3CX on Intel Atom Processor - Advice

[ziptalk]

All,

We are considering a short-form factor PC, more 'net-top' as opposed to 'net book' format for a 3CX deployment we are going to install for our client. (Half a dozen sets).

It has an Intel Atom Intel Atom 230 (1.6 GHz, 533MHz, 512KB). 2GB RAM, 160GB HDD, Windows XP SP2.

So my question is this:

Has anyone deployed a 3CX installation on hardware with an Atom processor ? and how did they find it ? would you recommend it ?

Also if the 3CX team could comment on this spec that would be appreciated.

The rationale for this is price point on hardware, and our requirements is that the 3CX is to sit on independent hardware (as cost effective as possible).

Thanks in advance,

Kind Regards,

Lewis

 

[comresource]

While I cannot speak from personal experience, I do know that 888 voip store offeres a 3CX 'mini apliance' based on the Intel Atom.

http://www.888voipstore.com/888voipstore-appliance-mini-powered-by-3cx.html

 

[leejor]

I run mine on an Intel board using the Atom Processor (2 gig Ram, 80 Gig HD), mind you it's not a busy system, but no issues at all for the 8 months that it has been in operation. Board with Proc and memory was less than $100 us at a Fry's store. Added an old HD and left over AT power supply, built a case....

 

[ziptalk]

Thanks Danny and Leejor, I am confident this will be fine for our installations based on that.

 

[eirNetics]

Hi Lewis,

it would be great to hear of your experiences with this, I've been looking into it for a client.

 

[ziptalk]

Hi Lewis,

it would be great to hear of your experiences with this, I've been looking into it for a client.

This is the unit i'm looking at:

http://www1.euro.dell.com/uk/en/business/Desktops/desktop-optiplex-160/pd.aspx?refid=desktop-optiplex-160&s=bsd&cs=ukbsdt1

I have ordered it so should be able to post some feedback in the next couple of weeks. I expect that installing the 3CX onto dedicated hardware might be a common requirement, so will be good to see other posts of similar 'net-top' / ultra-short-form factor PCs. The main driver for this is to remove the dependency of the 3CX on a single MS server, since most of our clients typically have one server, and should the server reboot, or unexpectedly shutdown, due to patching or a hardware fault, the last thing we want is their phone system out as well.

I'll follow-up with a post with how it handles it.

Lewis

 

[leejor]

It would be interesting to see how much traffic the Atom can handle before having a noticeable effect on call quality. The cost is still coming down, but even now, it is at the point where you can easily afford to have a complete system on standby.

 

[ziptalk]

It would be interesting to see how much traffic the Atom can handle before having a noticeable effect on call quality. The cost is still coming down, but even now, it is at the point where you can easily afford to have a complete system on standby.

We've done exactly that, 5 year onsite NBD warranty on hardware, and hot spare in stores in case the unit fails, we can restore to the standby unit and courier to site within 2-3 hours.

I'm deploying it on a 10 concurrent line system, so a reasonable setup to give it a bit of stress. We'll have to suck it and see, but i'm confident it being on XP (i.e. not draining resources like Vista), it'll be able to cut it for entry-level deployments of say sub-30 handsets! (arbitrary number i know, but that's the basis we're working on at the moment).

3CX could certainly appliance sell the software - although I think it might be against the grain of what they're promoting as voice as an additional application. The problem with storing it on existing hardware is reboots, the PBX in my opinion needs to be on something that does not change! of course you can turn updates off - but I would not recommend that on production servers. I'll revisit this post and update with my experience for the rest of the community.

Lewis

 

[houston]

I'd be very interested in hearing your results, particularly in regard to conferencing.

The cost savings of an Atom setup to me is minimal, $250 vs $450 for an e8400 system (Dell). What has me interested in the Atom is power consumption on the order of a quarter to a third of a regular desktop.

Here is $300 UPS available locally to me that will run a 450watt system for an hour: http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0210167

I figure 10 phones using Power Over Ethernet at roughly 20watts each (very much a guess, I haven't looked up the numbers). So, I'd be looking at say 400watts with a full desktop, a cable modem, a router, and 10 phones, or 300watts with an Atom system instead of the desktop. I figure the power difference all pulling off a single UPS to be about a half an hour.

Let us know how your Atom works out!

 

[ziptalk]

I'd be very interested in hearing your results, particularly in regard to conferencing.

The cost savings of an Atom setup to me is minimal, $250 vs $450 for an e8400 system (Dell). What has me interested in the Atom is power consumption on the order of a quarter to a third of a regular desktop.

Here is $300 UPS available locally to me that will run a 450watt system for an hour: http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0210167

I figure 10 phones using Power Over Ethernet at roughly 20watts each (very much a guess, I haven't looked up the numbers). So, I'd be looking at say 400watts with a full desktop, a cable modem, a router, and 10 phones, or 300watts with an Atom system instead of the desktop. I figure the power difference all pulling off a single UPS to be about a half an hour.

Let us know how your Atom works out!

Hi Houston, I like the idea with the UPS and will investigate cost, it's certainly a nice option to provide the client, and not necessarily an expensive one at that.

I have the 3CX v7.1 running on the Optiplex 160 Atom processor, and I haven't noticed any problems, although I haven't stressed tested it live yet. I'm actually cutting it over live this afternoon in a production environment, so will see how it copes. I am confident that the 3CX isn't CPU intensive, and it will be fine - provided of course later releases don't bloat!

 

[ziptalk]

3CX put into production on Intel Atom, and no issues. Are most busiest period is between 10am-2pm, and we frequently have upwards of 3-4 concurrent calls, and regular calls in (It's a Support desk environment - so a good test).

I'll post back - so far so good.

 

[tpinnovations]

I can see the ATOM holding its own in smaller offices of 5-10 people, But I can't imagine it handling much more then that with out it bogging down. As for the UPS situation, I run APC 1500XS with a Dell 860 for 108 minutes no problem.

 

[ziptalk]

I can see the ATOM holding its own in smaller offices of 5-10 people, But I can't imagine it handling much more then that with out it bogging down. As for the UPS situation, I run APC 1500XS with a Dell 860 for 108 minutes no problem.

Agree, there's going to be an upper-limit, and I wouldn't like to find out what that is in a live environment. Be interesting if 3CX can tell us what an Atom processor can reliably support. Most of our deployments are going to be 10 - 30 size initially - I would expect it to be fine - but of course that's just a guess - the only way to find out is to break it!

 

[tpinnovations]

I wonder how well it would work on one of these;

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&DEPA=0&Order=BESTMATCH&Description=hp+media+server&x=0&y=0

I mean after all you can upgrade the ram and load another OS on there.

 

[houston]

As for the UPS situation, I run APC 1500XS with a Dell 860 for 108 minutes no problem.

My thinking was to put the ENTIRE system (3cx + phones + router + SIP Trunk/PSTN box) on one (or two I suppose) cheap but beefy battery backups using PoE. If the phones aren't on backup power, might as well use a small UPS with the 3CX just to give it time to gracefully shutdown; set to reboot when power returns. Well, there is voicemail, but at that point I'd be failing over to cell phones or some such anyway.

Just random thinking/opinions. It all comes down to what the customer wants and has a budget for really.

 

[leejor]

In the past, when the original Gel-Cell has died on various UPS units, I've just gone to a much larger cell and mounted it external to the UPS. As long as the UPS is large enough to handle the load it is usually cheaper than buying a new, larger UPS. In fact you could probably get away with going right up to a car battery. Would probably give you a half day or more of operation for the whole system.