Unity VMO vs. UM

[jtiso]

I have a customer who purchased Unity as Unified Messaging. We installed it as a voice mail only. From a technical perspective it works fine. The customer wants to move to Unified messaging in the future. Unity version is 4.02 on MCS 7835. The SQL and Exchange that come with the Unity were used to to the install.

Are there any support or licensing issues I should be aware of in this configuration?

Thanks.

[lindborg]

I'm not sure what you're asking - if you've purchased UM licenses, moving to UM later shouldn't be a problem from a licensing stand point.

Perhaps you can explain a little more about what it is you're concerned with exactly - "UM" isn't very descriptive - are you wanting to home all mailstores on the Exchange on the Unity server and have them attach Outlook clients to those mailboxes or something? That'd be a bad idea, for instance.

Is the site already using Exchange with Outlook but they installed Unity on a seperate network/org? Are you worried about moving User information over to their email network to get UM features down the road? If so you'll want to review this white paper that talks about what you need to plan for with that:

http://www.cisco.com/univercd/cc/td/doc/product/voice/c_unity/whitpapr/migvm_um.htm

[jtiso]

Jeff,

Thanks for your reply. My customer has purchased Unified messaging. They are using it as voice mail only today and wants to to UM in the future.

The system was installed with all of the Cisco Provided CD's onto the same MCS Box. Are there any licensing or support issues here?

Thanks.

[lindborg]

so presumably they haven't purchased CALs for Outlook then...

If they want to move to UM and they plan to use Outlook (UM is kinda pointless without this) then they will need to purchase CALs from Microsoft for all the desktop clients that will install Outlook.

Second, the Exchange license you installed with is strictly for voice mail only. That's why it's so much cheaper than getting Exchange from Microsoft directly - You can't use that to provide desktop email client access.

so to get to UM you will have to purchase Exchange from MS, install it off box (just install it to the same org as the existing Exchange is and move the users over to it) and setup CALs for Outlook for your clients.

[jtiso]

So, does that mean that while they are VMO there is no problem? This is a supported and legal config? So to move to UM, they would need to buy an Exchange license and Client CAL's?

Thanks.

[lindborg · Accepted solution]

yes, if they're voice mail only they're cool with what they have.

Yes, if they want to go to UM they'll have to pony up for cals for Outlook and a fully Exchange license from MS and install it off box.