Cloud Architect in Information Technology at glueckkanja AG (201-500 employees)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

I used different AudioCodes SBC 800,1000,2600,4000 and Azure SBC's for Skype for Business before and in the last 3 Years for Teams Direct Routing with PBX Replacement to connect different Sip trunk provider. AudioCodes deploy new firmware very quickly with new features if needed and has a lot of experience with Teams Direct Routing.

Pros

different sip trunk profiles for each provider
secure tls connection to for Microsoft Direct Routing
high availability on each SBC and also on Azure or AWS

Cons

better detailed documentation for features like Dial Plan, Tagging
Better backup solution without OVOC
Improvemnet of OVOC to managed SBC's

Return on Investment

cheaper integration with sip trunk provider
lower cost for service as an local PBX
less hardware and lower Co2 footprint

Alternatives Considered

Ribbon Session Border Controller (SBC), Oracle APEX and Cisco 1000 Series Aggregation Services Routers (ASR 1000)

Other Software Used

Microsoft Teams

Richard Oberle View profile

Convergence Engineer in Professional Services at Special Order Systems (51-200 employees)

Pros

High capacity for call volume in a chassis with a low rack space requirement makes this gateway a great solution especially when you need more than one!
The ability to have redundant interfaces to the carrier, the network & redundant power supplies, makes these devices perfect for disaster recovery planning.
Ease of configuration via GUI without having specific CLI experience makes it a pleasure to implement the AudioCodes E-SBC with various circuit types. The GUI is particularly helpful when you are about to add a parameter that is incorrect and the device changes the color to let you know.
The low price tag compared to other brands, helps customers easily deploy these gateways to more sites with less cost overhead than others.
The SBC/firewall capabilities of these devices make it very simple to allow or block traffic from specific IP's or proxy groups
AudioCodes support is fantastic. They are helpful to diagnose issues even after it becomes clear that the problem is outside the device and with the carrier or network.

Cons

I believe the help files need to have more information about why certain options should be used rather than just a list of possible choices. Some choices obviously require a wealth of information or experience, but having just a bit more info in the help file would save research time.
I'd like to see a user side option to be able to ping and trace route testing without having to be in another admin interface.
The message log function is great for watching SIP packets stream but needs more options for pausing to capture when there are a lot of calls coming through.
In my opinion, the route tables & configurations for proxies and groups need some massaging. The normal config options could be placed on one screen and then have a choice to go to "extended" mode for less-used items. This would make implementation faster as there are so many options now that it can be hard to see the few that are needed for general configuration.
I would love to see a screen that would allow the formation of a "SIP Ladder" where you could enter a source and/or destination IP and have the gateway show you the communication rather than pouring through logs. This is something that various carriers and even Wireshark are doing now but it would be great to have this option from the gateway's perspective as it would make it easier to compare with the outside traffic diagrams without having a senior network tech having to help.

Return on Investment

Positive - My company has been able to retain business due to the low cost of the AudioCodes devices when compared to the other brands that some customers purchase through other vendors.
Positive - RMA is easy when it appears a card or module might be at issue, AudioCodes support is speedy to replace which grows customer confidence.
The ability to order, assemble, configure and ship multiple units to replace aged or failing gateways allowed us to impress the customer and gain more business.
The reliability of the devices with very lengthy up-time and little to no reboots has impressed customers greatly.

Alternatives Considered

Cisco ASA and Palo Alto Networks Next-Generation Firewalls - PA Series

Other Software Used

XMediusFAX, Cisco ASA, Cisco Virtualization Experience Infrastructure

AudioCodes Mediant SBCs

What is AudioCodes Mediant SBCs?

Categories & Use Cases

Who Buys & Uses AudioCodes Mediant Enterprise Session Border Controllers (E-SBCs)

Most Frequent Users

Educational Services

Finance and Insurance

Manufacturing

Most Frequent Users

Small Businesses

Enterprises

Most Frequent Users

United States of America

Brazil

Germany

Most Frequent Users

IT