How to setup a Polycom Phone

This article explains how to create an extension in Evolution as well as how to point your Polycom phone at the provisioning server.

In order to configure your Polycom phone to work on your Evolution PBX you will need to:

Create an extension associated with the MAC address and appropriate model of the Polycom phone in the Evolution interface
Tell the Phone how to find the server to download and process its configuration

Jump to:
SoundPoint IP Series Phone Setup
VVX Series Phone Setup

Creating the Extension

The first thing you will need to do is create the extension itself, ensuring you have selected the proper type and model of phone as well as entered the appropriate MAC address for the device. To do this you will need to log into the Evolution GUI and click on 'Phone Extensions' under the Resources tab as seen here:

After the 'Phone Extensions' tab displays, you will need to click on 'Add Extension' near the top center right of the page, ensuring you select the appropriate model of Polycom phone you are adding:

After choosing the correct model you will be prompted with a window that looks like this:

The settings for creating an extension are as follows:

Setting	Description
Extension	The extension number of the phone you are adding to the PBX
Phone Type	Selected in the previous step; the model of the Polycom phone you are adding, in this case a Polycom VVX300 Series Device
MAC Address	The MAC address of the phone
Remote Phone	For a phone that resides on the same network as Evolution choose 'No', for a remote phone choose 'Yes-Primary' if the phone is a stand alone device, if the phone is not a stand alone device, choose 'Yes-Backup' or 'Yes-Both'
Parent Extension	Use Master if this is a parent extensions, alternatively you can choose the extension the phone will be a slave under
Mailbox	Select 'Personal' to create a personal mailbox, 'None' for no mailbox, or, if present on the PBX, general voicemail boxes will also be available as an option
Caller ID Name	The PSTN Caller ID Name of the extension
Caller ID Number	The PSTN Caller ID Number of the extension
Profile	Choose the appropriate profile to associate with the phone
Button Map	Select default for standard buttons

After the subjective information has been input into the appropriate fields, be sure to click on save to create the extension.

At this point the extension has been created in Evolution and the phone needs to be told how to find its configuration on the server. To do that we will need to connect the phone to the network and ensure it has power.

Configuring the Phone

SoundPoint IP series:

When a Polycom SoundPoint IP Model phone boots it immediately starts a 10 second countdown before it attempts to reach out to the provisioning server to download its configuration.

During the countdown you are prompted with a few soft keys on the bottom of the LCD: 'Setup', 'Start' and 'About'.

Selecting 'Start' will force the phone to abandon the countdown and immediately start trying to download its configuration
Holding down the 'About' button will display information about the phone, such as the IP Address, the VLAN ID, MAC Address, and current firmware version
Selecting 'Setup' will allow you to configure the server type as well as the server address and additional network parameters for the environment the phone resides in

Click on the 'Setup' button, when you do you will be prompted for a password. Enter 456 and select 'Ok'

After selecting 'Ok' you will be prompted with another menu that includes the ability to enable/disable DHCP or change the phone to a Static IP address, as well as a 'Server Menu', 'SNTP' Address', 'GMT Offset', DNS configuration, an 'Ethernet Menu', and a 'Syslog Menu'.

In order to provision the phone, you will need to modify the server type and the server address, specifying valid values so the phone can find its configuration on your Evolution PBX.

To do that, using the arrow keypad on the phone, highlight 'Server Menu' and click the 'Select' soft button.

The first field in this menu is labelled as 'Server Type' and will be highlighted when the menu first displays. To edit this field, click the 'Edit' button on the bottom of the LCD and use the left or right arrows to choose a value. Available values are: Trivial FTP (otherwise known as TFTP), HTTP, HTTP(s), FTP(s), and FTP

For a phone that is on the same LAN as Evolution (local to the PBX), select TFTP or FTP. For a remote phone, or a phone over a more complex network (I.E. a VPN, or MPLS) select FTP.

Once you have defined the Server Type, select the 'Ok' button near the bottom right of the LCD.

After specifying the server type for the download, you will need to tell the phone where the server is.

Using the arrow pad to navigate, highlight the 'Server Address' field and select 'Edit'. Alternatively, you can use the check-mark in the center of the arrow pad to enable editing of this field.

The server address can be put in as a Fully Qualified Domain Name or the IP Address of the server. After selecting the 'Edit' key, a third soft key appears to the left of 'Ok'. This key, labeled as 'a ->1A' or '1/A/a' (depending upon the phone model; more on this below) allows you to change the input type for the value you are inputting into the field.

For SoundPoint IP 60X, 50X, 430 and 30X phones:

The default value for input is lower case letters, denoted by the lower case 'a': a->1A
To change the input to Numbers, select the 'a->1A' key until the '1' is on the left of the arrow: 1->Aa
If you need to enter Capital Letters, push the 'a->1A' key until the capital 'A' appears to the left of the arrow: A->a1
If you are populating the field with alpha values, the inputs are based on the T9 method. There are 3 or 4 characters per phone button; for example button 2 pressed once is an 'a', pressed twice is 'b' and pressed a third time is 'c'
To input a period, use the * key.
To remove a character, use the X button below the arrow pad
Special characters ( / or ~ for example) can be input by selecting the 'A' input and using the '#' button on the numeric keypad to cycle through the available characters.

For SoundPoint IP 6X0, 5X0, 450 and 33X phones:

The default value for input is lower case letters, denoted by the lower case 'a' at the top of the screen: a/Ascii
To change the input to Numbers, select the '1/A/a' key until '1' is left of Ascii on the top of the LCD: 1/Ascii
If you need to enter Capital Letters, push the '1/A/a' key until the capital 'A' appears to the left of Ascii: A/Ascii
If you are populating the field with alpha values, the inputs are based on the T9 method. There are 3 or 4 characters per phone button; for example button 2 pressed once is an 'a', pressed twice is 'b' and pressed a third time is 'c'
To input a period, use the * key.
To remove a character, use the X button below the arrow pad
Special characters ( / or ~ for example) can be input by selecting the 'A' input and using the '#' button on the numeric keypad to cycle through the available characters.

After entering the server IP address or FQDN in the 'Server Address' field, be sure to save you changes by selecting the 'Ok' key.

At this point, the phone should have a valid server type as well as a valid server address in the appropriate fields. You will need to hit 'Exit' twice, until you are prompted to 'Save and Reboot' the phone.

After the phone reboots it will start the the countdown again, as we have already configured the appropriate fields, you can now select 'Start' to start the provisioning process.

VVX series Phones:

As the Polycom VVX series phone boots it enters a state where it displays a message that says 'Starting application, press cancel to interrupt'

Your only option is to select 'Cancel' to interrupt the phones booting process after which a Polycom Logo is displayed momentarily, followed by a countdown that provides a few soft keys options (Start, Setup, About).

Selecting 'Start' will force the phone to abandon the countdown and immediately start trying to download its configuration
Holding down the 'About' button will display information about the phone, such as the IP Address, the VLAN ID, MAC Address, and current firmware version
Selecting 'Setup' will allow you to configure the server type as well as the server address and additional network parameters for the environment the phone resides in

You will need to select 'Setup', after which you will be prompted for a as password. Enter 456 and select 'Ok'.

A new menu will display that starts with 'Provisioning Server'. 'Provisioning Server' should be highlighted by default, if not use the arrow pad to highlight it, and choose the 'Select' button.

You should now see a DHCP Menu as well as Server Type, Server Address, Server user, Server password, FIle Tx Tries, Retry Wait, etc.

Using the arrows to highlight your selection, scroll to Server type and select 'Edit'. Using the left and right arrows, choose the server type.

Available values are: Trivial FTP (otherwise known as TFTP), HTTP, HTTP(s), FTP(s), and FTP

For a phone that is on the same LAN as Evolution (local to the PBX), select TFTP or FTP. For a remote phone, or a phone over a more complex network (I.E. a VPN, or MPLS) select FTP.

Once you have defined the Server Type, select the 'Ok' button near the bottom right of the LCD.

Now you will need to configure the 'Server Address' to tell the phone where its configuration is. Using the arrow pad to navigate, highlight the 'Server Address' field and select 'Edit'. Alternatively, you can use the button in the center of the arrow pad to enable editing of this field.

The server address can be put in as a Fully Qualified Domain Name or the IP Address of the server. After selecting the 'Edit' key, a third soft key appears to the left of 'Ok'.

This key, labeled as 'a ->1A' allows you to change the input type for the value you are inputting into the field.

The default value for input is lower case letters, denoted by the lower case 'a': a->1A
To change the input to Numbers, select the 'a->1A' key until the '1' is on the left of the arrow: 1->Aa
If you need to enter Capital Letters, push the 'a->1A' key until the capital 'A' appears to the left of the arrow: A->a1
If you are populating the field with alpha values, the inputs are based on the T9 method. There are 3 or 4 characters per phone button; for example button 2 pressed once is an 'a', pressed twice is 'b' and pressed a third time is 'c'
To input a period, use the * key.
To remove a character, use the X button below the arrow pad
Special characters ( / or ~ for example) can be input by selecting the 'A' input and using the '#' button on the numeric keypad to cycle through the available characters.

After you have entered the Domain Name or the IP Address be sure to save your changes by selecting 'Ok'.

At this point, the phone should have a valid server type as well as a valid server address in the appropriate fields, select 'Exit' twice until the phone starts a count down again.

After the countdown has elapsed, or you hit 'Start', the phone will return to the 'Starting application, press cancel to interrupt' screen. As it continues to boot you should see multiple status screens advising on the processing of the config, followed by the phone coming online.