Adding IP Phone's to our IPO 1

[cmakowsky]

Hello,

We've recently deployed 2 IPO 406v2's to two of our offices. Currently we're utilizing digital handsets, such as the 5410D, on site, with an IP line connecting the two offices.

We've just begun discussing the possibility of adding IP handsets to our system to be deployed remotely to our offices overseas.

Both of our IPO's have VCM 24's.

Can someone please tell me what the necessary steps would be to support this?

Can we simply purchase handsets and open a port on our firewall?

Do we need to deploy remote VPN firewalls?

What "programming" is necessary on the handset? and IPO Manager?

Any insight is appreciated!

THANK YOU!
Colby

 

[disturbedone]

You've got everything you need. Just buy the phones and configure them. As long as you use Avaya IP phones then you won't need a license (eg if you wanted to use a Cisco IP phone then you would).

You can either configure the phone using static or dynamic IP addressing. It all depends on how your system/network is setup as to what's the easiest way to get it working.

For remote phones you do require a VPN for it to work. Avaya will not support a phone connected directly to the Internet.

In a very simple scenario, this is how it's done. This assumes a system in default ie it's the DHCP server. Plug the phone in, wait 30 sec, start using it. That's how easy it is.

In the real work though it's very different. You're probably using a Windows DHCP server - if so, check the Engineer's Toolkit for details on what scope options you require - you need to tell the phone where to find the IP Office & TFTP server. If using static, you configure these options on the phone.

You can leave the system to allow the "Auto Create Extn" option to automatically create a new Extn/User when a phone is plugged in. Or create a new User and when you click Ok it will ask if you want to create a VoIP Extn so you say yes. When the phone starts up it will ask what Extn you want to be.

Hope that helps.

 

[cmakowsky]

While I know that Avaya won't support plugging their phone directly into the Internet, it should still work, no?

Given that this phone will be deployed overseas in China and I won't be onsite to perform the installation I'm trying to keep it as simple as possible.

To deploy a remote VPN appliance in rural china with my team can be quite a feat... dynamic IP's, non-ideal network connections... I'm thinking that as QoS will already be an issue simply due to the stability of their network connection, adding the additional IP overhead of VPN won't help... either in bandwidth or for our team to configure.

So, would it work directly over the internet? What ports would need to be opened?

 

[disturbedone]

Haha, well maybe! But the number of ports you'd need to open on your firewall would just be like leaving the door open with a big sign to hackers with flashing lights saying "come in and help yourself". If you had any problems, and you would, you won't get any help at all from Avaya or your reseller or distibutor so there's really no point. Without a VPN it's completey unsecured too.

Are you getting the phone in the country you're in (which is?) or are you getting it delivered directly to China? If you can get it in your office, get it working and then send it out.

Sounds like you know your IP so I'll just start talking and assume you understand....set up the office, create a VPN, plug the phone in and set it's local IP address with it's local gateway/router IP address and depending on your addressing you'll need an IP Route in the config of the IP Office.

QoS across the Internet is non-existent so don't even worry about it. If you had a dedicated circuit then you could enable it on all routers.

As far as the ports are concerned, it's a range of 1024 so you'd be foolish to open all of those on your firewall. Depending on system software version you can pick which ones (below 3.1 is fixed). You'll need 1719, 1720 and 49152-53247 at least.

I've heard of people trying and couldn't get it to work. You will not get any support from anyone if you try. It's that simple. Use a VPN, it's the only way.

 

[cmakowsky]

Yeah that's what I was afraid of.

I'm thinking of purchasing 2 vpn firewalls and 2 IP phones, so that I may maintain 1 configuration here, and send the other overseas. That will allow me to replicate the environment should anything arise.

We're located in New York, US and sending to our overseas office in mainland China.

Any suggestions picking a handset model? Our digital handsets are the 5410D.

 

[disturbedone]

The 54xx are DS/DCP phones and are standard digital xtns.

The IP series are the 56xx (5610 looks exactly like a 5410, 5620 looks like a 5420 etc). Or there's the older 46xx series but the 56xx are cheaper.

Or you could wait around for a year or so when they release SIP on the IP Office and that will only require 1 port!

 

[cmakowsky]

Unfortunately the office is opening in 2 weeks, so I can't wait around for SIP

Perhaps we'll take a look at 5610.

 

[big70]

You can also look at using 4610 and VPN-remote sofware in the phone,s but i suggest you use a distributor to help you and explain all.


Greets Peter

 

[janni78]

Yes, VPNRemote is nice, but I don't know if it should be recommended as it's unsupported