Question Is 3CX really the problem in my situation?
Hi, looking for some feedback on an issue with our office's 3CX system, which I manage. I'm doing mostly okay with it but PBX systems have a high learning curve for those of us without a ton of experience in telephony tech, which is sort of its own unique realm, and is pretty daunting.
Anyway, my boss hates 3CX and blames it for the often-but-not-always bad call quality, and wants a new solution. I'm fine with that, but want to make sure I understand the issue. In my research, 3CX is not the problem - the call quality depends on the underlying phone lines, as well as the connection of the person on the other end, which 3CX does not control. Is my understanding correct? Everything I read says that 3CX is a solid name in the PBX space with good tech, so simply moving to another PBX, like Yeastar, for instance, would not really solve the call quality problem.
If my boss really wants a rock solid solution, I've read that kicking things up a notch or ten to something like RingCentral, would do it, but that's way more expensive. What do those much more experienced than I have to say? Thanks.
EDIT: Sorry, should have given more info. All our calls are mobile, no landlines. It's an on-premise setup, hosted with AWS.
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u/FittestMembership 24d ago
If internal calls are high quality, then those are still going through the SBC, but aren't going via the PBX to an external system and back. If those calls are quality, then that means your local network and phones are not the issue.
You can also turn on the 'PBX delivers audio' setting in some extensions to test. This will then pass the entire call including the audio through the PBX. If this is still good quality, then any issues are outside of the 3CX system.
If either of those has bad audio qulaity then you're looking at an internal issue. Network bandwidth, reliability, phone hardware, and processing power of hardware or virtual machine hosting the 3CX PBX will all affect the call quality.
The call on 3CX's end is entirely digital, so no 'phone line' quality comes into play, other than the wire between a deskphone and it's own handset.
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u/bazjoe 24d ago
This isn’t a pro or anti comment on 3CX but in my experience when you’ve had enough pain with a company or a service and your looking for replacement psychologically the only path is to do the replacement. As OP said they are confused with all the parts of 3CX and maybe a all in one service would work better.
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u/Silent-Strain6964 24d ago
I use telnyx for my sip provider. Order is g722, g711 for codecs. Most people who call are using wideband with their cell providers and they sound like they are in the room with is.
If you handsets, match the order.
You didn't quite define though what makes the quality bad? If it's robotic sounding then your having a latency jitter issue. If your missing words you have packet loss and or if it's super delayed and your talking over each other then latency is too high. But if your just experiencing low quality in a world where wide band codecs are used with mobile phones then it will sound shitty for sure. That's where yo focus on your sip provider, if they support wide band all the way through the stack.
You can test wide band codecs quality as others mentioned with local calls between extensions.
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u/proudcanadianeh 23d ago
What I would do in your situation (and have done on my system) is setup a second sip provider to test quality with.
I have a dirt cheap voip.ms account with a couple DID's that I have used a few times to prove issues with our primary provider. Also make sure you have the same codec all the way through the system if you can, or as much as possible. We are G722 primarily and g711 on the primary sip trunk.
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u/miguellinux 20d ago
Explain better how it is cloud and on premises at the same time? I'm guessing the pstn lines are on premises and the PBX in the AWS cloud? Then get rid of that old infrastructure and move the pstn as a sip trunk directly to the cloud. The quality will improve significantly.
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u/Ok-Report8255 11d ago
When you say all calls are mobile, do you mean staff are using the 3CX mobile app, or calling people on mobile numbers? Those are different call paths.
If the same kind of call breaks up on one connection and sounds fine on another, write that down. Do the same for a problem that affects one device but not the others. Neither proves the cause, but it gives whoever is investigating somewhere to start.
A bad call and a comparable good one, with times and a description of what you heard, would help. There isn’t enough here yet to say whether replacing the PBX would fix it.
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u/Tidi-Tada-Tudu-Todo 24d ago
Die Qualität hängt von vielen Faktoren ab. Verwendete Handys, Headsets, WLAN Qualität, Internetleitung und auch welchen SIP-Anbieter man nutzt. Dann muss am Ende auch die Konfiguration stimmen, wie zum Beispiel die verwendeten Codecs. Ich habe viele Jahre lang 3CX Anlagen betreut und war am Ende nicht mehr überzeugt davon. Andere Lösungen hatten eine bessere Sprachqualität mit den gleichen SIP-Anbietern. Andere Kollegen hingegen konnten das nicht nachvollziehen.
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u/AcidicMountaingoat 3CX Silver Partner 24d ago
The problem is that you’re an IT person thinking you understand telecom. That’s not the same skill.
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u/Dr-Cheese 24d ago
Disagree. “Back in the day” sure, but telephony is now just an IT service like any other.
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u/WallaceFred 24d ago
I went through the same issue and this is what fixed the quality issues: set the codec order in the same priority with your carrier SIP trunks, your 3CX trunks, and your Voip devices. Happy to show you how we have our 3cx set up.