Need advice on moving PiaF from copper to ITSP

[mcbsys]

Hi,

I set up a small church client with PiaF a few years back and it's been working great. They connect to the outside world using two POTS lines (through a Digium TDM with two FXO ports). Thing is, they're still paying $70+ per month for those two business phone lines with hunting. Surely it would be cheaper to use an ITSP and port the primary number onto two channels.

My main concern is their Internet bandwidth. They have DSL with only 384-1500 down, 128-384 up. That works fine to handle their small email server and generic browsing. They could probably upgrade to 1500-3000 down, 384-512 up but that's the DSL max due to their distance from the Central Office. The DSL provider, DSL Extreme, does not offer QoS prioritization.

I tested VoIP compatibility here and got these results:

• G711u: 2.3ms jitter and no packet loss, MOS score 4.1
• G729a: 0.5ms jitter with no packet loss, MOS score 5.2

They have an old Netgear FVS318 router (not QoS capable AFAIK) and a Dell PowerConnect 2824 gigabit switch (does do QoS).

Obviously the main thing we want to avoid is that call quality suddenly drops because a person or the email server starts downloading or uploading a large file. (There is one day a month where they tie up the server for a couple hours blasting out PDF newsletters.)

What would you recommend for two concurrent calls?

1. Need to use G729a?
2. Need to upgrade DSL to 3000/512?
3. Need a new, QoS-capable router? What make/model?

Thanks for your help,

 

[kevinfvc]

1. Need to use G729a?
2. Need to upgrade DSL to 3000/512?
3. Need a new, QoS-capable router? What make/model?

I used to have a pretty slow ADSL line (300kbps/1.1Mbps) for my home office. I used G.711 and it worked fine. My router had great QoS/Traffic Shaping. My MOS score (provided by the router) were typically 4.4.

If you are going this route, getting a router w/ strong QoS is important. There are many that should work and several recommendations available on this board.

SIP trunking seems like a great way for this church to save some money. Going with an all you can eat provider (like bandwidth.com) at $20/trunk would cut their bill by $30/mo. VoIP.MS or Vitelity (pay per minute) could save even more if there use is not too great.

I recommend trying SIP trunking for outbound calls first before porting numbers. Once you're happy with the quality, port the numbers and set the appropriate inbound routes.

Good luck!

 

[mcbsys]

Thanks guys. Testing outbound and maybe inbound is a good idea.

Did some analysis of FreePBX logs and AT&T bills. Looks like usage is around 200 minutes outbound plus 250 inbound. Let's say 500 total, even at $.02/minute, would be only $10. Add a phone number, E911, maybe some taxes, and it's still under $20. Pretty compelling.

Started reading the sticky router thread but the first recommendation was a D-Link gaming router and most posts are from 2009. Any more recent and business-oriented suggestions? I've heard good things about Sonicwall but that isn't mentioned at all in that thread.

Also: is there any reason to update to a later PiaF? They have FreePBX 2.5.2.3, I think that's Asterisk 1.4.

 

[rossiv]

Stay away from SonicWall with PIAF. I suggest one of the newer Linksys E series. I use those at two locations just fine. Great QoS too.

If it isn't broken, certainly don't fix it.

 

[phonebuff]

PFSense with one of these two soutions for hardware ---

http://www.pfsense.org/

http://store.netgate.com/Netgate-FW-7535-1U-P1695C84.aspx

http://soekris.com/products/net5501/net5501-60-board-rm-case.html

 

[mcbsys]

Stay away from SonicWall with PIAF.

What's the issue with Sonicwall and PiaF? Granted the Linksys is much cheaper, but for a business I'm attracted to Sonicwall features like logging, filtering for viruses at the firewall, blocking specific services, etc.

 

[kevinfvc]

I've heard good things about Sonicwall on the data side, but heard they don't do VoIP well (PiaF or otherwise). The have SIP ALG that simply doesn't work well and in the past their tech support recommended turning off that feature. I've heard this 2nd hand but from multiple Sonicwall partners. No actual first hand experience.

 

[tbrummell]

PFSense with one of these two soutions for hardware ---

^^^^^^^ what he said!

And if that hardware is out of reach, pfSense will run on anything from a 500MHz cpu and up. I run it on a P4 2Ghz with 512 of ram, almost overkill in the CPU department.

 

[jmullinix]

I agree to stay away from Sonicwall. They have trouble passing SIP until you muck around with the ALG on the router.

I have been installing PFSense for years. It is opensource (free) and there are vendors like netgate.com that sell it preloaded on hardware. PFSense will run on just about any pc with two NIC's.

 

[gregc]

What router do you use now? Any possibility of a firmware update to 3rd party?

I've used Linksys WRT54G(x) routers at many locations using Tomato firmware and DD-WRT sometimes. Both firmwares offer great QOS and some fantastic features. People have even gotten Asterisk running on the router itself (albeit, with difficulty).

-Greg

 

[Sacrilego]

What's the issue with Sonicwall and PiaF? Granted the Linksys is much cheaper, but for a business I'm attracted to Sonicwall features like logging, filtering for viruses at the firewall, blocking specific services, etc.

I've had several issues with Sonicwall products and services, in order to get decent performance out of them, you MUST get their higher end models, licensing is a pain, features break, just to name a few issues.

Appliances we own from Sonicwall are the TZ210, 2 ssl-vpn 2000, and an ssl-vpn 200.

The TZ210 with the antivirus and ids enable dropped throughput to around 2mbps from 20 and ping times increased from 12ms to 300ms to our website, it's not so great if you can't really use the features, licensing servers from sonicwall had an issue a few years back causing all spam to get in and list our appliance as unlicensed. That POS was taken out that day.

The ssl-vpn appliances have been decent, but it's very important to maintain your support contract in order to get updates. This would not be a really big deal, you pretty much do the same with cisco, except that Desktop updates can break functionality of them, so it's not really optional.

The ssl-vpn 200 has had no new firmware for a long time, so it just won't operate as well as it should with IE9 and/or the newer Java runtimes. It feels like they have abandoned it.

I've also heard horror stories from my boss about their firewall products.

I'm sure some people may have a good experience with them, but if you ask me, I would NEVER recommend them.

I right now use PFsense as our firewall/router, never been happier, performance is great, lots of features, does QOS, so our voice calls are always clear. The only issue you might encounter is with dynamic port nat and some sip providers, what I've done to fix that is to put in a list the providers that have issues and use static port nat for that list.

 

[mcbsys]

Thanks all. I asked about SonicWALL on an IT forum. This answer was informative:

"Th[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]e Sonicwall NSA Series firewalls support QoS, but will set you back at least $1200 or so, the TZ doesn't have it. Sonicwall NSA may be a little overkill for that small of an office, so you're probably better off getting a Cisco 800 Series Router and configuring it through Cisco IOS (most likely you may need to set up DSCP). Depending on the router you get from them (or if you buy it used from elsewhere), you'll have different feature sets in each IOS version. Although I'm 90% sure all Cisco Routers do QoS, check the IOS version you're getting before you buy to see whether it has QoS enabled or not, Cisco does advertise QoS on their 861 router: http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/ps9555/index.html ."

So at least the low-end SonicWALLs are out, and they can't afford a high-end version.

Lots of folks like pfSense. I've always been nervous about putting something containing a hard disk in as a router...one more server to maintain/monitor, plus the likelihood of disk or power supply failure...
[/FONT]

 

[Sacrilego]

Thanks all. I asked about SonicWALL on an IT forum. This answer was informative:

"Th[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]e Sonicwall NSA Series firewalls support QoS, but will set you back at least $1200 or so, the TZ doesn't have it. Sonicwall NSA may be a little overkill for that small of an office, so you're probably better off getting a Cisco 800 Series Router and configuring it through Cisco IOS (most likely you may need to set up DSCP). Depending on the router you get from them (or if you buy it used from elsewhere), you'll have different feature sets in each IOS version. Although I'm 90% sure all Cisco Routers do QoS, check the IOS version you're getting before you buy to see whether it has QoS enabled or not, Cisco does advertise QoS on their 861 router: http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/ps9555/index.html ."

So at least the low-end SonicWALLs are out, and they can't afford a high-end version.

Lots of folks like pfSense. I've always been nervous about putting something containing a hard disk in as a router...one more server to maintain/monitor, plus the likelihood of disk or power supply failure...
[/FONT]

Doesn't need to have a hard disk, you can use the embedded version with a good quality cf flash card or SSD.

 

[blanchae]

Hi,

I tested VoIP compatibility here and got these results:

• G711u: 2.3ms jitter and no packet loss, MOS score 4.1
• G729a: 0.5ms jitter with no packet loss, MOS score 5.2

Not to be picky but my understanding is that the MOS score is rated from 1-5 with 5 being the unattainable maximum score. 5.2 is out of the MOS rating scale. The actual maximum MOS rating that is attainable is 4.5 due to the way it is calculated. For g.711, the MOS score is 4.1.

 

[mcbsys]

Not to be picky but my understanding is that the MOS score is rated from 1-5 with 5 being the unattainable maximum score. 5.2 is out of the MOS rating scale. The actual maximum MOS rating that is attainable is 4.5 due to the way it is calculated. For g.711, the MOS score is 4.1.

Hmm...wonder if I copied it wrong or if that calculator was wrong...

 

[tbrummell]

I was thinking the same thing about the MOS scores. I used to do testing with a NetAlly server and the highest we could attain was 4.1.

 

[lifespeed]

router recommend

For an inexpensive, off-the-shelf solution I recommend Draytek Vigor 2130. If you're willing to delve a bit deeper into the bank account and time to learn and set up, PFSense is very well regarded.

 

[phonebuff]

Lots of folks like pfSense. I've always been nervous about putting something containing a hard disk in as a router...one more server to maintain/monitor, plus the likelihood of disk or power supply failure...

The two units I recommended use compact flash not hard drives, it is one of the reasons I refer people to them verses using a PC systems.

 

[mcbsys]

For an inexpensive, off-the-shelf solution I recommend Draytek Vigor 2130. If you're willing to delve a bit deeper into the bank account and time to learn and set up, PFSense is very well regarded.

Thanks the Draytek does look interesting. Never heard of them before. I like the ability to use a USB modem as second WAN source.

Cisco Small Business (formerly Linksys) routers have some nice specs but the reviews on NewEgg are not good. Need to spend some time looking at Cisco 800 series which I think are the "real" Cisco.

 

[mcbsys]

The two units I recommended use compact flash not hard drives, it is one of the reasons I refer people to them verses using a PC systems.

Thanks, I did see that. I guess the $380 minimum plus CF card seemed high for this two-person office.

Though smaller and less capable, $207 for a Netgate including CF card and pre-configured with pfSense sounds almost doable.