PBX setup with Obi202 moving from expired Obiplus subscription

[ppppplus]

Hello.

I had tried out the Obiplus PBX setup with no major issue.  But since last month, I had discovered that I am no longer eligible for the Obiplus Basic service, which was perfect for my modest 4-line PBX setup.  I was advised to try FreePBX and while I learned quite a bit in the process, I'm still clearly not getting it because I would experience things like choppy sound, especially on the other end of the line, which had never been an issue with Obiplus/Obi202.  I've read that this is typical of bandwidth restrictions or high ping times, but for some reason, the Obiplus setup worked with the same bandwidth restrictions and delivered audible sound.

So I guess I'm wondering if anyone might be able to help with replicating my experience with Obiplus.  I had requested assistance from Obihai and am currently awaiting their response, but I feel that from what I've read here, that there are many experts in the field of SIP, RTP, etc.  I still have the 2 Cisco SPA504G phones that I had bought for use with Obiplus and am currently using those with my FreePBX server.  But again, even if the FreePBX server is being run on a robust Intel Core i5 2450m cpu and 4GB DDR3 RAM, the Obi202 when used as the Obiplus basic gateway, is still killing it.  I'm going to go out on a limb and say that this is not a hardware issue since I doubt that the cpu on the Obi202 wouldn't be capable of being used in a full blown current pc as the Core i5 is used.

I still have the Obi202 and Cisco SPA504G configuration files from the previous setup and I imagine that it just requires a little finagling to get the four lines going again.

Thank you!

[ppppplus]

based on this fantastic thread, https://www.obitalk.com/forum/index.php?topic=8857.0 , I attempted to set something up similar but am having some massive issues with it.  As I only have SP4 unconfigured, I went ahead and adapted a mixture of the instructions on the websites below to use SP4 as my proxy rather than SP2:

http://blog.obihai.com/2012/08/use-your-obi202-as-google-voice-gateway.html

and

http://voxilla.com/2011/02/15/how-to-obify-your-ip-phone-no-asterisk-involved/

but am finding my Cisco SPA504G phone not being registered.

I tried this with the auto-provisioning enabled and disabled per the voxilla article and for voice services >> X_InboundCallRoute, I have "{ph1,SP4(1001@192.168.2.2)}" so that it rings on both one of my analogue phone and my ip phone.

The blog advises to follow this syntax:  SP1/X_InboundCallRoute = {SP2(1001@local_client)}
but I'm wondering if "local_client" here is meant as a placeholder or if "local_client" needs to be in there verbatim.  Otherwise I followed the instructions to the letter and still can't seem to get my Obi202 to chat with my SPA504G as it once did with Obiplus.  Thanks.

[azrobert]

{SP2(1001@local_client)} is verbatim.
You should make the 1001 match the Auth User Name of the SPA504G.
You normally can use any string, but I had a device that wouldn't work unless it matched.
Did you check the System Status to see if the phone is registered?
You can register multiple phones to a single Proxy.
Outbound calls will work for all, but only the last to register will receive inbound.

[azrobert]

only the last to register will receive inbound.

This only applies when using "local_client". You should be able to route inbound calls to multiple phones via IP address.

[ppppplus]

thank you. That's how it's currently setup with the auth username as 1001 and password set temporarily to "password".  That's great news that multiple IP phones can get extensions this way.  Not so great news that only one ip phone can receive incoming calls though, unless I misunderstood.

Is there any more information I can provide to get my spa phone registered?  I can supply the entire spa504g config.xml if need be.  Cheers.

[azrobert]

Make sure your username and password matches SP4 and the Proxy points to the OBi IP address and port number like: "192.168.1.100:5063". The port might be defined separately.

I only registered softphones to my OBi200 and never tried to register an IP Phone, so I don't think I can help other than the above.

You can get this to work if the SPA504G can call without registration. Nothing changes in the OBi configuration, but X_Proxy is not required.

See my last post about inbound calls. You would route the call like this: sp2(1001@192.168.1.xxx:5060)

You can route inbound calls up to 4 devices including the phone port. You can do more with a hack. You would need to increase the MaxSessions parm. I'll explain after you get outbound to work.

[ppppplus]

I just lost a fairly long entry and am a bit bummed out about it as I'm still having issues with registration and the two blog entries that I linked to have seemingly conflicting information. 

For context, I just changed up my configuration to get it closer to the examples instead of being in a situation where I'd be more likely to introduce typos and other human errors through mapping the SP2 example to SP5.

To reduce guesswork, I was wondering if I can ask here whether the following is required for the proxy setup to work:

1) router mode of the Obi202 be set to router and not bridge?
2) change the settings for the port types in voice services>>sp2 (i.e keep_alive_serverport & useragentport)
3) enable "register" on the SPA504G itself

the first item is kind of important to me since I had up until now set up the router in bridge mode so that I can go into the Cisco IP phone's webui to configure it instead of going through the cascading menus on the phone <cringe>. On a related note, is the proxy method only going to work if the phone is plugged in behind the LAN port of the Obi202?  And if more than one ip phone were to be plugged in, I presume a switch would be required behind that LAN port for it to work.

I only ask about the second item because while neither of the blog entries suggest changing these port settings, they also are set to 5060 by default and I've been changing a number 5060 entries during the course of configuration.

the third item is where the obihai blog entry said yes and the voxilla blog entry said no.

Thanks again. 

[drgeoff]

The two examples are different.  The first is setting an SP on the 202 as a SIP proxy instead of the normal SIP client.  The second is about a 110 which does not have that facility.  Trying to mix and match the two may lead to problems.

If using the proxy method, have you definitely changed the relevant SP to proxy mode?

There is more detail of the first example in http://web.archive.org/web/20160317011451/http://www.obihai.com/docs/OBi-VoIP-Device-Attach-Legacy-IP-Phone-Workbook-v1-0.pdf.  That document was on the Obihai site in March this year but seems to have been removed since.

The last sentence on the page showing Option 2 says this can work with the 202 in bridge mode.

I don't have a 202 so have never been able to try any of this.

[azrobert]

I also don't own an OBI202, but I've tested an OBi attached to a 2nd router. When the client was on a different sub-net I had to use port forwarding to get it to work, so I recommend running in Bridge mode.

If you are using SP4 for the Proxy then the default X_UserAgentPort is 5063.

I use the Phonerlite softphone on my PC and it registers to my OBi200. You can try Phonerlite to eliminate or identify the OBI202 as the source of the problem.

Download and install:
http://www.phoner.de/PhonerLiteSetup.exe
When you start Phonerlite I think a wizard will popup because no accounts are defined.
Proxy: 192.168.1.xxx:5063
Click right arrow.
User Name: 1001
Password: password
Click right arrow.
Change Profile Name: OBi202
Click check mark
You should see a green circle on the bottom indicating you are registered.
Dial a number and click the green phone symbol.
Click red phone symbol to hang up.

[ppppplus]

The two examples are different.  The first is setting an SP on the 202 as a SIP proxy instead of the normal SIP client.  The second is about a 110 which does not have that facility.  Trying to mix and match the two may lead to problems.

If using the proxy method, have you definitely changed the relevant SP to proxy mode?

There is more detail of the first example in http://web.archive.org/web/20160317011451/http://www.obihai.com/docs/OBi-VoIP-Device-Attach-Legacy-IP-Phone-Workbook-v1-0.pdf.  That document was on the Obihai site in March this year but seems to have been removed since.

The last sentence on the page showing Option 2 says this can work with the 202 in bridge mode.

I don't have a 202 so have never been able to try any of this.

Thank you Dr. Geoff for your help!  That guide offered the step by step instructions I needed for my situation.  The way it's written as a specific use case to follow without generalization is a perfect fit for someone like myself whose experience with the syntax and meaning of the ports and flows, etc, is limited to my specific needs.  And of course, my limitations were made bare by my cobbling together two blog entries, only one of which would've constructively gotten me to where I wanted to be.  These instructions make it so I don't have to fill in any gaps in logic with assumptions that are presumably developed out of having a stronger background.

So now my ip phone is registered and can make outbound calls.  While I understand that you don't own an Obi202 yourself, would you happen to know if that make my problem of receiving incoming calls an easily resolvable one especially after trying to get the ip phone to register?  I definitely opted for option number 2 as I don't see my situation as necessarily benefiting from introducing yet another subnet with the addition of an ip phone or two.


Thank you azrobert for your extensive assistance and being super responsive and prompt!  Setting Voice Services>SP4 Service>X_UserAgentPort to 5063 worked with the document that Dr. Geoff provided. 

Unfortunately, I don't have a windows-based system on-hand, but I did finally get my ip phone to register.  It's just not receiving incoming calls.  I'm guessing that the two main parameters to bear in mind is

Voice Services>SP1 Service>X_InboundCallRoute, which is {ph1,SP4(1001)}

and

Voice SErvices>SP4 Service>X_inboundCallRoute, which is {1011>(Msp1:SP1)}

but perhaps there are some other settings that I need to verify to identify the source of my issue with not receiving incoming calls? 

Cheers!

[ppppplus]

 I found the issue!

It was here:

ITSP Profile D/SIP/ProxyServerPort should have been 5063, but was set to 5064, left over from one of my many configuration trials!

Again, thank you so much Dr Geoff and azrobert!!!! 

Now I'll try to add that second ip phone.  Baby steps.

[ppppplus]

You can route inbound calls up to 4 devices including the phone port. You can do more with a hack. You would need to increase the MaxSessions parm. I'll explain after you get outbound to work.

I was actually finding that adding another ip phone isn't as apparently an extension of what was needed to setup the first ip phone and I was wondering if you happen to have some time on hand, if I could enlist your assistance for nudging me in the right direction.

Cheers!

[azrobert]

To register a 2nd phone you need to use the exact same credentials as the 1st including the username.

You have a misplaced parenthesis.
Voice Services>SP4 Service>X_inboundCallRoute:
{1001>(Msp1):SP1}

Route inbound calls by IP address and port number of the SPA504G.
Voice Services>SP1 Service>X_InboundCallRoute:
{ph1,SP4(1001@192.168.1.101:5060),sp4(1001@192.168.1.102:5060)}

You said:
"3) enable "register" on the SPA504G itself"

Does that mean to can make calls without registering the SPA504G?
If you can, setup the 2nd SPA504G without registration and a username=1002

Then:
Voice Services>SP4 Service>X_inboundCallRoute:
{1001|1002>(Msp1):SP1}

Voice Services>SP1 Service>X_InboundCallRoute:
{ph1,SP4(1001@192.168.1.101:5060),sp4(1002@192.168.1.102:5060)}
___________________________________________

Check the status of SP4 to verify the IP address and port number of the SPA504G.
Status -> System Status
Only the last device registered will be displayed.
___________________________________________

Each inbound or outbound call uses 1 session on the OBi202 trunk.
When you get and inbound call and route it to SP4, it will use one session on SP1 and 2 on SP4 (1 for each extension).
This also applies to outbound calls.
Anyway, you need to allow for the max number of simultaneous active calls on each trunk.
If you exceed the maxsesions the call will fail.
You can just set max sessions to a large number like 5 or 6.

Voice Services>SP1 Service>MaxSessions: 5
Voice Services>SP4 Service>MaxSessions: 5

[ppppplus]

fantastic!  again, I thank you so much for the detailed information as I got ip phone 2 up and running.  The last thing that I was wondering about was if the configuration can be tweaked such that the two ip phones can have intercom capabilities and/or call transfer capabilities.


Cheers!