The snom ONE plus is scalable from 20 to 150 extensions and comes pre-installed and configured as a plug-and-play hardware appliance for deployment with nearly all of the company’s IP phones.  

Two versions are [...]]]>

It was inevitable. Snom (www.snom.com) has put the company’s snom ONE IP PBX software into a rack-mountable package. 

The snom ONE plus is scalable from 20 to 150 extensions and comes pre-installed and configured as a plug-and-play hardware appliance for deployment with nearly all of the company’s IP phones.  

Two versions are available, corresponding to the two software versions of snom; Yellow is good for up to 20 extensions while Blue goes up to 150 extensions.  Starting price on yellow, depending on config, is $2131 suggested MSRP while blue can go up to $3921, with choices of ISDN, FXO, FXS, and T1 and E1.

Snom resellers will likely eat the ONE plus up because they don’t have to install software or futz with configuring hardware.

The software-only IP PBX is available immediately through snom distributors and VARs and comes in three flavors. A free [...]]]>

Snom (www.snom.com) has gone official with its IP PBX offering. “Tightly integrated” with the company’s desktop IP phones, snom ONE’s introduction is likely to make its resellers happy and perhaps Digium (www.digium.com) a little annoyed.

The software-only IP PBX is available immediately through snom distributors and VARs and comes in three flavors. A free downloadable version is available for up to 10 extensions; snom ONE yellow handles up to 20 extensions while snom ONE blue has an “unlimited” number of extensions and multi-tenant capabilities for up to five companies.

All versions offer a full feature set, including hunt and ACD groups, mailbox, auto attendant, conference rooms and paging, and are designed to take full advantage of the hardware features of snom’s suite of desktop phones and endpoints. snom ONE blue also allows up to five separate corporate tenants, supporting multiple organizations to operate using a single IP PBX.

Other features include what you’d expect from an IP PBX with simultaneous ringing of desktop and cell phone, multiple extension aliases, centralized address book, hot desking, voice mail, shared line emulation and a web interface for provisioning and management. The snom ONE is compatible with Windows, Linux and Mac environments and is equipped with robust web security through HTTPS and call security through TLS and SRTP. snom ONE supports mixed IPv4/IPv6 LAN and WAN environments and comes with an automatic blacklisting feature that makes it possible to expose public IP addresses.

Up until recently, snom was pretty tight with Digium.  Rolling out a “free” PBX at the low-end (under 10 users) and an unlimited turn-key version capable of running run multi-tenant suggests snom and its resellers aren’t seeing the sort of support and features out of Asterisk they need.

Switchvox SMB 4.5 adds on Phone Feature Packs for Polycom handsets, enabling users to directly access things such as call recording, visual voicemail, a searchable company directory and call parking lots directly [...]]]>

Yes Virginia, there was more than the Digium AsteriskExchange store announcement at IT EXPO last week.  Digium also announced Switchvox SMB 4.5.

Switchvox SMB 4.5 adds on Phone Feature Packs for Polycom handsets, enabling users to directly access things such as call recording, visual voicemail, a searchable company directory and call parking lots directly on a Polycom handset, something that has made Polycom very happy.

New features beyond the Phone Feature Packs include support for distinctive ringtones for different types of calls, extension failover to a backup Switchvox SMB server, support for multiple extensions on a single hand set.  Also included in Switchbox SMB 4.5 are support for user profiles to provide caller information such as photo, extension, title and location; flexible language support in English, UK English, Italian, Castilian Spanish and LatAm Spanish, including sound packs including audio prompts.

Network junkies will appreciate Digium adding SNMP for monitoring into Switchvox 4.5.

Current Switchvox owners with a software subscription get SMB 4.5 free of charge while Phone Feature Packs are available for $30 per phone.

FREETALK Connect is schedule to roll out in March and will allow SBs (two to 49 users) to enable Skype calls from supported office phones, including the “free” Skype-to-Skype calls, mange Skype contact lists, and [...]]]>

Down in Miami last week, all the buzz was around FREETALK Connect, an PBX solution built to leverage Skype.

FREETALK Connect is schedule to roll out in March and will allow SBs (two to 49 users) to enable Skype calls from supported office phones, including the “free” Skype-to-Skype calls, mange Skype contact lists, and get inbound voice calls from Skype users.  In addition, they can also participate in the Skype for SIP open beta to make low-cost global calls around the world from a desktop phone.

The box is a partnership between FREETALK and Jazinga, with the latter company providing the software platform for doing thing like callback/dial-around/ access to Skype buddy lists, auto attendant/IVR, paging, cal parking, remote extensions, music on hold, and conferencing.  The FREETALK Connect box also includes managed routes to users, phone services, and apps, SIP/Skype service management, and router management.

Supported phones on the network are auto-detected and configured by FREETALK Connect and there’s an on-screen wizard for configuring everything that needs to be configured.

If that’s not enough, FREETALK announced the FREETALK Connect Alliance, an ecosystem of 13 supporting companies for the product to provide apps, products, and services for the box.  Alliance members range around the globe from Italy to Taiwan and include Cloudvox, IfByPhone, Iotum, Jazinga, Skype, Tatung, Thomas Howe’s Light and Electric, Voxeo, and Voxbone.

Whispers of Response Point’s demise started out from an anonymous post on a blog tracking Microsoft [...]]]>

When the axe came down at Microsoft last week, the Response Point small business phone team took a hit. How fatal it is to the business and new product releases is up for debate amongst the peanut gallery.

Whispers of Response Point’s demise started out from an anonymous post on a blog tracking Microsoft layoffs saying that the entire Response Point team had been “canned.”  Microsoft begs to differ and ZDNet quotes a company spokesperson saying—

• Microsoft continues to support Response Point version 1.0. and current OEMs, service providers and resellers that are selling it. Customers will continue to be supported through their OEMs.
• Microsoft will continue to promote the product online and spotlight compatible 3rd party services and add-on products.
• The Response Point team has not been moved to another division and
• The team is evaluating the strategy for the next version of the product and will continue to investigate the opportunity in the small business market.

Response Point has been kicking around since October 2007 and the IP PBX is targeted at SMBs with one to 50 phones.  SP2 — the latest release — included support for basic call queuing, better SIP trunking, and, VPN support, an automated night receptionist scheduler, and URL/HTML customization for web 2.0/mash-up style creations.

Around IT Expo in February, the Response Point “team” numbered a lean-mean 35 members. No indications on how many people got the axe last week or how many remain.

Shoutout to Bill Miller for the Tweet
Sources: Microsoft Response Point blog and ZDNet’s blog.