running voip on third party server wtthout third party voip service

[asinshesq]

I currently have a number of yealink voip phones in my house that tie into a 3cx server I am running on a local laptop. The phone service to the outside world is analog (Fairpoint) and I use a patton fxo gateway to bridge from my 3cx system to the outside.

I realize that this is a newbie type question but I am curious: is it possible to sign up for a third party voip server (to replace my local 3cx server) without actually signing up for a third party voip service? Would that be a crazy thing to do (as opposed to actually signing up for a real voip service)?

If I were to go with a true third party voip service rather than just a server, would I still be using a gateway or would I connect the voip phones directly to the third party service?

[Billx]

(12-26-2014 03:52 AM)asinshesq Wrote:  I currently have a number of yealink voip phones in my house that tie into a 3cx server I am running on a local laptop. The phone service to the outside world is analog (Fairpoint) and I use a patton fxo gateway to bridge from my 3cx system to the outside.

I realize that this is a newbie type question but I am curious: is it possible to sign up for a third party voip server (to replace my local 3cx server) without actually signing up for a third party voip service? Would that be a crazy thing to do (as opposed to actually signing up for a real voip service)?

If I were to go with a true third party voip service rather than just a server, would I still be using a gateway or would I connect the voip phones directly to the third party service?

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You asked:
Is it possible to sign up for a third party voip server (to replace my local 3cx server) without actually signing up for a third party voip service?

You would need to look around to see if any Third Party Providers allow this. Most of them seem to provide at least one telephone number as part of the package.

If you did indeed find one and you want to use your existing telephone number with their service, then you would need to set up your Patton Gateway to be access from your Third Party Provider.

This would not be ideal and the voice quality would be poor.

Maybe just Port your existing number to the Third Party Provider?

If you just want to use the VOIP phones as an Intercom (no outside calls) then look at Callcentric.com.
You can get a free number and up to 10 extensions.
They do charge for 911 service.

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If I were to go with a true third party voip service rather than just a server, would I still be using a gateway or would I connect the voip phones directly to the third party service?

If you get a telephone number from the provider, then you don't need to use your Patton Gateway at all.
Your VOIP phones would connect to your Internet Router to allow them to access the providers services.

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Hope this helps you.

[asinshesq]

Thanks very much for your response. My internet connection has reasonable latency (~36ms to google.com). My analog phone connection to Fairpoint has never been good...am I right that going with a VOIP provider will end up sounding better? Any downside to doing this? (I get my internet connection via fairpoint dsl so I imagine the times when I lose internet connection are the same times I would lose analog phone connection anyway and thus losing phones when I lose internet connection is probably not a material problem.)

Also, would a third party provided offer me similar control over my internal system that I currently have with 3cx? For example, would it allow me to have one of my voip phones call another in an intercom kind of way?

Any suggestions for providers I should take a look at?

[CWR]

Latency to my VoIP Provider is is in the 70 range and is acceptable. (My Google DNS ping is down in the 20's - but that is not as important)

Check VoIP.ms they have a per minute rate... as does Callcentric. But I did not have good quality with Callcentric when I tested them.
Nexvortex had a big outage last month, I would steer clear.

If you need just SIP Service, check out Sigma VoIP. Top service in the US by far.

In my opinion, I would port my phone number to a SIP Provider and look at getting something like the Grandstream UCM 6102 PBX. That is what I use at home. It is not free like 3cx's basic package... but easy to maintain and great support.

(If you do move to a VoIP Service and keep Fairpoint for Internet, you may need to rewrite your caller id. My provider was still taking calls for me that went to 16175551212 so my VoIP Provider changes it to 916175551212 and my UCM detects that as the main number 16175551212.)

[asinshesq]

Thanks. I'm looking for a full voip provider so I can stop running and maintaining my own VoIP server. (I've had my system up and running for a year but I would just as soon have a provider handle that if I am already going to pay for VoIP service) For example, I guess I would look at call centric (like you mentioned) or phone power or voipo or vonage. I just chatted with phone power and they say even if I am only using VoIP phones (in my case, yealink t20s an t46gs and w52s), I will need to use their adaptor. That surprises me because I thought when using a VoIP service the adaptor was just for hooking up pots phones to the service. Are they wrong? And once i am up and running, will I still be able to configure the extensions to intercom each other while allowing each to make and receive outside calls?

[CWR]

Check VoIP.ms... they provide many features of a PBX including Voicemail, Ring Groups, IVR's, Call Recordings, etc.

By intercom - do you want to have the phone auto-answer intercom calls so the other person does not have to pickup?
(Perhaps using Multicast paging will work just as well for this need - "Tom - please call John at ext 100.")

I think whoever you talked to at PhonePower wasn't understanding that you have SIP Phones already.

[asinshesq]

Yes, that's what I mean by intercom. I have 3cx and my yealink phones set so that if I dial an extension on one phone the destination phone auto answers. I suspect this is not really a 3cx feature but instead is the way I set up the yealink phones a while back (I did this a year ago so don't remember). I guess what I was looking to confirm is that I can plug a bunch of VoIP phones into my lan (my LAN is attached via a router to my DSL service) and then configure each phone to be a separate extension with all using the same VoIP service (and all ringing at once when an outside call comes into my ported number). Is that how a VoIP service usually works do I can just give it a try?

[CWR]

The intercom is a feature of both. 3cx sends a sip command stating it is an intercom call and the yealink responds accordingly.
I would find a provider that can do intercom (although I haven't seen cloud based ones do this) and try out the features you need.
I use VoIP.ms as a carrier for business calls and have not had any issues (on 3cx).

See this:
http://wiki.voip.ms/article/Sub_Accounts
http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r2557166...h-voip.ms-
If you can define a ring type it might work (need to do a wireshark and examine the sip header)

Ps - VoIP.ms for the price of a DID you get unlimited inbound calls for residential use (2 call paths). Pretty good deal.

[asinshesq]

Thanks. I used my browser to navigate to the internal ip for one of my yealink t46g phones and I see that it allows me to specify DSS keys as intercom shortcuts (specifying *9xyz where xyz is the extension of the destination phone). And I also see that in the features tab it allows me to set things up to automatically 'accept' intercom calls (i.e. automatically pick up). And sure enough, when I dial *9xyz on one phone the intercom automatically answers on extension xyz. So I think that means that as long as I can call from one extension to another directly I don't need 3cx to make that happen.

So do you think it is plausible that if I sign up for any old VOIP service I will be able to specify which extensions are which when I provision the phones with that service (and then I can make direct intercom calls like I currently do while using the third party voip service for incoming and outgoing calls with the outside world)?

It's amazing to me how unwilling support is at the third party voip providers to get into these questions (the rule seems to be if you are going to BYOD rather than using their adaptor with POTS phones you are on your ownd).

[CWR]

i thought *9 was a 3cx function. But maybe yealink uses same.
I wouldn't use any provider. I would find one you are comfortable with for your calls. Don't get stuck in a contract or cancellation fee.
I have used voip.ms and can recommend. Their support has been good to me this far.
With them you set up sub accounts for each extension. Those credentials are what you put into each phone. They have a ton of features. For like $2 month you get 3500 incoming minutes.
Try the providers out before you port your number to them.