[SOLVED] Will Asterisk work without external SIP provider?

[chenier]

I am looking to setup an internal only phone system for an Organization in Central America.

Can I setup the Asterisk module to work without an external SIP provider?

If so, any suggestions on the settings that would work?

[jsalamero]

The external provided is used to make low cost calls through the Internet, everything else will work without it.

[chenier]

Thanks, I did get it working last night.  For the benefit of other newbies, here are the steps I took and a bit about my config:

Setup
eBox 1.49 on Ubuntu server 8.04 32bit -- test server installed bare metal on a HP ProLiant DL385 with dual NIC, dual processor and 8 gig RAM
Setup as a Gateway using transparent proxy.  I am working on getting phones and file sharing working as well as possible other functionality.  I am curious how much this server can handle 

Things I did to make softphones work
1. apt-get update & apt-get upgrade
2. Installed a different soft phone on my LinuxMint LXDE test machines (first tried QuteCom, then Ekiga).  I don't think this was the problem as they both work now, though I have not ruled out with a fresh install (possible packages missing in the QuteCom?)
3. Drop the ".com" for the SIP domain setup in QuteCom... cannot connect when included
     My Domain is "HondurasTest.com" so I needed to put in "HondurasTest"
     When I disconnect then modify the account, It puts the ".com" back on,and I need to remove it again.
4. Properly setup DNS with a Dynamic DNS setup as well Under the DHCP server settings.
5. For my Windows 7 VPN client to connect to Asterisk, I needed to add the setting to direct it to the server IP address: In X-lite set Domain Proxy to "Register with the domain and receive incoming calls" also add proxy server IP address (eBox LAN IP address).  My win7 laptop is on the WAN side of my ebox.

There is a little more sound lag than I expected, but it may well be due to my using slow computers with the softphones.  I will soon have some Polycom phones on order to test out.

[Svein Wisnaes]

Chenier,

Thank you very much for this description! I am going to try something like this at home :-) Did you connect the system to the regular phone system in any way? I am thinking about taking our single analog line and connect it somehow to the server.

Could you please add [SOLVED] to the beginning of the subject of your first post in this thread? This makes it easier for people searching for solutions.

[chenier]

I have not yet connected to a POTS, and and the immediate application I am testing doesn't need me to.  I do plan on buying an ATA and connecting a few old phones to eBox... but internal network not external line. 

Any suggestions for ATA device? I am looking at the Cisco PAP2T, but have conflicting reports whether this works well with generic asterisk....

Correction to my above list of what I needed to do to get Asterisk working:
I did not need to setup Dynamic DNS.... disabled it to test and softphones still connect and work.