Does anyone have anything to say about Asterisk for the good or the bad? I am about to lose an existing client to a data guy...

There's been a great deal of discussion about this product. You might do best to use this site's search function on the upper-right corner of this page.

I would also have the Data guy prove how many voice systems he has installed and a customer list.

Somewhere in between what the phone guys think of IP telephony and what the data guys think of IP telephony is probably where it's going to end up in the next few years. Like it or not the IP systems are going to stay around. It would probably be a good idea to get a bit familiar with them and find one that works. I've been selling the IP Office for a few years and have been happy with it.

We have also been using Asterisk internally for about the same length and have been able to do some impressive things with it.

You definitely need to know your stuff, but all in all I would say it’s good and is only getting better. Unfortunately, this site does show its biases in regards to these types of products. If you really want to learn more about it I would recommend looking at the support links at digium.com, or PM ironhelix who, IMO, is most versed on the system at this forum and the aforementioned.

If your customer has no telecom knowledge and thinks that his IT background is all he needs to get it rolling, he will be in a deep surprise.

I would say it's OK. Great to play with as I have 2 running at the house and office. Not great. Just OK. Also agree you'd better have telecom knowledge and not an IT cert from Ebay.
This site does show alot of bias as we have seen more hangar queens than success stories. I installed a VoIP link between two sites yesterday using TDM Hybrid switches and VoIP transport between the two sites and it took about 20 minutes to get both sites going. The previous vendor had spent 4 days trying to get their crap in a box server solution to work and never did. I like VoIP between sites and telecommuters but still not sold on to the desktop yet. But I make money taking them out or putting them in.

I've built a few * Boxes. They are great to tinker with, but that's about it.

I appreciate all of the info. The quote was based on 60 phones which seems like a lot more then any of you guys are trying to support on your in house play systems.

For the record I was also quoting a VoIP system, becasue that's what they think they want. But the guy quoting the asterisk is 1/3 less. That's a scary difference in either quality of parts of quality of labor. I have the feeling I will be taking it out in a month or two.

Well, the biggest difference is that Asterisk is using cheap a$$ SIP phones..and the customer is in for a rude awakening. It's also open source..thus VERY cheap. If they can handle using slow, chesp sip phones (glorified analog phone) then they should be ok. Sorry, but SIP phones don't compete with digital phones or mgcp.

We have done 1 *
Currently running 2 sites, about 90 phones site A,
30 site B, Laser connection between sites.
Most phone are Grandstream basic.
2 PRI cards.
Server is robust with high quality components,
RAID, etc. I think our cost on server was 4k.
This was an existing customer that demanded * and was already pretty fair at setup (from using home version). We used the Business version of the SW that you purchase.
Still a lot of work to set up and add phones to.
They have quite a few users who have set up SIP trunks for thier ext.
I am looking at Trixbox now. Have a friend with IT company is now deploying Hosted system using Trixbox, they are installing first 6 user deal in Houston next week. I will be watching closely.

I'm still playing around with it but I have been impressed by Asterisks performance in a couple call centers near me. I think its a great add-on package to any TDM system that dosen't offer IP

Asterix is great if you really know the product you can almost make it do anything. Downside is that you are heavily dependant on whoever sets the box up, if they should leave or move on you now have a ticking timebomb with a lot of custom code.
As with all systems you need to know where you will stand with tech support from the manufacturer.

There's a few article on * in the newest Linux Journal. In case anyone wants to look into some idea's on the system

We have installed about 10 production servers.
I recommend Sangoma cards over Digium any day.

I always recommend custom white-box servers, Sangoma PSTN cards, Polycom SoundPoint IP Phones, and Netgear or HP ProCurve switches. This is the best product mix that i've come across.