The Cisco 2851 provides significant additional value compared to prior generations of Cisco routers at similar price points by offering up to a fivefold performance improvement, up to a tenfold increase in security and voice performance, new embedded service options, and dramatically increased slot performance and density while maintaining support for most of the more than 90 existing modules that are available today for the Cisco 1700, Cisco 2600, and Cisco 3700 Series.

The Cisco 2851 allows network managers to provide scalable analog and digital telephony without investing in a one-time solution, allowing enterprises greater control of their converged telephony needs. Using the voice and fax modules, the Cisco 2851 can be deployed for applications ranging from voice-over-IP (VoIP) and voice-over-Frame Relay (VoFR) transport to robust, centralized solutions using the Cisco Survivable Remote Site Telephony (SRST) solution or distributed call processing using Cisco Call Manager Express (CME).