One of the things I've been looking into lately is Phone systems. Because, it's simply not enough that I'm investigating mobile hardware and collaboration systems such as e-mail and SharePoint. I've tentatively been planning on having a Lync server when I eventually split out TECT's services into separate virtual machines, and eventually that grew into an Enterprise Voice deployment, because having a plain Lync server for just one person really doesn't make any sense.
In the interest of getting "something" faster, mostly to go with the faster Internet connection and PSTN phone line I'm going to have in the new place, I started researching different phone systems. It is also timely because just as a side-effect of a project at work, I've been learning a little bit more about Lync, Enterprise Voice, traditional PBXes, and telephone systems in general. Something I really never thought I'd get "into."
I'm young enough that although in my earliest years, picking up the phone and calling somebody seemed the easiest way to get in contact with them, there was definitely a cross-over point where it became easier to send an e-mail, instant message, or more recently, a text message in order to get in contact with somebody.
That said, there are still situations and people for whom "just pick up the phone" makes the sense. A group of my Internet friends built their own PBX using the free Asterisk software somewhat recently, and a nonzero number of them have physical deskphones that connect to the system using the PBX software. Up to this point, I'd chosen to use the LinPhone soft-phone client to connect to it, but given that I was planning on having Lync eventually anyway, I figured I'd just connect my own system to theirs.
In the interest of getting started more quickly, and because it seems like "play with phone systems" is becoming a meme in my circles anyway, I've decided to pick up my own system. I have a lot of writing to do over the next few weeks with what I've found out, impressions, predictions and desires, but for now I'll just described what I wanted and got.
My first priority was to have something inexpensive, but I also wanted something that would work both with the phone line I am going to have in my new home, and with the existing PBX system, with SIP trunking. After that, I tried to balance cost, configuration flexibility, features, and attractive phones.
What I ended up with was an Avaya IP Office Small Office Edition system. This is an appliance from the early 2000s that has a surprising amount of flexibility, including SIP trunking, four analogue lines, up to 28 stations (eight digital stations and twenty IP phones or softphone client) and voicemail built in. The appliance also has a WAN port and four LAN ports, and you could add a Lucent WaveLAN wireless card to it in order to use it as a wireless router for your home or small business. The brochure for it does specifically suggest using it in a large home or as part of a home-based business.
There's a surprising dearth of information about this particular system online. Once I receive it from eBay, part of my challenge will be to configure it, and another part of it will be to aggregate resources to help anybody else that may be using it.
My particular system comes with a voicemail card and five digital phones and is said to have been tested for functionality. Beyond simple internal calls, it'll be up to me to find out what it can do and configure it, which is both neat and somewhat terrifying. I expect that I'll be using it for a little while, and closer to the re-structuring of TECT, I'll decide whether or not to bring up Lync and use that as a PBX, and dedicate the attendant time and resources to that system, and either integrating it with the Avaya IP Office, or replacing that system outright.
The good news is that the IP Office I found was so inexpensive, I won't feel bad when it comes time to take it out of service. I can probably either make money putting it back up on eBay, or simply pass it along to somebody else who might want to use it.
So, whether this is the start of a new hobby (which I'll now have some more room to do) or just a "go insane or go home" situation with something I would have bought for that space anyway, we'll see.