Cisco vs. Polycom - Phone System
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I've managed Cisco's UCS/UCM phone system in a previous environment, and I know it was really expensive. Now I'm in a network that uses Polycom, that we don't really manage all that much (we do about 90% of requests, but anything deep level we have a contract). I was asked by a director at a school district about Polycom vs. Cisco vs. Asterisk. I said Asterisk is going to be the least expensive but I didn't think his provider could port for outside calls (that's pending), and wasn't sure about cost difference between Polycom and Cisco. He also asked what the Polycom software is called (I thought it was InCom?). Does anyone have any numbers on an RFP they put out, or have gone down that road comparing Cisco to Polycom? Thanks!
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@BBigford said:
I've managed Cisco's UCS/UCM phone system in a previous environment, and I know it was really expensive. Now I'm in a network that uses Polycom, that we don't really manage all that much (we do about 90% of requests, but anything deep level we have a contract). I was asked by a director at a school district about Polycom vs. Cisco vs. Asterisk. I said Asterisk is going to be the least expensive but I didn't think his provider could port for outside calls (that's pending), and wasn't sure about cost difference between Polycom and Cisco. He also asked what the Polycom software is called (I thought it was InCom?). Does anyone have any numbers on an RFP they put out, or have gone down that road comparing Cisco to Polycom? Thanks!
Polycom is not a a phone system. So first, identify the actual phone system. If it is InCom, that is a rebrandable IP PBX.
Either way, move to Asterisk. The provider is not relevant to that decision.
The decision for What PBX to use is never part of the decision for a provider unless you choose a proprietary provider that uses their own PBX thus technically not even giving you a choice.
Asterisk, or any other modern IP PBX, can connect to any type of trunk you choose to use. Obviously, some trunk types require hardware to interface from the physical to the IP, but there is a device for every scenario out there.
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@BBigford said:
Polycom
Polycom just makes phones, conference phones and video conferencing systems. No PBX.
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Why wouldn't you use asterisk? Start there. It's FOSS and easy to manage. I've used it at plenty of other jobs. We have avaya IP office and cisco call manager here, the IP office is going away though. For us shear scale is the only reason we aren't using asterisk.
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How did Cisco and Polycom come up as options? Cisco would almost never be on a short list. Polycom isn't the same animal. Of these only Asterisk would I generally consider.
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@scottalanmiller said:
How did Cisco and Polycom come up as options? Cisco would almost never be on a short list. Polycom isn't the same animal. Of these only Asterisk would I generally consider.
He clearly stated how they came up as options.
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@JaredBusch said:
@scottalanmiller said:
How did Cisco and Polycom come up as options? Cisco would almost never be on a short list. Polycom isn't the same animal. Of these only Asterisk would I generally consider.
He clearly stated how they came up as options.
That's how it was brought to him. But what drove the director to choose one option and one "word he heard somewhere?"
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@scottalanmiller said:
That's how it was brought to him. But what drove the director to choose one option and one "word he heard somewhere?"
That is an incorrect reading of this. No one chose anything yet. This is a statement of the current solution Polycom (as understood to exist and we have already established that is not correct). And a statement of a system he is familiar with, Cisco. As well as a well known low cost solution, Asterisk.
That is how things were driven. Sometimes I get really tired of you trying to read poor decision making into simple statements and questions.
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@JaredBusch said:
@scottalanmiller said:
That's how it was brought to him. But what drove the director to choose one option and one "word he heard somewhere?"
That is an incorrect reading of this. No one chose anything yet. This is a statement of the current solution Polycom (as understood to exist and we have already established that is not correct). And a statement of a system he is familiar with, Cisco. As well as a well known low cost solution, Asterisk.
That is how things were driven. Sometimes I get really tired of you trying to read poor decision making into simple statements and questions.
What did I "read in"? You seem to be implying that I've presumed something other than what was said. But what do you feel that that is?
I was asking what brought Cisco and Polycom in as the options to consider when they are different things and one isn't the right kind of animal? What is the "reading in"?
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Of course only they manager can give the answer to @scottalanmiller question, but I'll go out on a limb here.
The current solution as far as the manager is concerned is a Polycom system, but as @JaredBusch said, that's not the system, just the endpoint device - but the manager doesn't know that.
Now of course, the manager not being an IT person only knows the buzz words they hear through colleagues and TV, which is probably where Cisco and Asterisks came from. Again, the manager doesn't know the difference between a Juniper and a Cisco and etc... he just put the task out and tossed out these names. It's even likely that some of the manager's colleagues are using a Cisco or Asterisk solution, so the manager at least might know that those are actual phone systems, but know nothing more.
As we've discussed before, this was probably the wrong approach. Instead of the manager giving a list of names to IT to find a solution, they should have given IT a problem and asked for multiple solutions to that problem.
Hey IT guy, I'm not happy with our phone system. Here's what I don't like about it. Can you find me a solution that solves those problems?
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I think that that is more "reading in" than I did in just asking how that came to be the short list
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@JaredBusch said:
That is how things were driven. Sometimes I get really tired of you trying to read poor decision making into simple statements and questions.
Somtimes IT people like to act like 12 year old girls, and make things complicated.
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@Jason said:
@JaredBusch said:
That is how things were driven. Sometimes I get really tired of you trying to read poor decision making into simple statements and questions.
Someone IT people like to act like 12 year old girls.
Please, explain how this statement is helpful at all?
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@Dashrender said:
Please, explain how this statement is helpful at all?
Oh, sorry I offended someone.. Don't care.
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How about we post about the OP's issues, please?
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@scottalanmiller said:
How did Cisco and Polycom come up as options? Cisco would almost never be on a short list. Polycom isn't the same animal. Of these only Asterisk would I generally consider.
While a lot of people want to use this as "read into" what I asked to make this into something it is not to make a point that doesn't exist.... to actually help the OP here, it is important to understand what are the driving factors causing the short list to get created, which is what I asked and all that I asked. If that is behaving like a 12 year old girl and "reading in" then those are good things because it is an important and useful question.
Understanding what is driving the questions to be asked and why we are going the direction(s) that we are is important. We don't know all of the needs and requirements so we need to figure those out.
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@BBigford said:
Does anyone have any numbers on an RFP they put out, or have gone down that road comparing Cisco to Polycom?
RFPs will probably drive you in the wrong direction because the nearly certain best options won't be available from a company that will give you a RFP. RFPs are only good when you've made the assumption that you are going to deal with a reseller and that the reselling has the profit built into it. This is almost never a good assumption, especially in a case like this where your nearly always best option is one that is free (Asterisk.)
What you want is to step back and look at the needs and evaluate at a higher level. You'll also want to think of Polycom and Asterisk as likely the same solution. Polycom is an expensive option typically used with Asterisk because most PBXs that are not Asterisk or 3CX come with their own branded handsets (at least typically.)
But even in the Asterisk world, while Polycom is good, it is also wildly expensive. Most of us working with Asterisk will generally talk Yealink and sometimes Snom or Grandstream phones. Far more cost effective.
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@Jason said:
Why wouldn't you use asterisk? Start there. It's FOSS and easy to manage. I've used it at plenty of other jobs. We have avaya IP office and cisco call manager here, the IP office is going away though. For us shear scale is the only reason we aren't using asterisk.
I was told that the provider can't port an Asterisk setup. But again, that's just what I was told...
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@JaredBusch said:
@BBigford said:
I've managed Cisco's UCS/UCM phone system in a previous environment, and I know it was really expensive. Now I'm in a network that uses Polycom, that we don't really manage all that much (we do about 90% of requests, but anything deep level we have a contract). I was asked by a director at a school district about Polycom vs. Cisco vs. Asterisk. I said Asterisk is going to be the least expensive but I didn't think his provider could port for outside calls (that's pending), and wasn't sure about cost difference between Polycom and Cisco. He also asked what the Polycom software is called (I thought it was InCom?). Does anyone have any numbers on an RFP they put out, or have gone down that road comparing Cisco to Polycom? Thanks!
Polycom is not a a phone system. So first, identify the actual phone system. If it is InCom, that is a rebrandable IP PBX.
Either way, move to Asterisk. The provider is not relevant to that decision.
The decision for What PBX to use is never part of the decision for a provider unless you choose a proprietary provider that uses their own PBX thus technically not even giving you a choice.
Asterisk, or any other modern IP PBX, can connect to any type of trunk you choose to use. Obviously, some trunk types require hardware to interface from the physical to the IP, but there is a device for every scenario out there.
The management console is indeed InCom. I know Polycom is just the hardware, for purposes I just said Polycom because I really don't know much about it to call it something else (like Cisco UCS/UCM..) If someone could correct me (Polycom PBX?) I'd use that in my questions instead.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@scottalanmiller said:
How did Cisco and Polycom come up as options? Cisco would almost never be on a short list. Polycom isn't the same animal. Of these only Asterisk would I generally consider.
While a lot of people want to use this as "read into" what I asked to make this into something it is not to make a point that doesn't exist.... to actually help the OP here, it is important to understand what are the driving factors causing the short list to get created, which is what I asked and all that I asked. If that is behaving like a 12 year old girl and "reading in" then those are good things because it is an important and useful question.
Understanding what is driving the questions to be asked and why we are going the direction(s) that we are is important. We don't know all of the needs and requirements so we need to figure those out.
The short list was something I didn't ask about. To be honest, I was way too busy at the time to ask a bunch of other questions to go in a different direction, so I was just doing a simple "These are the differences in price and functionality" for the director. As I haven't worked with Asterisk or Polycom's side, I had little input for him and wasn't finding anything concrete online for InCom/Polycom vs. Cisco.
