Which PBX to choose? Avaya or Cisco?

Danny,

Before I answer you query. I would like to make it clear that I work neither for Avaya or Cisco and hence, do not have any personal biases.

Second, Avaya IP office is really not solution I would to someone because it does not have any DR/BCP features and secondly this single box solution seems to be way to cumbersome to manage. However this solution is still better to deploy then Cisco Communication Manager Express.

I would advice you to go for solution like ACM 5.1 (Avaya Communication Manager) as this would not only provide you with End to End SIP. I know Avaya offers big discounts, so bargin hard (40%-50%) and this solution which would not be a single box solution so no single point of failures also this solution which would not only suppot SIP and TDM both (in case you wish to run both a TDM and SIP based network.

This Avaya Solution would also provide you with complete redundancy and even if central site completly goes down the secondry site would work business as usual. However same cannot be said about the Cisco CME.

Cisco CCE Pros:
Virtually unlimited number of phones
great desktop software
tandemburg video conferencing
Fancy looking phones

Cisco CME Cons:
Phone LCDs are hard to read in various light settings and don't alert users very well while on a call
Nearly impossible to use 1 system for 2 seperate organizations
PoE can be expensive, in order to have centralized power
All phones are required to boot, hence have a delay before being usable
Servers run Win2000 not 2003 and use Cisco Security Agent
Requires more servers than 1 for voicemail
Requires VoIP QoS on all ports to keep quality high
If you seperate voice and data switches for reliability, your cost just went through the roof.


There are other solutions you can look for in the market much cheaper but scalablity would be an issue. These include include Nortel 11c or BCM.

If you need more info on any of these products do let me know. But let me tell you my english is not very good.

Thanks and Regards,

Vineet