The low-down on Fonality
August 01, 2014
The low-down on Fonality
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Software Version
PBXtra
Overall Satisfaction with Fonality
Currently we are supporting businesses that have Fonality deployed within their organization. Fonality is a great alternative to traditional PBX systems for business that want a high feature set at a reasonable price with features like the HUD app that runs on your PC and give a variety of features such as the ability to instant message and see when other users are on a call within your organization. You will also have the ability to use an automated attendant to route calls to appropriate departments as well as configure traditional direct dialing. Fonality builds proprietary value to the open sourced Asterisk telephony software and bundles in a support contract when you need help 24 hours 7 day a week.
- HUD application for instant messaging and user status within your organization.
- Support agreement when you run into problems or need help with your system.
- Non proprietary hardware makes servicing the hardware easier if you choose to end your support agreement.
- Tested platform based on Asterisk software telephony.
- Restricted access to advanced administrative functions will limit the capabilities of troubleshooting problems. It will also limit you in using the Asterisk platforms full capabilities.
- Support "can" be slow to resolve issues depending on your urgency of the issue.
- Increased inter-office communication efficiency.
- Support contract can minimize expertise from your IT staff.
We mostly use non-proprietary Asterisk based telephony systems but Fonality will give a good experience into SIP based PBX's. By design, Fonality will limit the full potential of an Asterisk system but it will keep you safely in what they've tested to cause the least amount of issues/interupts. Security leaves a bit to be desired since there are some important add-ins like Fail2ban for Asterisk that blocks repeated access attempts from hackers.