Redundancy in a Norstar MICS?

[jsun1]

Hello,
Before I start I should explain something about myself. I don't know a whole lot about our phone system. I am just doing some preliminary research on the feasibility of some things. That being said......

We are looking to add redundancy to our Norstar system. We have a primary system and an identical backup system. One method we have considered is to have our 2 systems powered up, configured and programmed identically. We will then punch our incoming trunk (CO) lines PARALLELED to both the primary and backup systems. The extensions for each system would be connected to an AB switch (with an Amphenol 25 pair conn.) so that they could be switched from primary to backup if needed.

Are there going to be any loading issues with punching the incoming trunk lines in parallel? Are there any other unforeseen problems with this setup?
Any better suggestions for making our system redundant or fail safe?

Any help would be greatly appreciated!!
Thanks,
Jason Eberhart

 

[sprucegrover]

There shouldn't be any problems having the trunks terminated on both systems, as long as the system isn't programmed to direct the incoming calls to any specific location. For example, if a trunk was programmed to ring on a specific DN and not at reception, on the redundant system that has no sets attached the line would have no place to ring ( on the backup system). This may cause a problem with incoming calls on that line. If all calls are answered at reception, the parallel connection shouldn't be trouble.
But if it was me, and it's not, I would have only the KSU with duplicate hardware and software, and just update the redundant system with any program changes made on the active KSU. In the event of a catastrophic failure, just swap the KSU for the backup and power up

 

[Arr]

I concurr with Sprucegrover. Just have a spare handy. Use a fast rad to do system backups and keep a couple of current disks available. Your proposed set up is OK as long as the 2nd KSU doesn't see the lines. But you don't need to keep it powered up. Electronics is often just as happy unpowered.

PhM

 

[curlycord]

I also agree, btw the odds of your KSU crashing and you have battery back up (and a good one) is probably 1 in 10,000 except for voice mail.

http://www.spoctel.com