I entirely forgot to tell that the server trouble got sorted out ...
One of the drives in the RAID 5 was failing and the 3ware controller didn't handle it terribly well. It didn't lose any data, so it did fulfill it's primary purpose, but it'd be nice if it didn't make the box crash. Sigh. The support from Penguin Computing was great, hurray for them!
The data center is a couple floors underground so the cell phones don't work there, making calling people rather inconvenient. I bought a cheap Grandstream IP phone and made an account with VoicePulse Connect so in the future we have a phone next to the computers for such emergencies. Unless of course it's network / IP emergencies. :-)
how do you like the grandstream? i've been thinking of picking one up to use for work.
I haven't used it for more than just testing that it can place calls, so I can't speak much for the feature set and such.
The feel of it is a bit too light and plasticy for my taste, so I'd probably not pick it as my "regular" phone. The speakerphone seems to be pretty loud, I'm not sure how good it sounds in the other end though.
Apart from a USB headset and a software phone it's the cheapest way to use VoIP though I think.
It's much more fun to build your own system with asterisk and a tdm400 card. :-) (I have all those things, but I use Vonage for my house phone number and they don't allow you to use your own equipment so I don't actually use it -- doh!)
Anyway, where was I? Unless you need to use the phone a lot and already know that VoIP will work for you, then I think I can recommend getting the grandstream phone to test if nothing else.
- ask