Cloud-hosted or on-site — Megabyte IT designs and manages VoIP phone systems that keep Acadiana businesses connected. No dropped calls, no vendor runaround, and local support when you need it.
There’s no single right answer when it comes to business phone systems. We assess your headcount, infrastructure, budget, and growth plans — then recommend the deployment model that genuinely fits.
Your phone system lives in a secure data center — no on-site PBX hardware to manage or maintain. Calls route over your internet connection, and features like auto-attendants, voicemail-to-email, and mobile softphones are included out of the box. Perfect for businesses that want enterprise features without the enterprise headache.
A physical IP-PBX server installed at your facility gives you complete ownership and control over your phone infrastructure. All call routing stays local — so even during internet outages, internal calls keep working. The right choice for businesses with specific compliance requirements, high call volumes, or a preference for a one-time capital investment over monthly subscriptions.
Not sure which fits your business? Here’s an honest comparison. We’ll walk you through the tradeoffs during a free assessment.
| Factor | ☁ Hosted VoIP | 🖥 On-Premises PBX |
|---|---|---|
| Upfront Cost | Low — hardware only | Higher — server + install |
| Monthly Cost | Per-user subscription | SIP trunks + maintenance only |
| Scalability | ✓ Add users instantly | ◎ Hardware capacity limits |
| Internet Outage Resilience | ✗ Requires internet | ✓ Internal calls still work |
| Maintenance Responsibility | ✓ Provider-managed | Megabyte IT managed |
| Remote / Mobile Users | ✓ Native softphone app | ◎ VPN or SIP required |
| Customization & Control | ◎ Platform limits apply | ✓ Full configuration access |
| Compliance (HIPAA, etc.) | ◎ Depends on provider BAA | ✓ Fully controlled environment |
| Hardware Required On-Site | IP phones only | PBX server + IP phones |
| Long-Term TCO | Higher over 5–7 years | ✓ Lower long-term |
With hosted VoIP, your phone system runs in a secure cloud data center managed by the provider — you pay a monthly per-user fee and there's minimal hardware on-site beyond the phones themselves. Updates, redundancy, and maintenance are handled for you.
On-premises means a physical PBX server installed at your office. You own the hardware outright, internal calls keep working even if your internet goes down, and your monthly costs are lower long-term — but there's a higher upfront investment and Megabyte IT manages the system on your behalf.
A single HD voice call uses roughly 100 Kbps upload and download. As a rule of thumb, plan for about 1 Mbps per 5 concurrent calls. Most business internet connections in Lafayette handle VoIP fine — but we'll assess your bandwidth and QoS settings during the discovery phase to make sure voice traffic is prioritized over general internet use.
It depends on what you have. Most modern IP phones from brands like Grandstream, Yealink, Poly, or Cisco can be reprogrammed for a new VoIP system. Older analog phones can often be reused with an ATA (Analog Telephone Adapter). We'll inventory your existing handsets during the assessment and tell you upfront what can be reused and what would benefit from an upgrade.
Yes. Number porting lets you bring your existing business phone and fax numbers to your new VoIP system. We manage the entire porting process with your current carrier — it typically takes 7–14 business days and your numbers remain active throughout the transition with zero downtime.
With hosted VoIP, an internet outage will interrupt external calls — but we can set up failover routing to forward calls to a cell number or backup line automatically. With an on-premises PBX, internal calls between extensions keep working even without internet. For mission-critical operations, we can also recommend a 4G/LTE failover router that keeps your connection alive during outages.
Yes — this is one of the most popular features of hosted VoIP. A softphone app on iPhone or Android lets your team make and receive calls using their business extension and your main company number. Clients see your business caller ID, not a personal cell. Calls can ring the desk phone and the mobile app simultaneously, so nothing gets missed when someone steps away from their desk.
10DLC (10-Digit Long Code) is the FCC-mandated registration system for business SMS sent over standard local phone numbers. Since 2023, carriers like AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile require all businesses to register their brand and messaging campaigns with The Campaign Registry (TCR) before sending texts — unregistered messages get filtered as spam or blocked entirely.
Yes, you need it. We handle the full registration process as part of enabling SMS on your business number — it takes a few days to process and you're covered going forward.
HIPAA-compliant eFax is available and something we specifically recommend for medical offices, dental practices, and any healthcare-adjacent business. This requires selecting a provider willing to sign a Business Associate Agreement (BAA) and ensuring fax transmissions are encrypted in transit and at rest. We'll walk you through the right configuration and documentation for your compliance requirements.
For a small business (under 10 users), a hosted VoIP system can typically be up and running within a week of signing — often faster if you're using new phones. On-premises deployments run 2–4 weeks depending on server configuration and cabling needs. Number porting adds 7–14 business days on top of that, but we stage everything so your old system stays live until the cutover is ready.
It means you call us — not a carrier's 1-800 support line. Megabyte IT acts as your single point of contact for anything related to your phone system: adding or removing extensions, troubleshooting call quality, adjusting auto-attendant greetings, updating routing rules, managing firmware updates, and coordinating with carriers when something upstream breaks. You run your business; we handle the phones.
