POLY EDGE E500 / E550 POLYCOM

[jfines]

Since there’s not a Poly/Polycom folder, posting here

Does anyone have experience installing/configuring/using the brand new Polycom edge E 500 series e500 and e550 with fusionPBX?

We are considering replacing all of our mishmash of phones with these. Would like to get thoughts in advance

 

[roger_roger]

I don't know why you'd do that. You'll be much better off with Yealink. They support automatic provisioning with Yealink's RPS (remote provisioning server), are well supported by Fusion, and they cost less. We have hundred of them out there and they are fabulous. We replaced all of our Cisco SPA and Polycom phones with Yealink and couldn't be happier.

Just my opinion...

 

[jfines]

Thank you for the feedback. A follow up questions:

1. What did you not like about Polycom that led you to replacing them?

2. What does the yealink provisioning server do exactly?

3. How does that differ from the provisioning tools for devices within fusionPBX?

4. Is there anything that you don’t like about yealink or something that it doesn’t do perfectly?

5. does yealink perfectly handle “shared call appearances” a.k.a. “bridged call appearances”?

 

[hfoster]

Not the replier, but:

1. Cost, firmware upgrades were a pain, a handful of the devices seemed to have rotted away from a rubbery plastic into a sticky mess. Anyone with Amstrad devices in the 80's and 90's might know what I'm talking about here.

2. RPS server allows a fresh out of the box Yealink to dial home as soon as it's plugged in. You would need custom firmware files from a supplier to achieve this otherwise.

3. RPS server doesn't do the bulk of the config, FusionPBX still does that.

4. Not a big fan about the number of devices they have out...but that seems to be all companies. More SKUs is just frustrating to support, I constantly have to Google how many DSS keys aa T43U or a T31P has.

5. There is a Shared Call Appearance mode for Yealinks, which I believe modifies how the line button works slightly, I never use it as it's a bit of a legacy feature from those old key system PBXs. The SIP spec has no problems registering multiple handsets to the same extension, and most people do this naturally with a handset, a desktop app and a mobile app. Emulating a key system like the olden days is probably better done with Parks and BLFs for the parks, though FreeSWITCH/FusionPBX/Yealink all seem to support SCA if that's what you are after. Worth searching this forum for people's experience with it.