Multicast Paging Across 3 Facilities?

[VOIP_IT_Guy]

I'm in negotiations with a VOIP provider to install 130+ Yealink handsets across three buildings connected with fiber-optics. The provider will host the pbx (3CX I believe) and manage the phone system.

First they told me that I could not page outside of the POE switch the phone was attached to, then they changed their story to I could page any phone connected to any switch inside the building, but cannot page outside of the building.

They are telling me though that this system is incapable of multicast paging across all three buildings. Nothing in the manuals indicate any sort of limitations other than all the phones need to be on the same subnet, but even that can be mitigated with VLANs.

They tell me I can multicast an entire building from any phone in that building, but I cannot page all three buildings at once. Another provider told me that what I want is possible, but not with a hosted solution, the PBX would have to be onsite. With the hosted solution they need to use a STUN server and a Session Border Controller that disables multicast capabilities across the entire system.

If I can intercom any phone in the system, doesn't it follow that I should be able to page all phones in the system? (I'm assuming dialing extensions between buildings works, but I also assumed a system-wide page would work, as it does with our 20year old Nortel system).

Thanks,
Frustrated IT Guy

[johnkiniston]

If your phones are all in the same multicast domain then you should be able to multicast from any phone to your other phones.

It's all down to routing the traffic correctly.

[complex1]

(08-14-2018 01:16 PM)VOIP_IT_Guy Wrote:  I'm in negotiations with a VOIP provider to install 130+ Yealink handsets across three buildings connected with fiber-optics. The provider will host the pbx (3CX I believe) and manage the phone system.

First they told me that I could not page outside of the POE switch the phone was attached to, then they changed their story to I could page any phone connected to any switch inside the building, but cannot page outside of the building.

They are telling me though that this system is incapable of multicast paging across all three buildings. Nothing in the manuals indicate any sort of limitations other than all the phones need to be on the same subnet, but even that can be mitigated with VLANs.

They tell me I can multicast an entire building from any phone in that building, but I cannot page all three buildings at once. Another provider told me that what I want is possible, but not with a hosted solution, the PBX would have to be onsite. With the hosted solution they need to use a STUN server and a Session Border Controller that disables multicast capabilities across the entire system.

If I can intercom any phone in the system, doesn't it follow that I should be able to page all phones in the system? (I'm assuming dialing extensions between buildings works, but I also assumed a system-wide page would work, as it does with our 20year old Nortel system).

Thanks,
Frustrated IT Guy

Hi Frustrated IT Guy,

Have you thought about dumping the 3CX provider?

If 3CX can page the phones (multicast paging) in one building, it can also page phones in several buildings IF all buildings are connected to each other by VPN.
With VPN you create one subnet, as you know, so there are no limitations anymore.
Personally I should host the PBX local, onsite. No STUN or SBC have to be used.

[VOIP_IT_Guy]

Quote:Have you thought about dumping the 3CX provider?

Personally I should host the PBX local, onsite. No STUN or SBC have to be used.

Unfortunately the VOIP provider is also the internet provider and network provider, and they don't provide a non-hosted option. So I have to deal with this provider and convince them multicast is possible with a hosted solution, or wait for them to deploy the system and set it up myself.

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(08-14-2018 05:37 PM)johnkiniston Wrote:  If your phones are all in the same multicast domain then you should be able to multicast from any phone to your other phones.

It's all down to routing the traffic correctly.

That's what I thought, and since they provide the phones, the host, the network and the internet, any and all limitations are made by them.

[jasit]

multicast paging uses a different broadcast stream and each of the phones will listen on that port
the sample port most use is 224.0.0.32:10000 even though your network may be 192.168.0.0

with multicast paging on the yealink phones you can setup multiple ports so that you can group the paging if you wish.

Say you only want to page only Building 1
you could have it as 224.0.0.32:10001
building 2 as 224.0.0.32:10002
building 3 as 224.0.0.32:10003

this listening stream is way faster than using the 3cx page to extension feature as it needs to connect to every phone listed before the page can begin.

you can also skip the 3cx portion and just add feature directly on the yealink phones.

Depending on how your router is setup, you will need to potentially setup firewall/routing rules to allow the broadcast across the router.

So yes it is possible. A quick google of multicast traffic over wan brings up lots of reading material.

Jasit

[jasit]

fun fact about 3cx, if you go to there website, you can see the costs on purchasing the software and installing it on your own machine. It is really easy to setup and then you can have it locally hosted.