What hardware and software setup is needed to configure a redundant/failover asterisk server so that the second server will "take over" when/if the first server is offline? I'm thinking all we need is a failover switch; if so, which one? If possible, we would like the failover to be seamless i.e., not drop any calls.
We currently have 1 server with two 4 port Digium cards. A single T1 line goes to the first port on the first card and the other ports go to channel banks.
This Question has been solved and asker verified All Experts Exchange premium technology solutions are available to subscription members.
Experts Exchange has been collecting answers to technology questions since 1996…3 million and counting! If you have a question, chances are we already have your answer.
If you can't find the exact answer you're looking for, ask our exclusive community of 50,000 experts. You’ll get a personalized answer from a trusted professional.
Thousands of free tech tips, tricks, how-to’s and tutorials are available in our peer reviewed articles section. See for yourself how smart our experts are, no login required.
Save solutions to your questions, answers you’ve discovered through searching plus helpful articles in your personal knowledgebase for easy future access.
Access the answers to your technology questions today.
30-day free trial. Register in 60 seconds.
Members of the expert community talk about why the experience at Experts Exchange is different than what you will find anywhere else.
Try it out and discover for yourself.
30-day free trial. Register in 60 seconds.
Join the community of experts here and help other tech pros by answering question in your area of expertise. You can earn FREE access to all Experts Exchange's premium features and resources.
You need to have 2 boxes with linux and same Asterisk conf, with same digium stuff on both.
You need to use Linux HA allowing a failover between 2 linuxes.
for switching your 2 telco access between your 2 x 2 digium cards (depending on the kind of interface),
You can either insert an A/B switch driven by one linux box, or having a telco interface allowing to pass thru on failure, and feeding the secondary Asterisk box.
grblades,
I owe you a BIG apology. One of my pet peeves is the requestor not responding to a post and here I am guilty of it myself.
I read the wiki page prior to my posting this question and that’s what we are shooting to accomplish. Unfortunately, we’re missing a link in the chain, “a little black box which has three T1 ports on it” that Andrew mentions.
I read the article in your first link when you posted your response but the link isn’t working right now so I can’t refresh my memory. If I remember correctly it was basically an overview of several approaches to redundancy but had little if any concrete examples (or links) of required hardware and its setup, just theory.
So, I guess my question boils down to who makes/sells a “little black box which has three T1 ports on it”? Which model would be best suited for my setup? My assumption is that one of the failover switches from this wiki page or some other similar switch would be required, but which one?
http://www.voip-info.org/t
Jenny,
We currently are using Linux hartbeat for failover on some of our other servers and will be doing the same here. The main issue is getting the T1 telco connection to failover to the digium card on the other server. Which of your 2 methods would you recommend (I'm thinking a "telco interface allowing to pass thru on failure") and do you have examples of hardware choices and software configurations?
I think http://www.dataprobe.com/s
Its still not cheap though at $1275
Isn't that switch used for failover of redundant T1 connections? We have 1 T1 connection and need to failover to another server if the there is a hardware or (asterisk) software failure on the primary server. We are planning on bringing in a backup T1 line where that switch could be used, but not right away.
Business Accounts
Answer for Membership
by: grbladesPosted on 2005-07-21 at 01:30:31ID: 14492086
There is very little that you can do. You can get switches whick go on the incoming PRI line and monitor for errors and switch to a different output if lots of alarms come up. That will enable you to switch to another asterisk box in the event of a failure. There is still an issue of how you get the phones in the office to connect to the other asterisk server when it becomes active.
http://www.marko.net/aster
http://www.voip-info.org/t