AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC Reviews

My main use case for AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC is that we activated it as the Session Border Controller, the border controller, and a Media Gateway. We used a fixed IP from the client's network, which used telephony only for physical, in-person work at the agency, a public agency here in Brasília, in Brazil. During the pandemic, we activated AudioCodes Mediant interface so that it could register extensions remotely, to provide home office for the agency's professionals, including Teams. During the pandemic, AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC was essential in this case.

I had the opportunity to work with AudioCodes in support as an on-site technician at a government client, where I stayed at the G-Box Smart Space, known here in Brasília. I worked at a government client where I was on site. AudioCodes FXS converted telephony to analog extensions, conventional telephony, including for use in elevators, in deputies' offices, with the simplest possible telephony, with analog digital phones there. The ports of AudioCodes FXS would generate a 60-volt ring voltage, which we connected to the quick-coupling BLI block, internal cabling, and we did the jumpers and connections.

A point in the main use case that I believe could evolve and further facilitate my work is the replacement of modules. The boards of AudioCodes FXS were very interesting and worked effectively. They have a positive and negative point in that they would burn out relatively easily, because the FXS did not have, in the physical circuit of the board, a protection capacitor to protect it. The resistors and micro-components would burn out easily when there was feedback on the metallic network of the FXS. This module would burn out, and often the module itself would burn out. However, since it was modular, both the power supply of the equipment and the fans of the physical equipment of AudioCodes FXS, we just replaced the module, replaced the fan, replaced the power supply, and the four-port FXS module.

I also worked with physical AudioCodes that converted, which would be the Media Gateway part. It converted E1 to SIP, to E1, with BNC connector. There was the bus, functioning as if it were an E1 patch panel. It converted that bus to RJ45, so it would enter via pure SIP into our SIP server, which was a machine we ran with, actually several machines. There was a technology park there with six main servers: proxy, SIP server, database, application, the management server for the web part, and the internal PBX management system, with redundancy. I converted there to the network to reach these machines via the internal network. My history in the IP telephony area has always been with these positive and negative points regarding the physical part of the equipment, but I saw that the Media Gateway did not have issues, even with lightning in the region and power oscillation. The E1-to-SIP Media Gateway worked very effectively. AudioCodes FXS had that issue, but it was also excellent. The company carried these boards, which had 48 ports. We had around 16 FXS gateways and four E1-to-SIP gateways. The external operator's TDM E1s would arrive, the optical modems of the PSTN link, of the public telephone network, delivering the E1s, the 30 channels, and it would convert to SIP. We would put these channels into our internal PBX to handle incoming and outgoing calls. I also assisted international clients from Econ and Orange as well, who deployed SBC and deployed Teams. They activated Microsoft Teams on the network and used it as an SBC to interconnect with the operator.

A challenging point in my previous job was that it was necessary to activate media bypass on the SBC for it to work with the telephone operator I work with today, which is an important detail. We had a little difficulty with that, but after we did it, everything worked fine.

The best features that AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC offers in my experience are its management of acting as an SBC, border controller, and a true proxy for VoIP, in those cases I mentioned, which were really the best I saw. To interconnect with the operator and provide good security, physically in the client's internal telephony network, it was also excellent. The ability to set it as media bypass is very good. It only does the routing, delivering the media end-to-end, and the endpoints handle codec management. This includes codec G.729, G.711 a-law, u-law, and others, and it is negotiated at the endpoints when it performs bypass. For it to also do codec transcoding, I see that there are options there in the web interface that I have not tested.

In terms of how management and media control directly impacted day-to-day operations, I can add that the SIP and TDM E1 Media Gateway I worked with for more than six years with a digital device, converting to SIP, handled inbound and outbound calls easily. The ability to view in the web interface of the physical device itself is excellent. I am not talking about AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC, but about AudioCodes Mediant 1000, to manage the logs of the layer two link, of the E1s, of SIP, and to check errors. This is very good. AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC is interesting because in these technology parks, in the strategic cloud project, it is perfect for using SIP trunked into virtual machines. Today, telephony allows us to work with cloud PBX and use it as a SIP server, and use AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC as a proxy server. This is a positive point because it brings all the know-how I have already described to the cloud. Then you can have your entire technology park in the cloud. The negative points would be bandwidth management, latency, where that data center is, where AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC instance is, the PBX, and the distance between the PBX and the SIP server, as well as security and firewall management, and how the firewall management will be carried out to protect this network from attacks.

AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC had a positive impact on my organization in terms of flexibility. Being able to place a VoIP proxy with an external IP to provide extension authentication via the internet, in a secure, isolated way, setting an IP, a port, and directing that internally, securely, to the client's PBX, generated flexibility for the company and security. It also increases productivity, including in that COVID pandemic timeframe.

In my opinion, AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC could be improved with more security features and VPN capabilities when you think of a SaaS machine, Software as a Service in the cloud. If AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC had the possibility of having that within the system, a more mature security module, it would minimize the need to keep creating that in Amazon Elastic, in DigitalOcean, in Contabo, whichever platform, in Azure, or wherever you place your machine. If it matures more, that would be very interesting.

I would like to reinforce that this security is different from cloud infrastructure compared to on-premises, on site at the client. When we are using an on-site AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC, we are only exposing one IP on the internet, opening a port, from a machine that is in the cloud. It is completely exposed, with the firewall issue.

My comments and advice about AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC include adding VPN and connected networks. The cloud infrastructure is a different paradigm, so it requires more care in cloud architecture. If AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC itself provides this security aspect with an increasingly robust firewall, it reduces this external work of managing the security infrastructure.

I worked for more than six years with AudioCodes focused on VoIP, Voice over IP.

My experience with the stability of AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC is positive. I do not see complaints from customers or other customers who used it.

I did not test the scalability of AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC, but I believe it does have that capability.

I did not need manufacturer support for AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC. I only needed support when we acquired the AudioCodes equipment, we installed and configured them. At most, when power modules or the fan of AudioCodes FXS, for example, burned out, we replaced them and requested the local reseller to supply new ones or sent them to companies that provided support that repaired the board components and carried out the actual repair of the electrical micro-components on the boards and modules. These equipment modules, when there was no way to repair them, were purchased new. There was also one I used that had Linux running as well, where we ran the SIP server inside it. It already did the job of a local VoIP server as well, and it was very good.

I previously used a different solution before AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC, where the external IP was exposed on the PBX itself on the internet, without using an SBC or proxy server. This highlights the security layer I mentioned. Placing it at the border, as a proxy server for VoIP, limiting it to one IP and having it do the job of inbound and outbound gateway, routing incoming and outgoing calls, is very interesting.

I observed productivity and service maintenance being kept up and available, which relates to obtaining a return on investment from using AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC.

My experience with the pricing, setup costs, and licensing of AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC is that, since I worked in the technical area as an analyst, support technician, implementation, and maintenance, I did not participate in pricing, bids, and so on. However, the company had no problem acquiring new AudioCodes, either Mediant 1000, Mediant 500, 800, or Mediant Cloud. There was always ease in getting them in the Brazilian market.

Before choosing AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC, I evaluated other options, but none was better than leaving the PBX itself exposed on the internet.

My advice to others who are considering using AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC is that AudioCodes is a responsible, professional brand, and it is worth using in your platform, in your project, strategically, whether in the cloud or on site. Overall, my experience with AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC was very good. It is not for those who have a basic level of knowledge; you need an experienced analyst. It is more for an advanced level, but I highly recommend it for robust environments, projects, and large telephony projects. I gave AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC an overall rating of 9.

Public Cloud

Other

AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC serves as my primary solution to support SIP trunking for direct routing for Microsoft Teams. We have a SIP trunk from LoopUp, which is connected to AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC, and the Cloud SBC, mostly using two SBCs for high availability, connects with direct routing through the Microsoft network to Microsoft Teams.

With AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC, we can connect any devices that are not directly supported by Microsoft Teams, such as analog phones on the customer side, door openers, special entries that could not be connected directly to Microsoft Teams, DECT systems, and legacy PBX systems.

The best feature of AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC is the security part because I can use the internal firewall of AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC and easily configure classification to allow only SIP communication from configured providers. Additionally, AudioCodes support is reachable twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week and provides excellent professional services.

The internal firewall and classification features help my organization by allowing only connections from Microsoft to prevent unauthorized access. For instance, we faced an issue where an attacker used an AWS IP range to emulate the Microsoft SBC for PSTN calls, but with classification, we only allowed connections from Microsoft, and the firewall settings enabled us to open media ports dynamically when the SIP connection is authorized.

AudioCodes offers a lot of different hardware and live services for AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC, and they also use LifeHub for bot configuration, allowing us to utilize bots for AI. We receive a comprehensive range of voice-related devices with the option to get Teams devices from AudioCodes, ensuring we have a single vendor for Microsoft Teams, which is advantageous given AudioCodes' extensive experience in voice competence and twenty-four hour professional service.

It would be nice if we could use AI on AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC to automatically configure it. The upcoming firmware version will support replacing the public certificates required for Teams, so I have no further requests.

Regarding AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC's AI capabilities, I believe it would be beneficial to use AI for configuration and troubleshooting. I notice that AudioCodes is already incorporating AI services with their live service, ensuring governance and security are well managed.

I have been using AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC for around fifteen years.

AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC has positively impacted my organization over the last ten years, as it has been reliable without any outages. We use AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC with the Microsoft Cloud, which is available twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, and we have not experienced any interruptions of the PSTN service for Teams.

This reliability has significantly impacted our team by reducing downtime costs to zero since we do not encounter downtime costs or high administration costs. Setup for AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC is a one-time process, and once configured, it requires no reconfiguration, apart from occasional firmware updates, which can be done easily through the Teams Admin Center, even for individuals less knowledgeable about Teams voice.

The stability of AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC is outstanding, with uptime near one hundred percent, and updates only take about five minutes.

The scalability of AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC is very easy to manage. As our organization grows, we can enhance the CPU and everything in the cloud, only needing to add additional licenses to AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC.

AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC's scalability is perfect, with diverse offerings that accommodate small to enterprise businesses, as well as provider businesses.

My experience with AudioCodes customer support has been positive, as they can be available twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week with the right contract, and their service is quick regardless of where AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC is installed around the world.

We previously used AudioCodes on-premises installation but switched to AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC to achieve high availability and eliminate on-premises hardware and data center issues.

AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC integrates perfectly with other tools in our environment because it offers an API for automatic management, allowing integration into the M365 ecosystem.

The setup for AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC is a one-time process, and once configured, it requires no reconfiguration, apart from occasional firmware updates, which can be done easily through the Teams Admin Center, even for individuals less knowledgeable about Teams voice.

I have not seen a return on investment.

From my perspective, the pricing, setup costs, and licensing is reasonable considering the service support that AudioCodes delivers.

I did not evaluate other options before choosing AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC.

My advice for those looking into using AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC is to assess the number of concurrent sessions required, which will guide the decision on the appropriate resources needed on Microsoft Azure for CPU, memory, and installation. I would rate this solution a ten out of ten.

Public Cloud

Microsoft Azure

AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC serves as the main communication solution between our internal telephony systems and our telecom operators, who are our suppliers. The integration between internal telephony and external providers is effectively supported by AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC.

AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC offers excellent features including ease of configuration, integration between devices, and management capabilities.

The ease of configuration and management significantly simplifies the IT team's daily work by enabling the ability to copy multiple configurations between devices as long as they have the same software version. The devices can interact with each other and maintain high availability.

AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC has positively impacted our organization by centralizing the devices across a few locations and integrating them via the network. This centralization has delivered measurable benefits including process optimization, efficient resource use, and improved management.

A single configuration page for all devices could be an improvement for AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC.

I have been using AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC at the company for more than five or six years. I do not currently use the tool myself, but my colleagues do.

AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC handles increasing demands and changing needs effectively based on my experience.

The customer support from AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC was very smooth and helpful when I needed to contact them. Since I do not work directly with the support team currently, I cannot speak in detail about how the service is now.

We used a different solution previously, but I do not remember which one it was. I am certain it was decentralized.

Before choosing AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC, other options were evaluated through a bidding process, so I cannot know for certain which ones were considered.

My advice for others considering using AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC is to study it and make use of the support and the usefulness of the manuals, which are easy to use and accessible. I would rate this product an 8 out of 10.

On-premises

Other

I use AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC for interconnection and call routing between Microsoft Teams and on-premises phone systems, and that has been the focus of my project work.

I created a tenant on Microsoft Azure to deploy AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC, where I have an Avaya Communication Manager on-premises. I created a NAT on the firewall public IP address to allow communication between the on-premises phone systems and AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC in the cloud. I secured an SSL certificate from GoDaddy to deploy directly on AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC to establish a TLS connection to Microsoft Teams. From there, I created a SIP trunk from AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC directly to Microsoft Teams and another SIP trunk directly to the on-premises PBX, which has a TDM gateway allowing Microsoft Teams to consume the TDM on-premise E1 or PRI line. After implementing the project, I was able to call on-premises telephone systems from Microsoft Teams, and I can also utilize Microsoft Teams to consume the E1 line to call a PSTN line, which encapsulates the main focus of my project.

We utilize AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC for call routing, specifically deploying a Huawei AICC, known as the Huawei Artificial Contact Center Intelligence, in a South Africa data center, where AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC serves as an intermediary connecting to other on-premises systems across Africa for call routing and SIP signaling.

The best features of AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC are its capabilities in handling and routing large volumes of traffic through different routing methods, including the manipulation of contact headers and SIP signaling to ensure compatibility with other SIP devices or applications, and it is also utilized in IMS call routing scenarios.

In scenarios with complicated routing for large enterprise customers possessing finite or infinite phone numbers and routing numbers, AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC allows me to declare different routing numbers and carry out simplified routing compared to traditional on-premises phone systems.

I also use AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC as a load balancer, with both primary and secondary systems acting as active and standby in order to achieve failover on Microsoft Teams on-premises connections using an SBA. AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC positively impacts my organization by supporting the reselling of SIP trunk services to end-user clients, where our SIP services are terminated on AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC, enabling us to act as a reselling platform for customers who wish to purchase SIP trunking services.

In terms of cost savings and increased efficiency, I find that AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC is best suited for SME businesses, particularly in enterprise environments. I recommend it for enterprise customers due to its cost-effectiveness.

My understanding regarding potential improvements for AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC suggests the need for alignment with additional public cloud providers beyond just AWS and Azure to enhance their marketplace presence. The improvement I would recommend is to align AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC with other public clouds, beyond merely being available on AWS and Azure.

I have been using AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC for about seven years now.

AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC stands out not just as an SBC but also as a capable proxy for SIP signaling, routing, and various telephony system functionalities. I rate AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC a nine out of ten because of these capabilities, though it misses a perfect score.

Regarding AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC's AI capabilities, I feel that its reliability is not one hundred percent accurate, particularly in analyzing SIP issues and log-related problems.

My advice to others considering AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC is that it is the best SBC available for voice environments, and I recommend AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC one hundred percent to other customers.

I have assigned a rating of nine out of ten to AudioCodes Mediant Cloud SBC based on its outstanding performance and capabilities.

Hybrid Cloud

Microsoft Azure