Unified Messaging: To Upgrade or Not to Upgrade?

[devine]

I have recently found myself in charge of a seemingly dated Cisco telephone system. I have a MCS 7800 Media Convergence Server, Cisco Unified CM Administration v. 6.1.2.1000-13 and Cisco Unity Messaging 5.0 Build 5.0(1). The support was allowed to lapse through Cisco. I am currently getting a quote on what it will take money-wise to get us back active on support and potentially look at upgrading the software and perhaps the hardware. I am looking to get some feedback from those who know more about the system regarding what kinds of benefits or challenges we may experience from doing this upgrade. Is it worth it? Is there new functionality? More intuitive to use? What's involved? Whatever you got, whatever two cents you have to share, I would sincerely appreciate it. Thank you!

[Rob Huffman]

Hi there,

You really don't have many options here as to whether or not

to upgrade both Unity and CUCM (Communications manager)

Both of the versions you are running have been EoL'd (end of life)

by Cisco so even if you didn't want to upgrade, you're sort of forced

if you want Cisco support.

On the Unity front, even the newest 8.0 version is now announced as EoL

with no future versions to be released so you would need to look at moving

towards Unity Connection if you want to stay on the Cisco platform.

End-of-Sale and End-of-Life Announcement for the Cisco Unity Version 5.x

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/prod/collateral/voicesw/ps6789/ps5745/ps2237/end_of_life_notice_c51-606617.html

End-of-Sale and End-of-Life Announcement for the Cisco Unified Communications Manager Version 6.1

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/prod/voicesw/ps6788/vcallcon/ps556/end_of_life_notice_c51-589088.html

Of course, with upgrades comes the need for new hardware in most cases, so an eye

towards virtualization is the way to go

Unified Communications in a Virtualized Environment

http://docwiki.cisco.com/wiki/Unified_Communications_in_a_Virtualized_Environment

This older blog From super NetPro Hailey is a nice place to start the Unity to

Unity Connection discussion;

http://www.netcraftsmen.net/blogs/migrating-to-cisco-unity-connection.html?blogger=David+Hailey

Cheers!

Rob

PS: I didn't want to even try to get into the enhancements between these versions

as they are pretty vast

"And if I should fall behind
Wait for me" - Springsteen