , We created our own issues , We still had no serious problems installing and running 3CX ! Our license keys had issues ( Our fault ) with our Fully Qualified Domain Name ( FQDN ) as they did not match correctly ! If your license and FQDN are not set up correctly , then the PBX database will not run and it will generate an unknown error !! You can load this on a Windows 10 Pro , recommended for small business but not for Medium or large - maybe Windows 2016 server or a Virtual Server . A full listing of technical specs is available if needed as we have them ready to send to you to make a technical build list of materials !!
Next issue : Be careful on logging in as it is VERY unforgiving as to the 5 times you have to log in correctly ! It loves to blacklist ( kill your IP address ) from logging in and it will do so with ease on your client or on your Management Console as once it blacklists you the IP address is out for 24 hours on the Management Console and 5 minutes on your Telephone! 84,200 Seconds or so . This was more of a pain in the You know what versus something wrong ! Today I will find out the actual parameters to changes so this does not occur again ! Our Main pc for programing could not log in for 24 hours even though We changed a parameter to 90 seconds !! Ah the techie life !! 2 Softphones were installed as we ordered some hard phones but they have not yet arrived . Softphones were set up as a receptionist and a standard telephone . VMail , calls in out etc. Hunt groups and ring groups as well . We will be installing SIP trunks today ! Also as it is in production today , We will kick the tires a bit more and see whats in store for us but so far everything registered correctly , no errors in the logs and calls are being made and answered !!
Windows 10 Pro Latest updates etc.
Memory 12 Gig shared
Intel I7 3770 3.40 GZh
Plenty of storage in the Terabyte range
Static IP address needed
FQDN MUST be set up via 3CX
Standard small business network right out of the box or customize like we did !
Loved the install as it was a breeze . The machine is a simple set up as only turn off Anti Virus on 2 folders and away you go !
A word of caution is to keep a careful eye on hackers as this is BIG TIME for the crooks to come out and find your system ! Today we will be spending some time on the 3CX website reviewing security recommendations and a SIP packet analysis of attempts and setting our security to match ! I;ll post some more information here later on !
So as time goes on and our system grows , we will be updating this document to let you know what we know , that this product is incredible , easy to use , great investment and cost effective for the SMB ( Small Medium Business ) group !
Thanks
Rich O'Connor
Spending about another hour today hooking up a telephone , recording my voicemail and searching thru the settings while all the time learning how to set up 3CX !!
My 3CX is 90 % up and running ! I am only waiting for my SIP trunks and We are in Business 100 % . Dealing with SIP providers is like dealing with the Old Verizon or Bell Atlantic ... We'll call when we provision it .. Ugh .. Day 3 ..
And all of this installation of say maybe 15 telephones could have been done in less than 5 hours !! I am amazed at how simple it was not to have to remember ports , firewall settings , network config params etc. I had my old book out with all of the SIP network ports , studying up , trying to remember my stun settings , my FQDN etc.
All for nothing !
After plugging in and installing a Grandstream 1782 8 button 4 SIP account telephone on my 3CX , I was amazed at how easy it really was ! A Grandstream 1782 SIP phone in less than 5 minutes by using their discovery method ! Recorded my voicemail msg and my name and its complete ! All in less than 15 minutes ! . By Using PNP to talk to the Tel system ( Something like Layer 2 Messages - I'll have to trace the next one out and watch it on my network to be sure of the discovery method ) when the telephone is plugged in , the telephone actually is known ! I just created a user 105 , created a new Phone and adding in the Mac Address into a new phone profile I created , clicked on the bold phone and clicked provision ! Oh and I also upgraded the firmware without having to set up an FTP/TFTP/ HTTPS connection , downloading a program , testing it out and spending an hour trying to configure it to get it to work ! A window to my installed telephone using its IP Address opened on the first try via https and in the firmware upgrade page , I dragged the file form my desktop into the window and pressed upgrade !
So now on to setting up my voicemail !
While listening to voicemail prompts , One in particular , " Self Identification " message is rather interesting . I was asked to record one and had to play thru some other voicemail prompt instances and listen to the choices , to figure out that this change in prompt recordings is my name .. Ah the changing times we live in ..
So all is well and we are getting more like a Telephone company each and every day now !
We are beginning to like this system more and more every day !
Oh and do NOT lose those passwords as that Demon hit again today .. Make sure NOT to continue to attempt to open a window if you do NOT know the password !
Experience , as you will feel the pain of waiting a LONG time for the system and 5 Minutes for the telephone before you can attempt another log in !!
rpocteleocm.com
Rich O'Connor
Slowly as we get acclimated into the 3CX system , Its hard to see this system NOT being one of the top 5 in today's market . A week has gone by and we literally tested out the Remote side , the network side internal and external , Firewall , Auto Attendant ( Digital receptionist ) , Still get a kick out of the " Self Identification " Prompt ( Old School Guy here ) but it works , and so much more . As a good Engineer would do , first check was the errors and problems , and so far the Log is clean of the oh no type of errors , in fact we see nothing to get alarmed about either !
My Grandstream 1782 works like a charm with my old analog headset too ! Audio is fantastic and clear , So headset purchases are out ! I programmed 4 buttons for incoming calls on the left side and other feature buttons on the right like DND , Call forward to cell etc. I'll never have a need to utilize all of the feature sets but for the price , I have a nice black and white display that shows everything I need , incoming , out going Calls , Mistakes I make on dialing etc.
I did notice one thing with the Auto Attendant that I need to address : Short DTMF tones are ignored / misunderstood on incoming calls . I never lost any calls but on a few calls I made , My IPhone for example has short tones and I noticed a few not completed calls as I attempted to dial thru my AA . I 'll be looking into this as well today . I tested out the AA from my cell network to my SIP trunk and found some calls not being understood by the AA . If a tone is too short then the AA replays the AA greeting over for a few times . I did have to hold down the dtmf key a bit longer than I expected .. I'll have more on this after I test it thoroughly but I am sure its no different than any other system today .
So in conclusion , with 5 Clients running , and 1 Hard Phone that was a breeze to set up , I am impressed by just the way 3CX simplified a LOT of the set up process so that Multiple Vendors devices can be used . Some of our folks can and will use their Software Clients at Customer sites , at Home or even on the road and they still get the same type of service expected in the office !
Voice clarity is great as we will be testing out conferencing this week on Multiple local and remote client apps . As for our network , We have a FIOS Quantum network and 75 up and down on our bandwidth stream . Nothing fancy here as we do most work on the cloud like everyone else today !! As for the system issues , well , There are some differences in terms of user abilities and functionality . Proper installation procedures make it relatively simple to install most Clients / Telephones / SIP Trunks / Gateway/SBC services ! I still am trying to get over the black list device timeout issues but I will spend some time researching 3CX Forums for the answers ! With this IP-PBX software , I can get away with standard telephones and more , connect multiple 3CX IP PBX installations ( Tie Lines for remote installations included in the software ! ) for different sites and have telephones all over the country at a very low cost of ownership ! Maybe a main Corporate HQ with a few stores across the land : Install telephones if you have a private network or connect Multiple systems if you have connections into each store / outlet !
And the cost is very low in comparison to other full IP PBX systems on the market today . If you do NOT mind providing your own hardware then this system is a great choice for today's office ! I have worked on many IP PBX systems over the past 15 years ( And many digital system prior to this too ) , and a LOT of integration practices are utilizing server based / Virtual server based systems and practices to conform / simplify installations and procedures . I was skeptical years ago but I think technology has adapted today and has excelled on fundamentals in re to integration practices , VOIP engineering requirements - Software and Hardware available and readily acceptable as well as Engineering acceptance .
So I hope your installation goes as easily as ours as we did some homework and got ready for the unexpected . If you need help or are having difficulties in obtaining a 5 - 9 type install with no user issues , we can help turn a bad install into a great cost effective experience for you today !!
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