Not renewing all SWAS in a cluster : possible ?

[Ronan]

My main client is spending a lot of money on SWAS, and would like to know if that could be reduced.

The client has a multinational cluster, with about 50 MXe and ISS. Used to be more but we removed the CX and put these people on VOIP through the WAN.

Basically the client wants to keep buying SWAS for the applications (nupoint, micollab, MiCC), for the ISSs hosting the main site and the VOIP users, but stop buying them for the MXes.

The cluster uses license sharing with a DLM.

Would we still need the SWAS for the users ?

We're upgrading from MCD 6.0 to MiVB 8.0 SP2 right now, and the client thinks that we won't be upgrading after that, the number of phones is diminishing, Lync will probably take over in a couple of years.

Is it possible or will we have problems ? For example an MXe drops a hard drive, can I replace it and sync with the AMC without SWAS ?

Thanks for your ideas.

[sarond]

As you are aware you won't be able to upgrade and technically Mitel won't support you on that particular product.

There is no issue with re-licensing with no SWA, keep the same HWID/ARID and it will still tie in to your current licensing and version.
So if you need to replace a HDD it shouldn't be a problem.

Now I can't be sure on the DLM side of things and what that will affect, I would assume the same goes.

Just wait to see what the other users think.

[Ronan]

Yes as I said there would be no upgrade. Our client is very wary of upgrades (which is a nightmare for me, as now pretty much all my tickets with Mitel get the answer : this is corrected in new version X.X). Basically I have no support already, while still paying for it.

Replacing a HDD is fine then. Now what if the motherboard dies ? Our proposal is that if an ICP crashes, we don't repair it, at least not permanently, instead we migrate all the users on our main site through the WAN. However to do this without a lot of database tinkering we would need to have a MiVB running the node backup to delete all the users and remove the node from the cluster.

Thanks for your answer.

[acejavelin]

Yes as I said there would be no upgrade. Our client is very wary of upgrades (which is a nightmare for me, as now pretty much all my tickets with Mitel get the answer : this is corrected in new version X.X). Basically I have no support already, while still paying for it.

Replacing a HDD is fine then. Now what if the motherboard dies ? Our proposal is that if an ICP crashes, we don't repair it, at least not permanently, instead we migrate all the users on our main site through the WAN. However to do this without a lot of database tinkering we would need to have a MiVB running the node backup to delete all the users and remove the node from the cluster.

Thanks for your answer.

If the motherboard (chassis) dies, you can still change the hardware ID in AMC or move the dongle from one chassis to another regardless of SWA, you just can't change the software version.

Otherwise I think this is a terrible idea... "The cluster uses license sharing with a DLM"... this is the sticking point for me, having some elements with SWA and others without could cause issues in AMC, which is weird with SWA anyway.

The other option is just let SWA go, and if it is REALLY needed later then renew and pay the re-up fee. Honestly, this customer is looking at nothing the bottom dollar, within a few years you will probably lose them as a Mitel customer anyway. Customers like this are often better to just let go...

[eugenej]

I don't think the DLM will allow you to do individual SWAS on ARIDs to be honest - just double check that

[Ronan]

In the end we continued retiring equipment and stopped paying SWA for these only. I still get an email from the AMC asking me to renew the SWAs, I must figure out how to destroy ARIDs and transfer the licenses.

We might lose the customer eventually but we'll be there for a few more years, we're finally upgrading from MCD 6 to MiVB 8 in a month.

Also the customer is a sister company so if they move on from Mitel we'll move with them and go for Skype or whatever.

[eugenej]

In the end we continued retiring equipment and stopped paying SWA for these only. I still get an email from the AMC asking me to renew the SWAs, I must figure out how to destroy ARIDs and transfer the licenses.

We might lose the customer eventually but we'll be there for a few more years, we're finally upgrading from MCD 6 to MiVB 8 in a month.

Also the customer is a sister company so if they move on from Mitel we'll move with them and go for Skype or whatever.

Ask the AMC to retire those ARID's you don't want. Also remember that all you'll be saving on SWA is the base package and that is normally minimal in any event. If you have more licenses than users, you could retire those and not pay SWA but that is extreme considering SWA per user is tiny.

[Ronan]

Well the bill is about 80 000 € currently.

[sunspark]

Well the bill is about 80 000 € currently.

To reduce your swas , put all the MXE and ISS on 1 VM multi-tenant .