IT Setup for SMEs of about 5 employees (Part 3)

IT Setup for SMEs of about 5 employees (Business Phone System)

Telephone has been and will remain important communication tools among businesses. So naturally, we have to start looking at phone system setup.

We shall look at 3 options for phone systems to consider:

Option 1: Traditional PABX (or key phone systems)

Most common brands used in Singapore should be Panasonic or NEC.

Pros: Reliable and should last many years

Cons:

• Limited to system configuration eg Panasonic KXTA824 basic system is limited to 3 incoming/outgoing physical line and 8 extension, but purchase option to scale up
• Limited to physical location for your extension
• Limited features like interactive voice response, voice mail and phone recording is not available
• Have to purchase proprietary phone, and require experience engineer to program
• Have to run physical phone cabling

Option 2: IP PBX (VoIP Systems)

Getting popular as technology and internet bandwidth advances. SMEs can consider Grandstream for a low end start.

Pros:

• Expandable up to 30 extension without add-on
• Can self manage to configure without engineer
• Not limited to physical location (can bring hone the phones)
• More features including voice mail, phone recording and interactive voice response
• Can purchase any brand of SIP phone or use software application like x-lite or gwave
• Can use a single network cable for both phone and PC/laptop

Cons: Not as reliable, if internet or network is down, all phone will be down

Option 3: Hosted IP PBX (bizphone)

Option 3 will have the same pros and cons as option 2 except you do not need to invest in PBX. Just purchase SIP phone or use software to run your phone by subscribing to a reliable provider will do.

Compare phone solutions

Above table is a quick summary, but not comprehensive enough to cover all brands and solutions. However, it should be generic enough for a quick glance of the 3 solutions highlighted.

Should you have any questions, do feel free to comment or contact us for further clarifications.

We definitely hope this article helps simplify the understanding for SMEs to make sound choices.


William Tan
Advanced Micro Control Pte Ltd
Tel: +65 6347 7000
email: sales@amc.com.sg