MaxCS has been designed as an open architected system, built on industry standard Intel™ servers, Microsoft infrastructure solutions, and SIP™ compliant phones. Instead of requiring expensive proprietary hardware, as is the case with most VoIP systems, MaxCS leverages today’s advanced IT infrastructure technologies to deliver a truly unified, scalable, and manageable voice communications solution.
MaxCS has been optimized to harness the power of standard Intel processors, running on standard rack mount servers or virtualized on blade servers under VMware™. The MaxCS software architecture provides scalability, manageability and reliability – all without requiring proprietary hardware.
MaxCS Architectural Overview
The MaxCS redundant softswitch architecture offers a more flexible solution with superior scalability, reliability and manageability by separating the call control responsibilities, media transcoding, PSTN interfaces and applications into separate, integrated subsystems which can be run on a single Intel-based server or virtualized under VMware™
The MaxCS softswitch is responsible for placing and receiving all calls, including call set up and tear down, while managing all signaling and messaging between the phones and the PSTN trunks. MaxCS also stores and manages all user, extension and configuration data, with direct link to Active Directory.
The MaxCS Media Server handles the transcoding of various types of digital media streams to create an end-to-end path for the media (voice and data) in the call. It also provides the interfaces for MaxCS softswitch to connect to the telco network with support for T1, E1, PRI, SIP and analog FX0/FXS circuits.
Scalability is achieved by connecting multiple Media Servers to the softswitch, with built in redundancy enabling calls to stay connected in the event of a softswitch outage.
Benefits of the MaxCS Software Architecture:
Most "modern" digital PBX systems were built on technologies introduced in the 1980’s. Most VoIP systems, introduced in the late 90’s, are still based on this outdated model. With the advances in computing technology and open SIP standards, software-based systems are the next generation of communications. Discover how your organization will benefit from a software communications solution with MaxCS:
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1. Eliminates Proprietary Hardware +
The MaxCS Media Server is responsible for the transcoding of various types of digital media streams to create an end-to-end path for the media (voice and data) in the call. It has the necessary interfaces to connect the MaxCS softswitch to the telco network including support for T1, E1, PRI, SIP and analog FX0/FXS circuits. The softswitch instructs the media gateway to connect media streams between these interfaces to connect VoIP phones - all transparently to callers. By moving the media transcoding and PSTN connectivity to external media gateways, the level of redundancy is enhanced by allowing calls to stay connected in the event of a softswitch outage.
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2. Improved System Scalability +
The MaxCS software architecture takes advantage of Intel’s powerful rack mount and blade servers to deliver a highly scalable solution, utilizing standard Intel processors to handle all of the voice transcoding. Supporting 2000 voice resources (Codecs) on a single server, MaxCS scales to thousands of users in a single location. Additional Media Servers can be added to increase scalability by distributing the call processing. This distributed architecture also enables centralized administration – providing a single unified system appearance with complete feature transparency.
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3. Enhanced Redundancy +
MaxCS server redundancy enables two identical systems to be installed, one as the primary and the other as the hot standby. The standby system continuously monitors the health of the primary system and, upon detecting any failures, automatically switches the standby system into service. The MaxCS databases are constantly synchronized so all configurations, securities, feature licenses, and call logs remain identical.
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4. Virtualization with VMware +
To ensure the highest level of availability, the MaxCS softswitch fully supports virtualization, running under VMware. Added benefits of virtualization include increased scalability and simplified system management. Virtualization also facilitates disaster recovery by eliminating failure die to hardware issues, while reducing the cost and unpredictability associated with traditional disaster recovery solutions. Virtualization further reduces the need for planned downtime, allowing IT to perform maintenance on physical servers anytime, without user or service disruption.
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5. Remote Survivability +
Most VoIP systems default to basic telephony functionality in the event of a WAN outage. The MaxCS distributed architecture provides complete PBX functionality on all MaxCS servers, allowing remote offices to continue to fully operate in the event of a WAN failure. Calls are automatically routed to the PSTN network, with no loss of functionality. In the event of a local gateway failure, AltiGen’s VoIP phones will automatically connect to another available MaxCS system on the network, to ensure maximum uptime.