Hi. Could someone here give me a definitive answer to whether or not the Cisco 7960G has 802.3af POE support? I have read in a couple places that the 7960 only supported the proprietary cisco power standard, but that the “G” model did support the standard as well. In other places people say both the 7960 and the 7960G only support the proprietary format.
The cisco documentation online seems confusing on this point, though one docujment groups the 7960G and the 7970G in the same cateory of POE support.
From everything I’ve read on the Cisco web site only the 7970G is 802.3af compliant. All of their earlier phones are pre-standard. I found a page that says the earlier phones can be powered by switching pins 4 and 5 with pins 7 and 8 on the phone end but it doesn’t work unless you’ve got a POE adapter that sends power regardless of the device plugged into it.
If you don’t want the color screen, you want the 7961 or 7941 phones. They support 802.3af power, a higher res. greyscale screen, and faster processor.
Also, the 7960G is a “global” version of the 7960. The only difference is they replaced the english words on the buttons with icons ( an envelope instead of messages for example) and include a sticker overlay with the words in whatever language. 802.3af power is in the 7911G,41G,61G,70G phones GigE and 802.3af are in the 7971G-GE,7941G-GE and 7961G-GE.
I power my 7960 phones with the in-line power injector that came with Aironet access-points. The power injectors is an always on device and provides up to 15 watts (depending on the Cisco power supply model) over the unused wire pairs of a Category 5 Ethernet cable, supplying enough power to provide for up to a 100-meter cable run.