Nortel Norstar MiCS Phone System

The Nortel Norstar MICS phone system  or Modular Integrated Communications System was created to be a phone system for customers looking for a reliable, feature-rich business phone system that would be expandable. The MICS supports up to 24 incoming lines and up to 274 extensions. Though now a discontinued system and now owned by Avaya, the Nortel Norstar line of products was world renowned for delivering what was promised.

The Norstar MICS was produced by Nortel, which at the time was one of the world’s leading telecommunications manufacturers. Millions of phone lines were installed by Nortel all over the world, a company which was known for producing well built and reliable products. The ICS line of business phone systems have a tested mean time between failure (MTBF) rate of approximately 100 years, nearly unheard of in the industry.

When it was produced, the Nortel Norstar Modular Integrated Communications Systems was designed to accommodate a businesses requirements as well as new technological developments. Some of the ways they accomplished this were through:

• High bandwidth to the desktop;
• VoIP Telephony-ready;
• Modular, scalable design;
• Digital technology.

Though most of those ideas are now readily available by a number of manufacturers, including Avaya, ShoreTel, and Grandstream, at the time they were revolutionary.

Norstar or Nortel MiCS Phone System

Norstar MICS Accessories:

The Norstar MICS is the hub of your phone system. Its strength is its ability to connect a variety of equipment and integrate all of the various functions each provides.

Note – some supported features such as Caller ID require you to purchase the service from your local telecom company.

Norstar Business Phones

A companies perception of a phone system is mainly based on how much you like your telephones. The Norstar MICS offered four user-friendly desktop phones, one mobile phone, a conference unit and a doorphone.

The “T” series Norstar desktop business phones come in charcoal and platinum color options. The conference phone and the Companion mobile phone are available only in charcoal. Alternatively, the system was also capable of supporting the old “m” series of phones and certain Meridian sets.

Voicemail and Unified Messaging

Callpilot 100 and 150 were common voice mail systems on the Nortel Norstar MiCS

The Nortel Norstar MiCS phone system was able to utilize the full range of Nortel voice mail products that were offered at thetime, including Call Pilot, Flash, and Startalk. Probably the most common was the Callpilot 100 and Callpilot 150. Borh tof these systems were robust voice mail platforms which offered a range of features at a competitive cost. However, being flash based, they were also the weak point in the design of the system as flash technology was new and not as stable as what is available now.

Norstar VoIP Gateway

Nortel Norstar VoIP Gateway

Interestingly the Norstar Nortel line offered an introductory VoIP enabling product called the Norstar VoIP Gateway. This device allowed businesses to use their existing company LAN or WAN to transport voice and fax traffic among locations. While available, the product was not a great success and Nortel customers generally did not take advantage of this equipment.

Call Center Solutions

Unlike the VoIP Gateway, Norstar Automatic Call Distribution systems were adopted in many businesses and were very common in implementations. This product used digital technology to provide full integration of Norstar telephone sets and reduce the number of ports required, as previous systems required analog or digital ports to operate. Supporting from 2 to 120 lines, and 2 to 80 agents, Norstar Automatic Call Distribution provided call center solutions for small and medium sized businesses.

Norstar Call Center software was available as an add-on to the CallPilot 100 but was included in the CallPilot 150 (Key-code activation required).

CSM & Nortel Norstar MiCS

Even though the product is now long discontinued, CSM still maintains many customers who continue to utilize their Nortel Norstar MiCS phone systems. Customers who are looking to replace their system should take solace in that Avaya allows them to reuse their old Nortel phones on the Avaya IP Office phone system. Customers of ours in Tampa, Austin, Naples, Sarasota, San Marcos and San Antonio, indeed all over Florida and Texas, constantly call upon CSM to service Nortel Norstar systems, something which we are happy to provide. Contact CSM today to learn about our competitive rates, helpful staff, and knowledge on Nortel Norstar products.

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