Unity Upgrade and Design Question

[hauchinango]

Currently, we are a Lotus Notes shop, and running vm only Unity 4.0(4).

I will be installing new servers in a failover enviornment and upgrading to 4.2. Also, I have a third server which will act as the Exchange server.

Our company is looking to move to Exchange vs. Notes, and I want to be ready if we decide to go unified messaging.

Please advise if there are any pitfalls to watch for, and if anyone steps I should follow.

Thanks

[jolo07310]

Hi Robert,

We have unified messaging 4.04 with exchange 2000, I alos will upgrade 4.2 later and intergate with our exhange 2003 soon.

It is so nice the voice mail go to your mail box and play the messaging from there.

Well of course, there is a catch... for example, we would like to upgrade exchange 2000 to 2007, but Unity hasnt supported yet, but eventually will. :)

Second, since the message store at your exchange email system now, so you need to deal with your servers guys. Also during troubleshooting, you need your server guys be there too... Basically, if exchange has problem, it will definitly affect unity system.

Good things is that the voice mail wont lose if exchange server unavailble, it will store at unity server until exchange available.

Now, here is the link how to turn your VM to UM:

http://www.cisco.com/univercd/cc/td/doc/product/voice/c_unity/rug/ex/ru_140.htm#wp1046626

Please rate the helpful post.

Ken

[Tommer Catlin]

Brief run down...

- upgrade the existing 4.04 to 4.2(1) (I think is the latest).

- Install your failover server as 4.2 with the same version unity, patches and MS patches. (everything the same!)

- if you have Exchange onbox with Unity, you will need to move that off box for the failover model. So if you Exchange, rehome all subscribers to the offbox Exchange, if they are there, you are set for failover!

If you are VM only, going to UM and to Exchange, there is a doc on Cisco for migrating users from VM to UM. It is much easier if all subscribers in the VM only Exchange, have the same alias in the production domain. The DIRT backup and recover will breeze then right though this. Otherwise, you will be doing one to one mapping with the alias of Old to New

If you are going from Exchange to Notes, you may just end up starting from scratch. Im not sure there is an easy way to migrate for this. The voicemails will migrate over, but the settings, etc may not.(greetings, recorded name, etc) CallHandlers should be ok, and general Unity settings, but subscriber settings will be iffy at best.

The upgrade is fairly straight forward.

- DiRT backup

- Pull a drive

- schedule some downtime

- Insert the DVD for 4.2 and let it rip.

- follow the guidebook to the "T". (permissions, Schema updates, replication to occur, etc)

After all is done and working fine, then move to the failover scenario and install that server with the same version. Test and verfy all is working. Once completed, determine your business requirements for UM and THEN move forward. Everything in steps....

good luck!