- A private branch exchange (PBX) is a system that connects telephone company trunk lines with individual user lines and equipment inside the organization. A PBX allows an organization to have fewer outside lines than extensions because it is safe to assume that not all extensions will be in use at once. The PBX acts like a telephone company switch, connecting outside callers with inside extension lines and extensions with each other as needed. Although PBXs and key systems are networks, they are deemed CPE because they are owned and operated by the customer (business, hospital, etc.), not the local telephone company.
PBXs allow for organizations to have a flexible telephone system designed for their specific needs and changeable over time. PBXs can have simple or sophisticated features, and may have a separate console for administration and/or receptionist duties. Individual lines may have different features on them, and different telephone sets attached to them. PBXs can be large, terminating hundreds of lines and thousands of extensions.
A key system is essentially a scaled-down PBX. Key systems typically have one unit, either an attendant phone or a separate box, that acts as controller of a limited number of lines (usually about 4) for a limited number of extensions (as many as 20). The features are similarly less ambitious.
Both PBXs and key systems use proprietary phones. That is, the system box and the phones are a bundle; users cannot plug other phones into the jacks and be assured that they will work. This makes the choice of a PBX crucial from an access perspective. Once a company or university has selected a PBX, access options may become extremely limited. This point also emphasizes the inevitable interactions between telephones and the networks they operate on.
PBXs may be analog or digital; more modern systems are consistently digital. It is important to remember that analog equipment cannot be plugged directly into digital jacks. For example, a TTY cannot be directly connected to a line on a digital PBX. But neither can fax machines or other analog-based telecommunication devices. So almost all PBX manufacturers offer digital-analog adapters. These adapters are plugged into the digital line, and the analog equipment (fax machine or TTY) is plugged into the adapter. Some PBX phones contain their own analog jacks. The aftermarket offers digital adapters as well.
Most PBXs and key systems offer voice mail and automated attendant as a feature. Some of these can be made TTY compatible.
PBXs also offer some access potential because of their architecture. The system boxes that control PBXs are essentially computers with specialized hardware. If access features could be added to PBX software, any line connected to the system could use those features. This can be done either with the PBX hardware itself, or with a second computer attached to the PBX. This is an element of computer telephony integration (CTI). See Appendix E for more information on CTI.
- PBX-type networks are now offered based on a local area network (LAN), the data network that connects computers together in an office or hospital. Each workstation PC is able to convert between analog and digital, so it can send and receive LAN packets that contain voice signals. These can be played out of the computer’s speaker, or into a telephone connected to the sound card on the computer. LAN telephony does not suffer the voice quality degradation common with Internet telephony, because the network is designed to handle the necessary load and has fewer “hops”, or places at which congestion can occur.
There are some PBX solutions for TTY traffic. In these the TTY traffic terminates on a TTY modem that is integrated into the LAN. All text conversations (whether real-time or stored) occur on the LAN as text, not as Bardot. This gives every workstation a virtual TTY, whether for internal, incoming, or outgoing calls.
Another access advantage of LAN telephony is that it opens up telecommunications access into the world of computer access, which offers many more tools, such as speech synthesis, speech recognition, conversion of signal tones into screen flashes, and alternative keyboards. Virtually anything that a person uses to make the computer more accessible can be made to improve the access to telecommunications functions. Since LAN telephony is based on software, access software solutions are often compatible with it.
Unified messaging is one of the reasons organizations adopt LAN telephony. Unified messaging takes voice mail, email, and fax and puts all of them in one mailbox, notifying the user whenever a new message, regardless of the medium, arrives. The ability to see and sort all this incoming traffic through one tool may offer some access advantages:
A user who is blind:
“I have everything come into one mailbox that I always keep open. When something new comes in, if it is a voice message I just play it. If it is email I have my screen reader read it. If it is a fax … I try to get it into text with my character recognition program … it is certainly easier than keeping track of a lot of paper. Plus I can keep anything as long as I want and not run out of space, so I really use it as a filing system.”
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Almost all business phone systems run a PBX (Private Branch Exchange). Our Service will enable a Virtual PBX phone system to work on your Cellphone! With WirelessPBX, we set you up with a Virtual PBX system and with a few presses of a button on your cell phone, you can configure your mobile phone service to use the PBX. Wireless PBX is a virtual office phone system. WirelessPBX directs office calls to employee cell phones, wherever they are, saving your company time and money. We all get simple requests for information or calls from important clients at times when we simply cannot respond. In fact, did you know? that at any given time, 35% of all workers are only available by mobile.
75% of all business calls are not completed on the first attempt.
50% of all calls are to either deliver or request information.
67% of all calls are considered to be less important than the work they interrupt.
How could you use this? When you're home. You can have your cell phone's calls ring on your your home number, so you can use any extension in the house, and so you don't miss any calls while your cellphone is off or charging (or upstairs when you are downstairs or you left it in the car...) When you don't answer, the PBX will forward the voicemail to you as an email attachment.
Easy Setup
Web-based configuration
Works with all mobile phone carrier plans
Many features available for PBX service
Forwards to all types of phones: cellular, VOIP, Standard, etc.
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Virtual PBX and Hosted PBX are synonyms. A Hosted PBX is a modern, Voice over IP (VoIP), business phone system. The terms "virtual" and "hosted" signify that the business owner no longer has any physical equipment at the premise of the business. The phone system is provided as a service by a service provider, in the case of Monmouth Telecom, also an Internet Service Provider and a Local Telephone Company.
There is a cloud computing revolution going on. Businesses are realizing the many greatbenefits of Hosted PBX by moving responsibilities, once maintained on-site by business personnel, out into the cloud. Hosted PBX means replacing the phone system that normally sits in a closet at a business with a full-featured voice over ip phone system as a service hosted in carrier grade data centers.
It's Desktop VoIP feature phones, your LAN, and your modern Telephone Company.
Easily supports your company's growth without surprise costs.
Includes all the features and benefits of a top end, traditional PBX, but without the expense.
4 tiers of highly competent service specialists and engineers are available to support your business.
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Summary of DECT vs WIFI
Spoiler Alert! Before you get all bogged down by disadvantages and advantages of each technology there is an elephant in the room that needs to be addressed. WIFIalmost works for voice. That's right, you read that correctly, almost works. If you need wireless phone calls that always work, WIFI is not for you. Sure, you can certainly set up some voip devices on your wifi network, and you can make a phone call, and maybe it will even sound great. The problem is that some portion of your calls will have audio problems. Some portion of your calls will go unanswered and will be dropped. It is simply because the QOS standards in WIFI aren't established and widely adopted yet. I will cover this more below. OK, now for the Pro's and Con's in details.
Advantages of DECT
DECT was designed for Voice. It operates on its own isolated frequency, guaranteeing that the Voice is never competing for resources with a lower priority communication. DECT has been used for Voice for over 20 years. DECT works reliably.
Advantages of WIFI
WIFI is inexpensive. You probably already have a wifi network, so buying a wifi VoIP phone is your only expense. You can even simply download a soft-phone app on your Smartphone for free and start making VoIP calls on your wireless lan. WIFI is less maintenance. You have to maintain a wireless network whether you use it for voice or not.
Disadvantages of DECT
DECT isn't free. You have to buy a base station and possibly repeaters. DECT operates on its own wireless network and there are infrastructure costs associated with it.
Disadvantages of WIFI
WIFI doesn't always work! WIFI wasn't designed for voice. It is a packet based technology designed for data communications. WIFI hasn't established QOS standards. For VoIP to work, the Voice needs to be prioritized. This is called QOS or quality of service. When a network component sees two pieces of data competing, one for youtube and one for your phone call, it needs to know to prioritize your phone call. Without QOS you end up with gaps in the audio, distortion and dropped calls.
Final Analysis of DECT vs. WIFI
WIFI clearly has advantages, and one day when the WIFI QOS standards are mature it will be a great and inexpensive medium for wireless communications. Unfortunately, we are not there yet. In today's marketplace, if you want a wireless voice technology that actually works in your office, DECT is your only choice. Luckily there are plenty of vendors manufacturing DECT phones, including Polycot and Snom. Check out our favorites in our office voip phones page.
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- About Push to Talk Online Contact Management. With Push to Talk Online Contact Management through My Business Account and Verizon Enterprise Center, you can quickly and easily manage the Push to Talk contacts for your entire organization. Updates made to Push to Talk contact lists are automatically synchronized with your employees’ phones. Visit verizonwireless.com/my business account to log in. Push to Talk Online Contact Management allows you to: • Create and manage contacts. Store up to 50,000 contacts (25,000 employees and 25,000 partners) and 1,000 groups online. (Device limits—500 individual and 100 group contacts.) • Create and manage groups. Add and manage Push to Talk groups, which allow your teams to contact up to 50 Push to Talk contacts at the same time. • Copy contacts from one phone to another. Quickly copy the Push to Talk contacts from one employee to another. • Import partner contact information. Easily import the Push to Talk contact information for partners using a standard comma-separated file.
