Cisco vs Microsoft. Who is telling the truth?

Over the last few days I have been listening to a lot of Cisco guys fresh from Networkers and sprouting all the latest anti-Microsoft propaganda. Here are some of the things that were given as ammunition to their followers.


1. The codecs used by Communicator are negotiated by the clients, unlike in the Cisco world, the codec is controlled by CUCM.
This is this is as the codec used by Communicator is adaptive, based on the amount of bandwidth between the clients. Obviously the OCS server is in no position to dictate this.


2. Integrating OCS with your Call Manager means you have to manage 2 dial plans, so keep it simple by using CUCiMOC.
In my experience it is easier to write up a dial plan in OCS than it is to deploy a client to thousands of machines. The one good thing about CUCiMOC, is that it does atleast start people getting used to using their PC as their Voice end point.

3. OCS has no CAC
I am not sure if I have ever picked up the phone and heard fast busy tone because my call was blocked by CAC. I think these days we have more issues with email clogging up links than we do voice. In any environment with or without CAC, if the network is not provisioned correctly you are going to have problems with everything you do not just voice.

4. Calls in a branch office will hair pin through Mediation Server
This scenario describes a situation where in a branch office, calls between Office Communicator and a Cisco phone will have to go from Communicator across the WAN to the Mediation Server and back down to the Cisco phone. This is true and would happen in an R2 environment (I have heard rumours that this will go away in 2010). I would however say that if you are migrating your voice platform to OCS that planning is key, and you would either have to migrate all or none in this situation.

5. Unity provides a richer user experience than Exchange 2007
The first problem with this statement is that Unity is built on Exchange (and not even the latest version). The issue most companies have with Unity is that it requires a schema extension. I have not yet seen a company that has put the Cisco schema extension into their production AD. So most implementations involve creating a second AD just for Telephony, giving them the flexibility they need to get the job done. This in turn means that users will now have 2 mailboxes. 1 for email and maybe fax/SMS and the other for voice mail. This means that you can only get real UM with a few paddle pop sticks and some sticky tape.

6. Microsoft UM requires a 3rd party for MWI
While this was true with Exchange 2007, this problem has now gone away. Exchange 2010 can natively switch that oh so important little red light on and off.

So for Matt's 5 Cents:
Both Cisco and Microsoft have great features and both have room for improvement. When looking at deploying UC, it is important to look holistically at the experience you are providing to your users, and keep your eyes on the road maps of your favourite vendors. This space is fast paced and ever-changing. Most importantly, to quote a hip hop group from the 90's, "Don't believe the hype".