8x8 VOIP issues

[Velvis]

I have a client with 8x8 voip. Recently they been having intermittent issues with phones not ringing and going straight to voice mail as well as not being able to transfer calls.

The network is FIOS going directly into a USG (Verizon router is not in place at all) and it has been working without issue for almost 2 years. These phone issues started about 2 weeks ago.

8x8 ran some tests and sent me a text file of the results and it looks to me like it passed everything.

The tech said to:
disable the ALG and to set the modem to Bridge Mode

Before I start messing with something that has worked for 2 years anyone have any suggestions?

 

[lan101]

I'm pretty much a beginner skill level on voip, but a few years ago I had a small office that was on I believe Intermedia. Similar type of issue. I basically got their tech support on the line and spectrum tech support (time warner at that time) on the phone at the same time. I put my cell on speaker and I said alright I want you guys to hash this out with the settings etc. and get this working. Took them about 10 minutes on the phones and everything worked great after that.

I was just the middle man that gathered the right resources together to get it done. Some of the easiest money I ever made lol.

As far as the tech side goes, Intermedia was telling spectrum tech what all the suggested settings should be and then he just changed what was said. I do remember bridge mode was one of them but don't recall much else.

 

[MichaelBits]

So nothing changed in their setup? No updates or devices being switched out?
Just one day it started having intermittent issues?
If that's the case, you may have to do some serious network troubleshooting to determine the cause. As in wireshark.

SIP ALG is generally good to have off. It's supposed to be helpful for voice traffic, but often times causes issues.

Again though, if nothing has changed, it leads me to think some network equipment could be beginning to die and affecting the VOIP service.

 

[Velvis]

So nothing changed in their setup? No updates or devices being switched out?
Just one day it started having intermittent issues?
If that's the case, you may have to do some serious network troubleshooting to determine the cause. As in wireshark.

SIP ALG is generally good to have off. It's supposed to be helpful for voice traffic, but often times causes issues.

Again though, if nothing has changed, it leads me to think some network equipment could be beginning to die and affecting the VOIP service.

No network equipment has changed and is only 1.5-2.0 years old. USG, Cloud Key, and Unifi Switch. I don't believe any of the Unifi equipment is set to auto update, so that hasn't changed.

 

[Markverhyden]

If there's no VZ modem then your running directly off the ONT. Last I checked there's nothing you can do on the ONT, that's VZ's turf.

First thing I'd do is make sure all of the UniFi stuff is updated to the latest. A lot has changed in that time frame. On ALG. I agree with @MichaelBits, it's the source of a lot of VoIP issues in many cases. Don't know for sure but I don't think it's enabled on UniFi by default.

 

[Velvis]

Is the SIP setting under CONNTRACK in the USG firewall the same as SIP ALG?

 

[VISA MC]

How does 8x8 service work?

We use 3CX and there are three ways we can configure our phones:

STUN - We usually use this for low number if phones in an office, each phone connects directly to the VM we setup for that client .

SBC - Session Border Controller, it's a lightweight helper program that runs on a computer on the LAN or a raspberry pi, essentially creating a tunnel to the VM that each phone connects to.

LAN - If we install the PBX software on a device on the LAN we use this option (also if we use a VPN tunnel to the VM)

I realize 8x8 doesn't give you access to the software side of the setup but the principles are the same and would help nail down the issue with Wireshark. I would start by logging into the phones and see if they have any built in packet capture utilities that will capture from the phone itself. Make a couple test calls while capturing packets and open the pcap file with Wireshark. They have an awesome VOIP SIP Flow filter that will show you all of the SIP commands coming from each machine.

Try to get one from 8x8 of the same test calls and compare the ports on each device. We had a similar issue it ended up being a SIP Registration timeout bug in the firmware after an update. It caused the PBX side to unregister the phone and the phone would not refresh because it thought it was still registered .

 

[Velvis]

So 8x8 had me revert to an older firmware as well and turn on the SIP ALG. Same problems exist. Now they want me to setup 8x8 subnets. But right at the top of the directions to do so it says its only necessary on a restricted network.

I feel like this is going to make no difference whatsoever. (once again)