VCS C/E migration to VM

[aravindhan.srinivasan1]

Hi

I've a query regarding the IP address assignment for the Virtual VCS-C/E. When ordering a virtual server, is it necessary to have dedicated subnet range for the VM VCS C/E or is it fine to use the shared IP subnets (All other application VM's will be using the same subnet range).

To enable the second NIC on virtual VCS E for external facing DMZ (using VM's which is available within my organization) do i need to buy any license (advanced network option).

Is there any difference between VCS C/E and Vcs Expressway C/E. Please help me on this.

Thanks

Aravindhan S

[Alok Jaiswal · Accepted solution]

To sum up, yes you need to buy Advanced networking key to enable second NIC. Without this you can;t even have Single NIC with Static NAT.

For the network, you can have VCS-C/Expressway-C in the same subnet as your other UC applications, however for VCS-E/Expressway-E it better to have a separate network, as this is the component which normally seats in the DMZ. I prefer and recommend customers always to go with Dual NIC design for Exp-E/VCS-E which basically means you would have two DMZ segments.

For your other part of question, VCS (C/E) and Expressway (C/E) are almost simillar in functionality. You can say Expressway is a bit lighter version of VCS. When you order CUWL licensing, Expressway series now comes as bundle. 

Regards,

Alok

[Patrick Sparkman · Accepted solution]

You can put the VCS-C/E on the same subnet as other servers or separate, it really depends on how you want to deploy it and how secure you want it to be, most put the VCS-E in a DMZ separated from the internal network since its public facing.

The advanced networking option key is included with the purchase of the VCS-E, to see what all is included with a VCS-C/E, refer to Tables 7 and 8 of the VCS Data Sheet.

VCS and Expressway products run the same software, but the features are named differently and each use a different licensing scheme. At first the Expressway was released with a subset of features of the VCS, but recently Cisco has added most of the missing features, the VCS series is positioned for video centric deployments and the Expressway series is meant for CUCM deployments, you can refer to each of their data sheets for comparison between the two series of products. 

[aravindhan.srinivasan1]

Dear Patrick/Alok

Thanks a lot :) And yes am going to put VCS-E in a DMZ zone which is having different subnet. If am not wrong in DMZ also i can use the shared subnet range where other DMZ applications were running.

[Alok Jaiswal · Accepted solution]

Yes, you can use that. Nothing holds you off do to that as well. However the policies you put on the firewall, you have to make it specific to your Expressway's.

Regards,

Alok