96xx vs the J series 12

[BernPed]

I m considering replacing the 9611 series handsets with the newer J series.

Can you tell me what your opinion is of the 9611 vs the J series?

Thank you

 

[FractalTelecom]

Follow.

 

[tthunder]

Our company currently has a mix of J169/179 for our contact center & 9608s for everywhere else. We were going to replace the rest of the 9608s with J169/179s but we're moving off of Avaya.... The J series are a little smaller. You can still do the everything you need to do on the J Series that you've been doing on the 9600. The biggest thing now is the 9600 series is now end of sale/end of support so you can't get firmware updates. Last year I ran into issues with our security 9608's with sidecars constantly flashing and dropping the programmed lines due to the last available firmware update that was installed. I had to roll them back to an old firmware while I configured a few J179 with sidecars.

 

[Rhinorhino]

The J series looks a lot like the old Nortel 1140E series.

 

[ACSscott]

The biggest difference to me is that the J series are SIP and so can be used on cloud platforms like RingCentral or Avaya Cloud Office (which is just Avaya whitelabeling RingCentral anyway).
So if there's a plan to move to the cloud someday, those phones have future use where the 96xx do not. Just make sure your IP Office SW version is up to date so the J series are supported. I believe needs to be at least 10.1.
J179 has an optional wifi chip where there is no such option on the 96xx.

 

[Shaun E]

Just make sure your IP Office SW version is up to date so the J series are supported. I believe needs to be at least 10.1.

The J179 will run just fine on earlier versions in H323 mode and will identify themselves as a 9611. It will have the older interface and won't support the wifi/bluetooth module but otherwise it's a good intermediary step before upgrading.

 

[ACSscott]

Shaun E is correct, there is H323 mode on the J series. Seems to me like you'd be doing twice the work setting the phones up H323 and then converting to SIP later, but it's an option.
In trying to remember why I set one up in H323 mode before, I think I recall that the J series phones in SIP mode do not have the built in VPN client. Pretty sure that you can run them in H323 mode to access the VPN client. I also feel like I recall it working fine but not "officially" being supported on IPO in H323 mode.