Customer Reviews

Cisco SPA3102 Voice Gateway with Router

5 star:		(23)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

The SPA3102 gives you both an FXS port (for a phone) and an FXO port (for a phone line), it's two devices in one box. Each device can operate independently or can be made to interact with the other. It's great for a start-up VoIP system where you want to have one phone and access to one phone line from the PSTN. Be aware that this is NOT a device that is made for plug and play. You have to know what you are doing. It is an extremely flexible device with MANY options. Which means it can be overwhelming to a beginner. A lot of the options can be left at default but you still need a basic (at least) understanding of networking, SIP and VoIP to get this working with a provider or VoIP PBX. If you know what you are doing, this unit can be up and running in 10 minutes, otherwise you'd better have a lot of patience.

This unit is the successor to the SPA3000, first released by Sipura, which was bought by Linksys, then Cisco. they added a few more features upgraded firmware AND a router. Most people will already have a router on their system and will probably just disable this feature and use the second Ethernet jack in bridge mode allowing a second device to be plugged in, saving a port on your router or switch.
All in all a great unit, but not made for the inexperienced, do some research if you aren't quite sure if this is for you, there is a lot of info on line

 

I just got the SPA3102 Gateway a couple of days ago. This device has a lot of options that allow you to fine-tune its performance, for example to operate behind a firewall and router, or to fine-tune to the available bandwidth on your Internet connection.

For some reason I didn't have the administration guide after I copied files from the "setup" disk. This did turn out to be an problem, because I was unable to connect using the default IP address described in the quick install guide. To begin with, it turned out that a D-Link router on my network had the same IP address for configuration. But I was still unable to connect after I removed all other devices on my network. Finally I downloaded the administration guide from the Linksys download page for the SPA3102 device, and its "Basic Administration and Configuration" instructions described how to get the IP address using a telephone attached to the device (****110#). The second page of the quick install guide, it turns out, has a table of the interactive dial commands that may prove useful if you're having trouble initially connecting through the Web browser. For instance, you can enable the Web utility. For good measure I did that (****7932#1#1). After I got the correct IP address I had no difficulty updating the firmware and using the Web configuration utility.

Another reviewer claimed that the firmware may only be updated with at least Windows Vista. I downloaded the firmware update and followed installation instructions to install the firmware using Windows XP. No problem.

The same reviewer also described lack of support from Linksys. Contrary--Linksys has a community forum in their product support area. That's where I found instructions to enable the Web utility (although for the particular question--which was exactly my problem--the respondent should've also described how to get the IP address). You can download the administration guide from the download area if you do not find it on the quick install disk.

The configuration details for IP telephony require a hobby-level skill and interest. I do not expect Linksys or any other device at this price to support unique configuration issues for every service provider. Your VOIP telephony provider should be able provide configuration support for hooking up to their service. (Mine, future-nine, has configuration sheets for different devices and they'll review screen-shots or property sheets of the administrative settings if you're having problems.) This is a configurable device aimed at the bring-your-own-device crowd. If you want a configurable device and/or have good configuration support from your telephony provider, then the Linksys Gateway adapters rate five stars for their combination of features at this price range (cheap). If you do not want to do VOIP configuration or it seems like a bear, ask if your VOIP telephony service provides preconfigured adapters for their service.

PS--I've been using two of these devices for a couple of years now with no problems--configured and forgot. One I configured here and sent overseas for zero-cost local dialing to an in-law's house in Central America. The device in my house is hooked to the house phone circuit (which I first disconnected from the Telco line--may have current even without service); it rings four house phones with no problem at all. My brother send one to in-laws in Nepal--they find dialing cheaper to India using his VOIP provider than service provided by the local telco.

SPA3102 is upgraded version of SPA3000 from Sipura. This device has all the cool features of SPA3000, and in addition it has a built-in router, which avoids SPA3102 not being behind any router. Secondly, it has larger memory(ROM), and enables two G.729 calls simultaneously.

All in all is truely a masterpiece.

I generally like this product, but there's one problem with it.

Likes: Lots of options, VOIP stuff (the most important stuff) works fine.

Dislikes: The PSTN functionality is very poor. If the unit has no power, it just passes the PSTN connection through, which is fine. Kind of a 'fallback' mode if there's an electrical outage. However, if its powered on, the PSTN audio has a distinct and annoying echo. You can mitigate it a little by tweaking the "Echo Cancellation" settings, but you won't get it to go away, and it was enough for me to decide just to ditch the PSTN line and go VOIP only.

 

Although VoIP is slowly moving more and more mainstream, a device as flexible and as configurable as the Linksys SPA3102 is not for anyone who either is not comfortable with programming the ATA with your VoIP provider's SIP settings or coming up with an approprate dial plan for your device that is compatible with your provider. With that as a caveat....

This device is PHENOMENAL! I love the potential for PSTN dialing (either by prefixing your calls with a code or by programming certain numbers--like 911--to go directly through the PSTN line). By manipulating the dial plan, you can also program certain key combos (*101 for example) to speed-dial certain numbers. You can program the SPA3102 to allow yourself to dial into your device via your VoIP line and then subsequently dial out the PSTN line (using a number of authentication methods including caller id, PIN, etc.). Likewise, you can set it up to allow yourself to dial into yoru device via your PSTN line and then subsequently dial out the VoIP line (one way to save on long distance?). It's robust, reliable and cheap (just $10-20 more than a PAP2T-NA). Just be prepared to do a lot of googling and "self tech-support"! In all seriousness, there is a wealth of information out there on the SPA3102. It is a popular device for VoIP users and is often the BYOD (bring your own device) of choice!

This is a very nice piece of equipment, that I actually bought two of.

I use the one for my second telephone line of [...] combining Gizmo5 and Google Voice for completely free incoming and outgoing local and long distance calls with basically all call features like Caller ID and Call Block.

I like how I can switch over to the PSTN line at any time, because some random toll-free numbers act horrible with my VoIP line, even though every other one usually works. I also love how I can force a different ring for PSTN calls, so that I'm not running over like, "I have a VoIP call maybe".

Though, the biggest complaint that I have is, that when you set SPA to PSTN and vice-verse Gain to 0 and 0, no echo, but then you can barely hear. I set it to -1 and I hear a slight tiny echo, but at least I can hear and the other person doesn't seem to hear the echo.

Now the reason I have the second one is both backup and portability, so that if I travel and there is Internet near by, I have an already ready to go phone line, that is 100% portable. Perfect if you ever get a hotel that has an Ethernet cable just sitting there for ya, don't even need to bring your own phone, if you didn't want, could probably just use the room's phone, just please remember to hook it back up afterward, or will cause headaches for the next guest, I would assume.

This product works great, and luckily I found detailed instructions on how to configure this thing to work with my Asterisk server. Currently use it to make a Google Voice phone call with a traditional phone.

I purchased this product 2 month back. It works great. The great feature of this product is you can have one VSP incoming and upto 4 different outgoing VSP. My bill does not go above $5-$7 a month even though I make a decent number of calls every month and no service charges, taxes, etc.

The Linksys/Cisco SPA3102 is an extremely versatile analog telephone adapter that provides you with not only access to a voip provider for incoming and outgoing calls but also access to up to four additional voip providers for outgoing only calls.

In addition you can attach a landline pstn line to make and receive calls from the pstn line or bridge calls to/from voip to pstn.

With such flexibility, the adapter is somewhat complex to configure but the learning curve is worth the effort.

I am using this ATA to hook asterisk up to the PSTN and to my analog wireless telephone.

Pros: Works great, very configurable, and quite a capable device. Sound quality on the FXO and the FXS ports is excellent (I did turn the gain up on the FXS 3db to get adequate volume). Echo is not an issue at all.

Cons: It could be a bit quicker on the hangup detection.

Overall: This product is incredible, especially for the price.