Partner ACS Voicemail systems 1

[pshull]

Hi,

I just recently purchased a partner ACS R6.0 with an 308EC module. I have the 5 card carrier as well. I work in small office with about 12 people in it at any given time. What are my options for voicemail? Money is DEFINATELY an issue - the cheaper the better.

I am looking for essentially basic voicemail features. I need a good bit of storage for each user so that large PC v-mail card seems to be out. I know that there are tons of VM cards (new or refurbished) that work with these systems. I am not necesarily against purchasing refurbished equipment if the price is right.

I don't really need more than about 20 mailboxes and say 4-5 hours of VM storage. I also need an automated attendant. I am not certain how the ports work either. If you buy a 2 port card does that mean only 2 people can be on the voice mail. (As in 1 outside caller leaving a message and 1 internal office worker checking his voicemail?) What happens if a second outside caller dials in? We have about 4 incoming lines.

 

[pshull]

Thanks for your help. I ended up going with a Partner Messaging R6 with 4 ports. It wasn't that much more expensive and it was in stock at the place I ordered everything else from. From what you guys said here, Partner Messaging has more features than the VS5 anyhow. Anything I should know about this system?

 

[telprog]

Good deal, you will like it more then you would have liked the VS5, It's pretty striaght foward with good menu prompts. If you have any problems just post and we will help.

A trusted source for years.

http://www.tel-programmer.com

 

[itpphoneguy]

Hi pshull,
Get this unit hooked up to your network and use the GUI. This will make setting the unit up way easier. You need a static iP out of the DHCP range. You set that via the RS-232 port. Once that is done, launch Partner Messaging Administration R6. The iP is what you assigned.
Once you have set it up, use your browser and type in the iP (same one) and log in to your mail box. Now you can pick out that one important voicemail out of many.
Your people are going to love this!

-Chris

 

[pshull]

itpphoneguy,

Thanks for the advice. I am not much of a phone guy but I am learning. Fortunatly, we bought our Partner ACS 6 with a remote access/backup card so connecting to it is a breeze. I hope managing the Voicemail is just as easy. I'll have a number of questions in terms of setting it up.

I've read over a lot of these forums in the past couple weeks while I've pieced together our system. The voicemail was really the last piece to the puzzle. I am interested in setting up the automated attendent as our company is pretty well departmentalized into about 4 areas. I'd like it if I could group those areas with a press 1 for sales, 2 for service, etc. and the phone rings to those people and if no one is there then goes to Voice Mail. Of course, I am also interested in (what I guess is) direct extension dialing by allowing people to "dial the extension at anytime (or whatever)"

I hope Avaya includes documentation for all of this because the ACS documentation I received with my control unit wasn't tremendously helpful.

 

[itpphoneguy]

Hi pshull,
Go to support.avaya.com, documents (under support) and download all the *.PDF manuals. Free download. What you are looking at are the short form instructions. The complete version is a PDF file on the CD you should have got.
Now, don't do the 1..., 2... ,3.... thing at the main menu level. No one can direct dial an extension then. A really bad idea. What you can do is say "to dial by department press" say 6,7 or 8. These numbers are out of your dial plan. Use that selection for a sub menu where you can do your 1..., 2... ,3... thing. You may have to route an extension back to a CO to get a "group" mailbox.
-Chris

 

[ttech]

You could look into a voicemial from a different vendor.
Duvoice makes a nice unit called the DV4 and I have it doing supervised transfers to a group then coming back to the voice mail if nobody answers on the partner. I have had more "it doesn't do that-s" with avaya voicemails than any other. The VoiceGate is nice too.

And they run on a PC using a NORMAL operating system so if down the road you have any problems you can back up the system to a network drive or a portable hard drive Replace the hard drive and your're back up and running. It's nice when the drive fails that you can goto to staples and buy a new drive, put it in, reinstall the software (that they include on a CD) and get the system up and running in an hour. with avaya you have to send it out and wait a day or more to get a replacement. I have seen 2 new Partner mail R6 and 1 merlin messaging R4 fail within a week of installation in the recent months.

Don

 

[itpphoneguy]

Hi Don,
The DuVoice only has one attendant. There are others that work well, but now you need a computer box sitting there, with monitor etc. The Avaya integrated units are in the carrier. As far as a "normal" OS, the only ones I trust are the old OS/2 boxes (love'em) and something running Linux. If it runs Winblows, it ain't production quality. How would you like to do the SP2 thing on a wack of vm computers?
I have had more computers die running voicemail than integrated units. They are all subject to early failure. Unit failure is a fact of life. You have to go with averages rather than specifics. The new messaging units have been good so far.
-Chris

 

[stffpeter]

Hey, you should checkout some of the solutions at

http://www.Dictomail.com

vs your voicemail issues. Instead of fiddling around with this & that, and frantically spreading te nature of your issues, go to the people that specialize in all types of voicemail and messaging soultions and get a serious and cost effective answer to your problem. It might even make your life easier.

 

[ttech]

chris-

I have a duvoice dv4 running 5 different main greetings/ companies on a partner ACS 6.0 you can call their tech support and they help you set it up
As for windows, since the VM is the only application on the machine besides the operating system itself, you should't have to screw with it. It is usually a bunch of applications that makes windows go south. It should always be running in a "clean install" state because nothing else belongs on there besides what came on it.

You are right though the AVAYA mails are generally Rock solid Especially if You have A UPS on the system

~Don~

 

[itpphoneguy]

Hi Don,
The only problem I have with DuVoice is "another box on the wall". We also deal with AVT (AVST now) and the one that ships with Millenium and the old ITT System 3100. Enough boxes already. I will go with the integrated Avaya solution if I get a chance.
The windoze boxes have issues when rebooting. The last was a 2000 box that wanted to disable the vm cards every time. Autodetect turned off everywhere. It's in a lawyers office. I am afraid of the call I know will come some day. Gimme OS/2 or Linux any day .... please.
-Chris

 

[ttech]

I know man. I have had voicegates lose harddrives like crazy lately.

 

[itpphoneguy]

Hey Don,
Don't you just want to go home some days? Just rebuilt an AVT today using OS/2 Warp 3.0 and a 40G drive in a P4 2.66 GHZ box. We are only using a tiny slice of this power. Sad thing is is the hard drive will die in a couple years because it's made in China. Oh crap.
-Chris