Telco Ltd. Blog

Awhile back, We posted on ESI’s Presence Management, which features a special device called a Presence Management Reader that has multiple functions.  It can act as a door phone, as security access for building personnel (using RFID-based security cards or fobs), and more.

ESI presence Management Reader

We are pleased to announce that ESI has developed an ...

We got a chance recently to take ESI Mobile Messaging for a spin.  This is ESI’s new voicemail-to-email solution, available on all ESI Communication Server phone systems (the ESI-50L model must be upgraded to an ESI-50 to take advantage, which we are told is a painless process that does NOT require reprogramming the phone system; existing ESI-50, ESI-100, ESI-200, ESI-600 and ESI-1000 phone system owners can participate without a model upgrade).

ESI Mobile Messaging requires the addition of ...

ESI (our manufacturer of choice for business phone systems) announced recently that ESI has achieved interoperability with Broadvox GO! SIP trunking.  SIP trunking, for those who may not know, is a relatively new type of dialtone that is delivered via an IP network by an ITSP, or Internet Telephony Service Provider.  It’s far more efficient than Plain Old Telephone Service, and it appears to be where dialtone technology is headed.  Like ISDN PRI, it offers both DID ...

ESI recently announced another great application available to users of Communications Server phone systems: ESI Mobile Messaging, a voicemail-to-email solution.

ESI Mobile Messaging combines the advanced capabilities of an ESI Communications Server phone system with the convenience of users’ existing e-mail accounts. When one receives a voice mail message at an extension or guest mailbox, the person also receives an e-mailed notification to which a .WAV (standard computer audio file) of the voice mail message is attached. The email’s subject line ...

When choosing a phone system, small business owners have traditionally had to settle for less when it comes to features and capabilities.  Things like ACD (Automatic Call Distribution, or “holding for the next available agent), PRI (digital dialtone) support, Service Observe (ability to monitor staff calls for quality assurance or training), and more have been out of reach of many small businesses, because manufacturers tend to develop these types of capabilities for larger (and more costly) systems.  This is true ...

Occasionally, you’ll see the word “convergence” come up in regards to phone systems.  But what does it mean?  In a word, flexibility.

Traditional, “old school” phone systems have always had two different types of ports: one type to support phone lines (dialtone), and another type to support the phones.  Since all phones used to be analog phones, this second port type would also handle fax machines, credit card machines, and cordless phones, all of which have analog interfaces.

Over time, phone system ...

In the open-source PBX world, one platform is king: Asterisk.  Asterisk is an open-source software PBX platform originally created by Mark Spencer of Digium. Because of the open-source nature of Asterisk, many companies have used the Asterisk code as a base for their product and modified the code to suit their needs. There are a host of products built on top of Asterisk, such as Fonality’s products PBXtra and Trixbox, IntuitiveVoice’s Evolution PBX, etc. This post applies to ...

Not too long ago, I posted about ESI’s line of Cordless Handsets.  They were flexible, easy to use, and had a ton of features.  Now, they’re even better.

Introducing the ESI Cordless Handset II.  Like its predecessor, it comes in a digital version, local IP (LAN) version, and remote IP version.  Like the original version, it’s no ordinary cordless phone like ...

Telco Ltd. recently wrapped up a couple of promotions that made some new (and existing) customers happy.  Buyers of new phone systems got free professionally-recorded on-hold recordings and free call accounting software, while customers upgrading from an ESI IVX 56s model to an ESI-50L or ESI-50 model got up to $250 off the upgrade price.

One of the benefits of buying a new ESI phone system between 1/1 and 2/16 included free entry into a drawing for $500 in additional products ...

Any new business, in the course of getting their new facility operational, must do a host of things to prepare to get themselves up and running.  One of these important things is to purchase a phone system, as this will be your primary means of communication with the world (if you’re like most businesses, anyway).  One of several choices that comes along with a new phone system is what type of dialtone you will order.  Choosing the right type of ...