We have been implementing an asterisk phone system for clients with a T1/PRI for quite some time now.  Unfortunately, we really couldn’t provide a cost effective solution for small business that had less then 6 incoming lines. The solution has always involved SIP trunking, but it was a technology that until recently was not stable or mature enough to trust with a companies communications needs. Recently SIP trunk providers have started to address the need for concurrent calls over the same SIP connection, DID’s, local phone numbers, and local number portability (moving existing numbers). With that in place it was just a question of finding affordable hardware to build a phone system. Because we are relying on a SIP connection we don’t need any extra analog or T1/PRI card in our system, so we can go with a really small form factor computer. We chose the Intel NUC with 4GB of RAM and a 128GB solid state drive. For phones we looked at the Polycom VVX311, a six line phone which can be purchased for roughly $110 a piece.

Using that equipment we can design and implement a small business phone system with all the features of an enterprise PBX for less the $3000. And the advantage of a system like this is that expanding it at a later date just involves the cost of buying more phone. There are no licensing fees for adding extensions. If you need more incoming lines that can be arranged with your local SIP Trunk provider.

In Hawaii a local SIP Trunk provider, Pacific Wave Telecom, charges $24 per month per concurrent connection on a 5 year contract. Four incoming lines will cost less then $100 per month. Compared with most B1 lines from the phone company at roughly $40 per month or $160 for 4 lines.