Leon,
I will start by saying I am not a sales spoken person for Sysmaster, I only happen to have researched, like you right advised, quite a few products out there and have come to the conclusion that products from the Sysmaster range offer excellent value for money, given the functionality they offer compared to the competition. As someone who has had the very painful experience of using some of the products repeatedly mentioned and recommended in this forum and painfully seen their limitations, I am glad to say, I am putting my money where my mouth is and purchasing their units from them, so I am customer and not an employee of or indeed a reseller for Sysmaster.
I am not sure what your experience of the VOIP market is, but I would be interested in you comparing like for like, the Sysmaster GW, for instance, with a comparable one from Cisco or Quintum i.e. comparing functionality and price, and you reporting back on this forum your findings. A good one to look out for would be any in the Cisco A53xx or A58xx or the Quintum CMS or D3000.
I think its not practical for you to suggest, that people try different products in the market before making a decision on which to use, I am sure in so doing one would never get business off the ground. Yes…I completely agree with you that you need to clear about your VOIP network requirements before you make a purchase, you can’t expect to buy a Mini and expect the performance of a Ferrari…hence my comments, you get what you pay for.