Building a voip server

[P2dadecka]

A buddy and I are thinking about getting into the business of selling voip plans. And I wanna cut out all the extra monthly costs that I can. That's why I wanna host my own voip service for the clientel I get. How powerful of a server do i actually need? What software will I need to host a business grade voip service? This will be my first sever. So any tips would be really appreciated. And also what kinda Internet connection would i need to host. Up and down speed. 

[Scheer]

I'm not positive this is the case, but I can only imagine that industry standard would be at least two different ISPs providing fiber (in case one of the ISPs goes out), and even being common to have two power companies providing power, while still having a backup generator. Then you need to get a firewall up, your Asus router isn't going to cut it.

 

Business grade means it doesn't go down unless it is an extreme situation.

 

My VOIP service that I use for home is nearly 1mbps per call, meaning you need a pretty good internet service if you plan to provide to more than a handful of people.

 

 

 

The server you use is the cheapest thing you need to worry about if hosting at your location, this is why it is fairly expensive buying rackspace at a datacenter or renting a dedicated server, all the above is taken care of for you.

 

Also, I could be wrong, but I don't think there is a software for being a VOIP Provider, its all custom stuff. Asterisk, Call Manager, 3CX, etc. are for deploying extensions not DIDs. Speaking of, I don't even know where you would begin to obtain DIDs to handout.

[miguelr]

To be honest, 

 

I would recommend a minimum of 500MBPS Up/Down. Reason being, is for QoS. 

 

To be honest, there are many different choices, most of which @Scheer mentioned, and some turnkey[prebuilt and packaged] ones like PIAF(PBX in a Flash)

 

But, yeah, you will need to custom make all of the different things, since it's not really a big industry for some.

[P2dadecka]

Hmm. It seems like it's gonna be a bit difficult to self host. I just see it as such a great business opportunity considering how much providers around here charge for business phone sevice, which doesn't have all the benefits that voip has, and I'm sure more to come when people end up with a video phone in evey conference room. Voip can make a transition. To feature full video or even hologram chatting.  Just something I feel like it's worth investing in and gaining a big customer base for those future possibilities. I appreciate the help

[LiMz]

@P2dadecka maybe you should piggy back off a larger organization and resell their solution to get a little more familiar.

You will need a USP to differentiate yourself from the many other providers but you can always sell the service and support of a smaller company.

 

forgive me but why do you need to host anything at your place? the benefit of a VPN is a private network that no-one has access to other than the customers branches themselves.

 

As long as each branch has a sufficient connection for throughput you don't really need a central place.

 

Research PPTP tunnels. They work in small cases but maybe test between yourself and your mate. Many consumer routers offer this functionality even via DynamicDNS so you don't need static IP's

[Scheer]

14 hours ago, P2dadecka said:

Hmm. It seems like it's gonna be a bit difficult to self host. I just see it as such a great business opportunity considering how much providers around here charge for business phone sevice, which doesn't have all the benefits that voip has, and I'm sure more to come when people end up with a video phone in evey conference room. Voip can make a transition. To feature full video or even hologram chatting.  Just something I feel like it's worth investing in and gaining a big customer base for those future possibilities. I appreciate the help

So I think I mis-understood what you were trying to do since you were talking about having it at your place. I thought you meant selling phone numbers (DIDs) and the routing service to businesses.

 

If I'm correct here, what you are looking to do is go into a business and load up the place with phones/video phones and provide the service and support for it. If that is the case you wouldn't host one server at your place, but instead have a local server at each business and run some form of a PBX on it there. Leave the DIDs and provider service to the large established companies and instead buy the services from them and resell to your customers. Then give them local in-person support to make it worth while rather than them just going to the VOIP providers directly, and handle the config and deployment of the server and phones.

 

Is this what you are thinking?