Hosted vs On-Premise

[Frank86]

For a company with two sites (site A with 50 users and site B with 13 users) connected via site-to-site VPN, how would set up 3CX?

1. On premise at site A with failover (and Windows SBC) at site B, through Enterprise license
2. Hosted on on Google Cloud or AWS (Pro license) with Windows SBC at site A and site B

Equal reliability and performance? Or one better than the other?

Is an SBC at site A (50 users) advisable since it hits the limit of the SBC?

 

[accentlogic]

Part of the equation is your existing infrastructure and internet reliability. If you are served by a single ISP that is down very often, you are much better off hosting in the cloud.

Good point on pushing an SBC - I would use a site to site VPN even if you cloud host with GC or AWS. Put the phones on a VLAN and just route that. Use DHCP option 66 for provisioning. If you go Enterprise you could put one on prem and the other in the cloud, or at your secondary site if infrastructure is sufficient.

 

[Frank86]

The infrastructure is there (enterprise equipment with QoS, voice VLAN, PoE switches, 100 Mbps fiber Internet) at both sites. The problem is that site A has frequent power outages (twice a year, lasting 1 to 12 hours), hence the thinking of a failover solution at site B or hosting 3CX with GC or AWS.

 

[OCWI]

I would for sure host and run a linux SBC at each location. This will be far more reliable. The cost of hosting is nominal for a company that size and i would assume the leadership would far rather have the piece of mind for a few extra $ per month.

 

[Frank86]

Thank you. No problem with an SBC at site A since it's 50 users? Isn't that the limit of the SBC?
Do I lose anything at the sites using an SBC compared to doing a site-to-site VPN to the host VM? (I'm assuming GC and AWS allow VPNs now.)

 

[accentlogic]

The new Debian SBC is great, but starting at 50 extensions it leaves you with no room for growth. Also one more appliance to rely on. Using the SBC actually gains plug and play provisioning where the phones just show up in the console and you assign them to extensions. (No multicast over GC VPN, not sure about AWS.) An SBC is much more salable for a VoIP service provider to manage, because we then don't need access to your firewall to make things work. (For our managed IT clients we may setup a VPN if the install is large enough or they have legacy devices.) For your situation a VPN setup would be my choice. Setup an extension import spreadsheet, add all the MAC addresses, import into 3CX and fire the phones up on the remote LAN using DHCP option 66 to get the provisioning link. Works great, and uses the routing equipment you already have in place - just the added time and effort to setup the cloud to site VPN.