Do I need a CON-ECMUS-RISEV9SM for every Small ISE VM ?

[Arne Bier]

Hello

When quoting a customer for an additional Small ISE VM (to their existing ISE 3.0 deployment) I was wondering about the Services and Support of that VM. 

When I get an estimate for "R-ISE-VMS-K9=", the CCW tool automatically adds in the SKU "CON-ECMUS-RISEV9SM" which I can configure for 12 months or 36 months etc. My questions are

- is this CON-ECMUS-RISEV9SM required to allow customer to download ISE upgrades and patches from CCO? How does CCO know for which VM I am downloading this patch? 

- The Small and Medium licenses have the same list price - but the Support is more expensive for Medium (in fact, a 3 year support is more expensive than the Medium license itelsf) 

The 3 year CON-ECMUS-RISEV9SM is almost as expensive as the Small VM license itself. It would be nice to have a detailed explanation of what this is for.

What happens if a customer procures the Small VM license with 1 month support license? Does each ISE node then have its own support end date?

I am thoroughly confused.  Would appreciate a Dummies Guide regarding the ISE support.

regards

Arne

[Milos_Jovanovic]

Hi Arne,

Yes, you need to purchase support for each VM you purchase. VMs would come either as PAKs or directly to your Smart Account. If delivered with PAK, then each PAK has its own support attached. If delivered on SA, then I assume you don't need to tie it up specifically to VM, rather you need to have quantity of support (e.g. 5 VMs + support times 5)., as this is a benefit of SA. And yes, support contract allows you to download software and open a support case for ISE.

The funny part is that VMS, VMM and VML were never of the same price, and there was quite a big difference between them (like multiplied by integer number :-)). Now, Cisco has recently announced EoS for S/M/L VMs, and migrating to common one - 'R-ISE-VMC-K9='. I'm assuming that they are now making old SKUs obsolete, thus making their price equal, and this is what you see in quoting tool. I've tried to quote new SKU, but it is still not showing up. I haven't talked to anyone from Cisco yet about this, but I'm assuming it will come up soon.

And for me, the funny part is that Cisco already had common PID, migrating to different VMs, now migrating back to common PID. I don't know what is the difference, but I'm very eager to see. I would assume, since Cisco is shifting to subscription based model, that you'll have initial purchase price for device (which won't be too much) followed by support contract that will have significat price, and this is where S/M/L will be mapped. But, we'll see how this will look like exactly later.

BR,

Milos

[Arne Bier]

Hey @Milos_Jovanovic 

thanks for the detailed reply. I also tried the new PID but had same experience as you had.

The more I think about it, the more questions I have:

- what is ISE VM support? Is it TAC Support entitlement, or software (patch/upgrade- which one) entitlement. Or both???

- Is there co-termination for this support in an environment where there is more than one ISE VM, and deployed over a period of time?

- Why is Medium support more expensive than Small support? The downloaded software is identical. And supporting a Medium VM is identical to supporting a Small VM. 

I guess customers just want to know the basic things: when they buy one or more ISE VM licenses, what support are they entitled to and what SKU(s) provides them with that support - and for how long does the support last.  I'd like to know how Cisco tracks all of this, since the serial numbers of VMs are randomly generated.  

I would be interested to head the Cisco BU view on this. Perhaps there is a video out there explaining all this? - apologies if I have missed it.

[Milos_Jovanovic · Accepted solution]

ISE VM support contains both things - entitlement for TAC support and software download.

Second one is a tough one. I would say that each VM would have its own support date, depending on when have you purchased it, ad when have you renewed it. It is also possible that you allign all of these support dates to same date (e.g. for one VM you purchase 24 months, and for another 28, in order to co-terminate it on the same date). On the other hand, If you assign all of them to SA, then there is no strict boundary, as you are just counting instances.

Support for Medium is more expensive than for Small, as VM Medium was also more expensive then VM Small (I assume due to the percentage ratio). Large was even more expensive. Although downloaded software is identical, I'm again assuming with bigger deployment there is a bigger chance for support engagement (TAC), so Cisco is protecting themselves this way. I haven't read this anywhere, it is just my common sense, so it would be nice that someone from Cisco actually explains it.

Regarding the question on what support they are entitled to, this should be easy. There are public documents about support levels and their SKUs. I found this one by doing quick search. Support duration is also flexible, as you can order it from couple of months, and also to EoL date (if published), anything in between (e.g. 12m, 18m, 36m, 5y). Cisco is tracking this normally by serial number, but, since ISE doesn't have SN (it does, but it can easily be changed), it can be tracked by other parameters, such as PAK, subscription ID, WebOrder ID and similar. You need to know this information when opening a TAC case.

You should take it as an axiom that when you purchse VM, you must purchase support as well. Also, you should always have VM covered by support service. Before doing any work for my customers, I'm always checking if deployment is covered by support contract. This way, is things go wrong, I'm sure I can engage TAC.

BR,

Milos