New GSM routers from OpenVox

Openvox is a company from China. It is no longer news that engineers from the Middle Kingdom can not only mislead other people's ideas, but also create independent, effective and high-quality solutions.

As telephonists, OpenVox is probably known to you as a manufacturer of PCI and PCI-E boards for VoIP telephony. And I will add that the product line does not end there.

The company produces FXS routers, various Embedded motherboards, analog and digital files, and even telephone exchanges (on Asterisk, of course).

In the 3rd quarter, OpenVox announced the expansion of its lineup of routers.

We offer you an overview of budget and sooo functional GSM gateways from OpenVox.


At the moment, the manufacturer introduced three devices to the market:

VS-GW1200-4G for 4 SIM cards,



VS-GW1202-8G on 8 SIM cards,



and modular VS-GW1600-20G .


VS-GW1600-20G expands with the help of special VS-GWM400G boards.



Each such board adds 4 GSM channels, i.e. You can build a gateway for 4, 8, 12, 16 and 20 SIM cards. It is convenient if you choose for yourself a gradual upgrade path.

OpenVox claims that each such board lives its own small asterisk. Do not be afraid to start the gateway, you do not have to configure 5 separate stations. One, head, board takes control of the rest automatically.

These modules can be considered more thoroughly. Altera Cyclone III FPGA is used as a controller for managing GSM channels, and to be more precise, EP3C10 256-pin. Works in tandem with GSM modules Simcom sim840w.



The main processor is a dual-core ARM MNDSPEED M83241G-13, which, according to the specification, operates at a frequency of 450 MHz, supports DDR2-667 and has a 2x128K cache in the first level. I think this is more than enough for this device.

TTX

Routers are made in a durable metal case. Reminiscent of Soviet technology, originally from the 70s. Honestly, appearance is the last thing you consider when choosing a device of this class, so that it can be forgiven the Chinese :)

One unit, half length. One large gateway, or three small ones, will enter the rack. Ears are not included.

• 2 10 / 100M LAN interfaces
• 4 SMA-K interfaces
• Use temperature 0 ~ 40 ℃
• Humidity 10% ~ 90% Non-condensing
• Power supply 12V, 4A. (included)
• Consumption: 18 W to 46 W.

Device functionality

Gateways are running Asterisk. SIP (RFC3261) compatible, promise IAX2 support in the near future.

• DTMF Support: RFC2833, Inband, SIP Info
• G.711A, G.711U, G.729 , G.723.1, G.722, G.726, GSM
• Echo Cancellation: ITU-T G.168 LEC
• GSM 850/900/1800/1900 MHz & Band binding
• USSD Transfer
• change IMEI
• API Interface (AMI）
• Flexible routing, unlimited rules
• Support for your scripts and dialplans
• Configuration Reservation
• Least Cost Routing LCR (by time, number)
• Static IP or DHCP
• Sending, receiving SMS

Everything is standard except for changing IMEI. The thing is useful, and is inherent in very rare devices.

Interface

The most convenient way to configure the system is through the web interface. The device is initially available at 172.16.99.1 admin / admin. The gateway is also available via SSH if you enable the corresponding checkbox.

We are immediately greeted by the main screen with the status of the device. Here you can see information about connected SIM cards, call status (incoming / outgoing), connection of SIP accounts. The gateway, by the way, can not only register itself, but also assume registration of other devices.









Watching CDRs, executing AT commands - all for granted. This is a modem in a way :)

Conclusion

Of course, in any device you can find the cons. OpenVox gateways are no exception. It does not support Vlan, and ACLs. I would also like to see a firewall, even the simplest one.
I wrote recommendations to the manufacturer, promised to carry out work in this direction in the very near future.

GSM routers OpenVox - must have! There is no one on the market who can provide similar functionality at this price.
AddPac gateways are ideal, but not everyone can give $ 1200 for a gateway to 4 SIM cards. OpenVox sells for less than $ 500. And if we consider the modular giants for 8 -16 or more SIM cards, then in general the cost there differs significantly.

A close competitor to GoIP - but I highly recommend not contacting devices from this manufacturer. Not only will you configure it for half a day, it will then constantly reboot, hang and not let you sleep.

I tested the VS-GW1200-4G for a couple of weeks in heavy duty. “Not a single break!”

Colleagues, it has a full-fledged Asterisk, I won’t be surprised if I can configure IVR and queues on it and use it as a full-fledged PBX.

 _______                     ___ ___              
|       |.-----.-----.-----.|   |   |.-----.--.--.
|   -   ||  _  |  -__|     ||   |   ||  _  |_   _|
|_______||   __|_____|__|__| \_____/ |_____|__.__|
         |__|   W I R E L E S S   F R E E D O M
 Openvox Wireless Gateway Technologies - Build in 2013-12-17 18:04:44
 ---------------------------------------------------
@Openvox-Wireless-Gateway:/tmp$ 
@Openvox-Wireless-Gateway:/tmp$ uname -a
Linux Openvox-Wireless-Gateway 2.6.33.5 #16 Mon Oct 14 09:41:20 CST 2013 armv6l unknown
@Openvox-Wireless-Gateway:/tmp$ asterisk -rvvvvv
Asterisk 1.8.20.0, Copyright (C) 1999 - 2012 Digium, Inc. and others.
Openvox-Wireless-Gateway*CLI> 

On this note, I propose to finish. Thank you for attention.

UPD: OpenVox VS-GW1200-4G is discontinued. VS-GW1202-4G is released, which allows expanding to 8 SIM cards in the future.