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Grandstream UCM series IP PBXs

Score8 out of 10

8 Reviews and Ratings

What is Grandstream UCM series IP PBXs?

Grandstream presents the UCM series of IP PBX appliances as powerful yet easy to manage voice, video, data, and mobility communications platform, whichoffer an extensive set of unified communication features in an easy to manage on premise solution with no licensing fees, upgrade fees or costs per features. The Grandstream UCMs range from small and medium business deployments to small and medium enterprise solutions.

Categories & Use Cases

A PBX that will redefine your needs and raise your expectations to a new level!

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

When the pandemic started we needed to make a change and enable our users to work from home. While this was possible for them at the time, they did not have access to their office phone, so they could not accept or make calls with their office number. So we were force to move to a new ΠΒΧ, that would support remote connections. After looking at all available solutions and compared them we concluded that the UCM6308 was the best choice available

Pros

  • Wave is a great solution to have access to your phone from your laptop while working from home
  • Managing extensions and all the PBX features is very easy
  • Grandstream does listen to the customer and they accept reasonable change requests that will benefit users
  • The UCM supports paring 2 devices and creating a standby cluster for high availability!
  • The UCM gets updates very often and new features are added constantly.

Cons

  • The cluster implementation does not work on all network modes. Would be great if this was improved.
  • Wave on mobile phones works in a different way than on desktops and this makes it hard to set it up for use on the firewalls, as it requires different and more permissions than the desktop app. For example is one receives an invitation per email on the mobile phone and wants to participate in a Wave meeting as a guest, the still need access to the network ports needed to login the extension (while they only need / want to join the meeting as anonymous users). On the desktop app this is not needed.
  • There is a limit on the number of 1 device per connection type. We have an extension used in the maintenance department and is shared by 6 users. We were able to install it on 1 PC, 1 Wi-Fi phone and 1 Android shared mobile phone. We would like to install it on a second shared mobile phone, but this is not allowed by the UCM policy. We could use anther extension to do this, but the maintenance department does not want this. They want to accept calls with problem reports only on one extension. Would be great to be able to install the same extension on more than 1 Android devices.

Most Important Features

  • Wave desktop and mobile apps
  • Frequent updates which include new features
  • IP Phones zero config
  • Easy configuration / management / deployment

Return on Investment

  • Ability to work from home and have access to office phone number
  • Ability to make basic video conferencing
  • Ability to have access to the office phone on the mobile phone

Alternatives Considered

Yeastar P-Series PBX System

Other Software Used

WatchGuard DNSWatchGO, WatchGuard AuthPoint, Microsoft Defender for Office 365, Microsoft 365 Business Premium

Usability

Grandstream UCM series IP PBXs - nothing like it for the price - a definite winner!

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Grandstream UCM series IP PBXs products typically manage a company's phone system for internal and external voice communication. The Grandstream UCM series IP PBXs product line is competitively priced and offers a lot of PBX features. While that is the most common use for businesses, we actually use it for their security camera and access control integration with the GDS product line. We use the GXP phones to monitor the door cameras and the GDS facility access systems for door entry. The system works extremely well and is simple to use and configure. At some point in the future we would likely migrate our existing analog PBX system and go with the UCM product completely.

Pros

  • Solid, reliable products
  • Simple to configure and manage
  • Compatible with ONVIF for use with 3rd party systems

Cons

  • The GDS software is built on old technology and somewhat limited in my opinion
  • Centralized management of GDS devices has limited functionality in my opinion.
  • Grandstream firmware updates aren't very frequent.

Most Important Features

  • Cost-Effective
  • Simple to configure and manage
  • Works with 3rd party companies
  • Reliable for 24/7 use
  • Excellent audio and video quality

Return on Investment

  • Low-cost initial investment, minimal recurring costs
  • Used by everyone in our company and easy to adopt
  • Runs 24/7 and is reliable
  • Allows our school to manage access control easily and efficiently

Other Software Used

Original Prusa MINI+, Duda