This was taken recently at a local Books A Million. I first heard of them when I traveled to D.C. in 2002. They took over the space once held by Borders since they went bankrupt around 2009, specifically I am not sure because I do not frequent Concord.
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POTD: Avaya 6408D+ Digital “Telephone” | Attitash Grand Summit Resort | Bartlett, NH
I spotted this 6408D+ DCP telset at my last visit to the Attitash Grand Summit Resort in late October. This hotel off US302 is used mostly for conferences and skiers who want a vacation. This set was replaced in between a Labor Day week visit and the visit in late October. This area is a space for tourist information to help a customer find a place of interest. Previously (and years before) had a generic “trimline” like set. As previously posted, it appeared there was an upgrade of refurbished sets.
What would be nice given the decline of digital office telephony, that maybe digital sets could be seen in more locations in the facility or even in the rooms, despite Avaya and their BPs jacking up the maintenance costs of digital telephones in lieu of going to VOIP for no reason.
The 6400 series sets have been known unofficially to have a “European” look (but never claimed by Lucent or Avaya directly.) While Lucent introduced the line in the late 1990s, mass deployments occurred under Avaya tenure (spun-off late 2000.) The 6400 sets probably had a large friend count with the other models in the line. What do I mean? 6400 sets were often found in new deployments where a Definity or later MultiVantage systems would be setup. Because the 6400s were made around that time, other models like the 8400 was ether refurbished or not aggressively sold. It was not to say they couldn’t go in existing plants; just you’ll see them more obviously in new deployments after 2001.
These sets also introduced a mandatory two-wired setup (albeit with an RJ 45 jack) where a single pair of tip and ring would run on pins 4 & 5. Aux power would need two pairs with said T&R wire and another pair on pins 7 & 8 on an RJ 45 plug.
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POTD: New Hobby Lobby
This newer version of the NEC Electra Key Telephone was found at a local Hobby Lobby that had recently opened. Hobby Lobby is basically the K-Mart of arts and crafts stores. Their footprint is probably quadrupled compared to an AC Moore or Michaels. Coincidentally the stores that Hobby Lobby filled in my area were former KMart stores. Other stores in the area use this system.
Phone of the Day: Nearby Kohls | Undisclosed location
This was taken at a local Kohls, just a little north of where I live. This is located in massively redeveloped area of box stores when it was just all trees. I can’t remember when it was built, I’m going to bet before the 2009 bankruptcy of Nortel. (Remember a similar post of noticing Mitel sets of their alleged “Do we stand by our man?” post bankruptcy mentality across any former Nortel sites.) Newer stores went with the “screw them” approach of building new stores with Mitel and older stores still run Avaya Blue.
POTD: Avaya Red 8410 DCP Telset Attitash Grand Summit Resort | Bartlett, NH
This was taken at the front desk at the Attitash Grand Resort Conference Center in Bartlett, NH. This area in the building is where you can only spot the digital sets. The nearby bar, conference rooms and rooms use analog sets. There is no evidence of any attendant consoles ether.
I’ve frequented this facility during the spring time over the last four years for an annual conference. I no longer attend, and I like the place, so I went for the vacation this week. The people I used to see at the front desk were not working (or is no longer working there) to see if I could see the switch room.
POTD: Western Electric Crank Telephone | Cannon Mountain Tram Station | Franconia, NH
This is another crank telephone I spotted at Cannon Mountain. There is at least three of these and after Monday, I might had spotted and have at least a capture of them all from my visits over the last couple of years.
As you can tell in this second picture, there is a Shure like gooseneck mic, I wonder if phone is really a wiring box for intercom as my state government is known to be very frugal.
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POTD: Zeb’s General Store | North Conway, NH
I do not believe this set works.
POTD – Local Kohls
In today’s Phone Of the Day I recently took this picture of a Mitel IP 5212 set (if memory serves me) at the Bedford NH store. This Kohls has a few IP telsets and boatloads of analog sets all across the sales floor. There are no sets near the fitting rooms. This store was built within the last five years around the time where perhaps Kohls was in a position of like a dysfunctional marriage: Do I stand with my man? (i.e. sticking to Avaya.) Don’t forget in early 2010s there was a bunch of doubt whether if Avaya would continue in supporting an overrated brand of telephony equipment. There is probably many reasons why in newer stores (of which popped up in my area, as their stores came to my area around 2002 – of which the Norstar 7200s are still in use in those locations) and other reasons such as higher maintenance contracts if you go through Avaya directly and the change of the user interface. Continue reading
POTD: Whole Foods Market Bedford, New Hampshire
In recent weeks, the world’s newest Whole Foods Market opened in Bedford, NH. Built on top of the legendary Wayfarer Inn (known more during the Primary Election years), it’s also within hundreds of feet of the now torn down Macy’s.
As proof from Joe the UCX Guy from Chicago, many Whole Foods stores are Cisco shops. Interestingly, the WFM in Nashua, just miles on the Everett Turnpike, is wired for TDM telephony using Toshiba’s Strata system (opened in 2014 to replace a former Market Basket.) Building was totally gutted and rebuilt mostly from the ground up.
The store in Bedford is mixed with 7942s and the 6902s at the cashier’s lane. Paging works, as teenage girls don’t know how to lower their octaves and learn how to page professionally.
The 7900s are still in the market, despite the more cheaper quality sets being deployed more and more. The 7900s are in a depreciation mode. Current generations are all multi lines, Java based and/or colored displays and I was surprised to see a 7942 because I believe its End of Sale.
I snapped two pictures, one showing how much characters you can use to describe your telephone extension. If the characters can’t fit on the top black colored indication bar, it will break the description up in two screens
Personally, these devices are just “endpoints” – they are PCs acting as telephones. Sure Mitel, and Avaya and others sell the same thing (and acts the same way), but for sales people or the accountants, its just another device attached to the Internet and it shouldn’t be treated special like a office telephone. These phones are not easy to manage outside of expensive Cisco solutions or if you like to code and reverse engineer – be my guest! I feel like the 7900s were always a 2554 with Internet connectivity and a great audio quality of its SCCP signaling.
Other than that, Cisco just keeps on winning on selling “free” gear and report them as “profits” by smooching up to the CIOs and heads of IT departments at the Fortune 500 companies. You think I am kidding???
POTD: Avaya 8403 – 34th Street Macy’s, NYC
I thought this was an 8410. Till I zoomed in. I did see 8410s (ether D or B as in Blank) throughout the 34th Street Macy’s.
