Based on the price of these configurations, I wouldn't even mind putting two servers each with 2 T1s just so that I could get all calls recorded and distribute the risk of failure.
Now, I don't know if it would make a difference or not, but here it goes:
Assuming the cost of the systems is of no importance for a moment (actually looking for the most scalable and reliable solution), which would be a better approach to solve the issue of activating 4 T1s which will be constantly taxed with load and be able to record all conversations:
Scenario 1: 4 T1s into Asterisk (A1) where all SIP agents register. Call recording in A1.
PSTN <--4xT1--> A1 <----> SIP_Agents
Scenario 2: 4 T1s into Asterisk (A1) to do TDM-IAX transcoding. Asterisk (A1) connects to Asterisk (A2) via IAX where all SIP agents register (IAX to SIP transcoding). Call recording in A1 or A2.
PSTN <--4xT1--> A1 <----> A2 <----> SIP_Agents
Scenario 3: 4 T1s into Asterisk (A1) to do TDM-IAX transcoding. Asterisk (A1) connects to Asterisk (A2) via IAX where half of SIP agents register to, and the other half would register in A1. Call recording in A1 and/or A2.
PSTN <--4xT1--> A1 <----> SIP_Agents
A1 <--IAX--> A2 <----> SIP_Agents
Scenario 4: 2 T1s into each Asterisk (A1 and A3) to do TDM-IAX transcoding. Asterisk (A2) will connect to A1 and A3 via IAX. All SIP Agents register at A2 (IAX to SIP transcoding). Call recording in [A1 and A3] or A2.
PSTN <--2xT1--> A1 <----> A2 <----> SIP_Agents
PSTN <--2xT1--> A3 <----> A2 <----> SIP_Agents
Scenario 5: 2 T1s into each Asterisk (A1 and A3) to do TDM-IAX transcoding. Asterisks (A2 and A4) will connect to A1 and A3 respectively via IAX. Half SIP Agents register in A2 and other half in A4 (IAX to SIP transcoding). Call recording in [A1 and A3] or [A2 and A4].
PSTN <--2xT1--> A1 <----> A2 <----> SIP_Agents
PSTN <--2xT1--> A3 <----> A4 <----> SIP_Agents
Hopefully you're all able to understand my 5 scenarios. I guess, my questions would be:
1) Is there a load limiting factor in terms of whether you do the Monitor"ing" of the calls when you're doing TDM-IAX transcoding or IAX-SIP transcoding?
2) Will a single CPU machine handle the 4 T1s to do TDM-IAX transcoding, if another machine is doing the actual recording (IAX-SIP transconding) (Scenarios 2,3,4,5). Basically, just setup "cheap" Asterisk boxes to act as VoIP gateways and the distribute the "load" and/or intelligence on other Asterisk boxes to connect SIP agents and all dialing rules, etc?
Thanks, Daniel
On Apr 28, 2005, at 9:17 PM, mattf wrote:
You can throw together a single P4 3GHz with 1GB RAM and 2 x 80GB SATA HD
for about $600. One of those can easily handle a Sangoma dual T1 card($900)
or a Digium quad T1 card($1400). For that you can have a system for about
$1500-$2000 that will be able to fully record 2 T1s(48 channels) worth of
Zap->SIP conversations. Putting two of those together with a nice big
fileserver will give you a lot of flexibility, as well as only a reduction
in capacity if one of the servers go down instead of a total outage, for
about the same overall price of a single high-end Dual Xeon server. Building
your system this way from the start will also allow it to scale much more
easily than using just a single very expensive server. You can just add
another 2 T1s of capacity at any time for just $1500.
I recommend only 50 or less recordings concurrently because that is the ceiling that we discovered while trying Zap->SIP recording on both Dual Processor server-class systems and single processor cheaper commodity computers as well as on SCSI, IDE and SATA drives.
If anyone out the has reliabily done recording of more than 50 conversations
I would like to know the hardware architecture of your setup.
Thanks,
MATT---
-----Original Message----- From: Daniel Salama [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, April 28, 2005 6:59 PM To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] Asterisk Hardware Recommendation
Thank you again. I will definitely do that. By "cheaper" asterisk servers, do you mean single-CPU machines that can handle Quad T1s and still do the call monitoring?
BTW, I tried the monitoring without the 'm' option and mounted the audio directory via NFS. Big NO NO for everyone. Just do what Matt says: copy the -in and -out to archive server separately several times a day :) - don't record to NFS mounted drive.
Thanks, Daniel
On Apr 28, 2005, at 6:42 PM, mattf wrote:
I have never been able to do more than 50 concurrent recordings with Zap -> SIP phone calls without the audio skipping and/or breaking up. Also, if you are using Digium TE4XXP and want to do a lot of recording I would recommend against a SCSI RAID card because of the interrupt conflicts that you will run into over time. I would recommend a couple of cheaper Asterisk servers with a dual T1 or Quad T1 board in them and SATA drives, with a nice big archive server that the audio will be copied to several times a day. Also, do not record(Monitor) with the 'm' flag on because this will also lead to more disk read-write while you are already trying to write another 100 or so streams. Offload the -in and -out files to the archive server and let it soxmix them together instead. This is the method that we have settled on for our 12 Asterisk servers and it works rather well for us.
MATT---
-----Original Message----- From: Daniel Salama [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, April 28, 2005 5:56 PM To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion Subject: [Asterisk-Users] Asterisk Hardware Recommendation
Hi,
I've been reading on the wiki as well as on this list, different suggestions of what to look for when designing an asterisk server with a lot of traffic. By "a lot" of traffic, I mean a box with a a TE4XXP, that will be hit to full capacity (96 simultaneous calls). This box will also deliver these calls to SIP users and record all their conversations via Monitor.
I've heard that it's not necessarily a matter of memory (RAM) nor the
need to have a multi-processor machine. But what really matters is that
the motherboard (architecture) is designed to handle such a high amount
of interrupts generated by the TE4XXP, the NIC, the storage array
(whether it's SCSI or IDE or SATA).
Does anyone have experience with particular brands of either motherboards they recommend are capable to handle this or complete systems (e.g. Dell xxxx or whichever brands), that are ready for this?
Thanks, Daniel
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