7940/7960 phones with non-Cisco equipment

Does Cisco make a HCL document for compatiblity on their phones (PoE)? I'm looking at the Dell PowerConnect line with PoE and really like the bang for the buck factor, but wasn't sure if I actually 'needed' a Cat

35xx. Anyone tried using them or the non-PoE versions with the phones? Thoughts? Suggestions?
Reply to
fred.branham
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Well, first, you can use their power cube to power the phones from standard wall outlets. I do this in a couple remote locations where buying a POE switch doesn't make sense. You can use a basic 2950 for this purpose. However, note that the auto qos feature is nice if you are going to run VoIP. There you would need (I believe) at least the enhanced image in the

2950's.

That said, I believe that if the POE switch is 802.11af compliant, then the phones would probably work with it. I've exerienced some POE devices that didn't work with the Cisco switches, but they were pre-standard.

Hope that helps,

Jim

Reply to
Scooby

The advantages of going with a Cisco switch is QoS.

If you use a non-Cisco switch, the phone cannot determine the voice VLAN and the data VLAN automatically with CDP.

The solution it to make the port a trunk port, and manually tell the phone which VLAN is which in Network Configuration on the phone (especially if you are going to plug a PC into the back of the thing.

You will need to do the QoS manually on the switch.

Jonathan

Reply to
Jonathan

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