Edgewater Networks EdgeMarc

Finally got my hands on a couple of Edgewater Networks EdgeMarc devices yesterday. I have to say, they really seem like the 'magic bullet' for almost any kind of Internet based VoIP solution.

Highlights:

• Build in Firewall
• VPN capabilities
• Traffic Shaper (by ToS, DSCP, IP Address)
  
• WAN Router with up to 4 T1's (MLPPP support)
  
• FXO / FXS Gateway
• 4 Port Network Switch
• 802.1Q VLan Support
• Call Quality Monitoring device
• Local NAT / DHCP
• Local TFTP and FTP Server
• Optional Site Survivability
• SIP NAT Traversal & Application Layer Gateway
  

The units I got were 4500 series for a particular project and don't have the FXO / FXS ports so I am unable to test that functionality with sipX. In this particular project I need to interconnect 3 sites that have traditional PBX's with proprietary VoIP trunk cards in them, prioritize that traffic over everything else and mesh VPN the sites. I plan on creating a separate VLan for the VoIP cards and plugging the VoIP card directly into one of the switch ports on the EdgeMarc, and prioritizing all of that IP address' traffic outbound.

The site survivability for SIP is an optional component that must be licensed. It monitors the availability of a PBX (via various methods including Ping) and if that connection is not present can re-route calls out a PSTN connection connected to the unit or to a gateway at that site.

The firewall pages could use a little 'dressing up' for creating rules and NAT translations. The GUI management is not as slick as a typical firewall device.

I'll planning on getting in a couple units for testing with some FX ports... when then 'crazy season' ends.

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