e1 c onnection to switch servers

I’m currently working as a voip engineer at our ofc. I’m quite new to linux and asterisk.But I have already set-up a test bed with linux and asterisk 1.2.5. Our production server is configured with e1/ss7 card connected to our switch which i think is a TDM. We would like to try a new card with e1/r2 or pri signalling. How will I connect to our switch?If i buy a e1/r2 or pri card will it’ll be automically be detected by my OS?Is there other tools to install?Are there any documentations on this. Hope you could help us out. Thanks

Regards