SBC installation: virtual machine or Raspberry pi?

[agentsmithitaly]

Hi all,
we are testing 3CX 15.5 running on an AWS micro.t2 instance, there are still call quality issues from time to time, I guess mainly due to Internet connection slowdowns.

Before resorting to an expensive router with advanced QoS, I would like to give the SBC a go.
I understood I cannot install on a Windows Server 2012 R2 machine, it needs a dedicated OS - despite the server doing very little work.

Based on your experience, do you recommend running a Linux Debian VMware Player on said Windows Server, or go straight to a dedicated Raspberry Pi 3? Or forget the SBC, and run the full 3CX system on said virtual machine?
There are 14 extensions at the moment, of which 3 are not essential and could be removed.

I tried to look for previous posts in the forum, but the word "sbc" is deemed too short by the search tool...

Thank you in advance for your insights,
Nick

 

[eddv123]

Hi Nick,

I have always used the Raspi version of the SBC and for the amount of extension you have I would recommend this device, I have always found it reliable and is small enough that customers do not even notice it onsite. It runs on Debian Stretch 9 and supports up to 20 phones tops.

Just ensure you are running a "supported" phone with the correct Firmware version on it:
https://www.3cx.com/sip-phones/

Yealinks are my preference.

 

[agentsmithitaly]

Thank you eddv123 for the quick reply, we have 4 Yealink T23G phones, the rest of the extensions are Android/Windows 3CX Clients.
I had to use a Cisco SPA112 adapter to ring a bell (it is a noisy environment) when there are incoming calls, but it is not used for voice.

 

[Saqqara]

As above Raspi version will be fine for your setup - get one of the newer Raspberry Pi 3 Model B+ just because of the processor / network speed of the unit.

if you have poe switches , this unit takes Raspberry Pi Power over Ethernet (PoE) HAT - no external power supply required

 

[agentsmithitaly]

Hi to all,
In the end I installed the Sbc on a Debian VM on company server as I was out of office.
I provisioned the Yealink phone and seems to work.
What about the 3CX Android and Windows clients? There are no instructions to provision them on SBC.
Is it automatic? Shall I re-provision them?

Thank you and apologies for these noobs questions.

Nick

 

[Saqqara]

Hi to all,
In the end I installed the Sbc on a Debian VM on company server as I was out of office.
I provisioned the Yealink phone and seems to work.
What about the 3CX Android and Windows clients? There are no instructions to provision them on SBC.
Is it automatic? Shall I re-provision them?

Thank you and apologies for these noobs questions.

Nick

Android , IOS and Windows clients connects directly to the 3CX server - they do not use SBC - So no changes are required for these devices

 

[agentsmithitaly]

Ha! So almost useless in this setup since we have like 2 Yealink phones and 12 clients.
I wanted to improve call quality with internal calls, are the clients smart enough not to traverse the tunnel to AWS-hosted 3CX server?
If not, I could simply run whole 3CX installation on company server and call it a day. Company have no branches, just a single office.

Thank you for the quick reply

 

[eddv123]

NOTE: Despite the fact that the clients do not use the SBC to direct traffic to and from, they still use 3CX Tunnel to connect (port 5090). It is in-built to the client.

You can turn this functionality off on the client and have a direct SIP extension but this isn't advisable.

 

[agentsmithitaly]

Yeah but there will be a tunnel connection for each client and as such they will be NATted. I through it was a more streamlined approach to have a single tunnel connection via the SBC with no NAT involved as I'm forwarding traffic to port 5090 directly to the SBC

Thank you for the reply. I think most of customers issues are due to unreliable Android app. It is too finicky. I probably switch to Snom cordless phones quickly... or they will revert to a standard PBX.