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Exchange 2007 UM vs. Cisco Unity Unified Messaging

By: Matthew McGillen Posted: July 9, 2007 at 4:52 PM

I've been looking around for a feature comparison between Cisco Unity Unified Messaging and Exchange 2007 Unified Messaging. There doesn't seem to be one out there, so I put together an incomplete matrix comparing the two UM platforms. There are a lot of features to add to the list, but I figured I should at least start putting some of them down on the blog. Any comments with additional comparisons are welcome.

If I had to boil the comparison down to 1 tagline it would be this: "Microsoft's UM is easier to deploy, maintain and use and is a good choice for Exchange shops and 'information worker' companies; Cisco Unity is more customizable, flexible and has a larger install base and is probably more suited for large enterprises who are very VM-dependent".

My general take on Microsoft's first foray into UM is that it is a good product that will get better with time. It's relatively cheap and gives a lot of features for the price.

Feature	Exchange Unified Messaging	Unity Unified Messaging
play VM in inbox	Yes	Yes
embed notes in VM for indexing	yes	no
play on PC speakers	yes	yes
play on pc outlook control	yes, only outlook 2007, form automatically installed	yes, form must be manually installed
play on phone	yes, any extension or phone number	yes, specific extension
play from OWA	yes, on PC or any extension or phone number	yes, on PC only
listen to e-mail from telephone	yes	licensed
autoattendant	yes	yes
Autoattendant with SpeechRec	yes	no
failover?	yes	licensed
call trees	limited	yes
access to calendar	yes	no
access to contacts	yes	no
access to AD user directory	yes	no
UM on separate server	recommended for most deployments	required
Administration interface	native Exchange Management Console	IIS
backups	via native exchange backup	exchange + Unity Server
retention policy	granular by message type (voicemail or e-mail)	uses general mailbox quota
UM lights MWI	supports most TDM PBXs (via 3rd party gateway), need 3rd party app for Cisco IP phones	supports most PBXs
hardware required for PBX integration	none for Cisco CallManager 5.1+ and Avaya IPT, hardware gateway for all else	None for CallManager, dialogic card for other models
licensing	requires Windows & Exchange server license and ECAL	includes Windows server license, requires Exchange license, Unity server license (per port), Unity client license, Outlook CAL
scalability	depends on hardware	depends on hardware
server hardware	must meet minimum requirements	requires Cisco MCS server platform
maximum VM sessions per server	60-75	72 (depending on platform)
maximum users	2000 to 10000 depending on platform (http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb430784.aspx)	1000 for smallest platform, 7500 for largest
maximum text to speech sessions		24
integration to PBXs	http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/exchange/telephony-advisor.mspx	several
schema extensions	No (already party of Exchange 2007)	yes
multi-language support	yes, only for tts, not for asr	yes
end user reset VM PIN	Yes, via outlook or OWA	no
multiple greetings	2 (standard, out of office)	5 different greetings
mobile phone support	yes	yes
remap tui keys?	no	yes
Versions of Exchange supported	2007 only	2000, 2003, 2007
Other mail systems supported?	no	lotus notes, some functionality via IMAP for GroupWise and other IMAP systems
integration to other VM systems	no	yes, using AMIS/VPIM

exchange vs unity message store

By: keino leitch | Posted: December 10, 2009 at 8:01 PM

I have had the experience to deploy and impliment both exchange and unity. In my opinion there is value to both I solutions and I would simple say that unity is more feature rich and is more robust when integrating in an environment where training is costly (unity end user feature are configurable to customer need). Within the next few years MS exchange 2007 will challenge unity. Today MS exchange is lacking a few key function (ie MWI and configuration flexibility) third party components are required; however it has high business value like centralize storage for voice mail and email all of which leverage the Enterprise licenses. Cisco is trying to address the issue with their cuwl licenses offering. I believe it will come done to feature and cost and if both power house (Microsoft and Cisco) done open the door to collaboration both will lose has the virtual world is a reality and we are all connected.

Out of Date Information

By: John | Posted: November 17, 2009 at 11:01 AM

Most of the information on this page is out of date or inaccurate with regards to Unity.

By: samantha | Posted: October 30, 2009 at 11:12 PM

The above post is very informative. I personally feel that Microsoft is very good in the unified messaging system compared to Cisco because i m a Microsoft user from years. but its up to the user which he finds the best.

Licensing - SQL?

By: Tony W | Posted: July 7, 2009 at 5:54 PM

Cisco Unity also requires SQL server - at least if you are over a certain number of users. If you are under that count, and you want to use SQL instead of SQL Express/MSDE, then you have to buy your own license. This complexity in the Unity environment is a key differentiator.

Unity 5.x

By: Mark Parker | Posted: May 13, 2009 at 8:30 PM

Unity can have 144 ports per server Unity runs fine in VMWare Unity runs on any windows 2003 server and above hardware Unity per-server user limit is based on usage, more than number of users

re: Message Light

By: matt mcgillen | Posted: November 20, 2008 at 10:13 AM

Hi - Exchange UM does not natively light the MWI on Cisco phones. I have used Geomant's MWI 2007 product to do this and it has worked quite well. It is a separate application and you do need to purchase it from Geomant, but you can install it on the Exchange UM server co-resident and cost is reasonable. - Regards, Matt

Message Light

By: Dan | Posted: November 20, 2008 at 10:09 AM

Does MS Exchange UM provide a message light on a Cisco VoIP phone? Or do we have to purchase a third party application for this purpose?

re: Question about Call Handlers

By: matt mcgillen | Posted: November 7, 2008 at 2:23 PM

Hi, Exchange UM does have "call handlers". They are called AutoAttendants in Exchange, but they work very similarly to Unity Call Handlers. You can map out a menu that sends callers to different extensions based on what keys they press etc. As for "Play on Phone" that's a capability built into outlook. So you can click on that button in outlook and have it dial your Cisco phone (or cell phone if you want). --Matt

Question about Call Handlers

By: Terry | Posted: November 6, 2008 at 2:54 PM

Unity has Call Handlers and allows callers input capability to be redirected. Does Microsoft's UM have the same features? And question about Play on Phone. What did you do to get that to work? Both on the Cisco side and the MS side.

Thanks

By: Aaron | Posted: May 31, 2008 at 4:58 PM

This is great!!! Thanks

By: mahra | Posted: March 31, 2008 at 12:44 AM

thaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaanx you saved my life

good doc

By: Mrugesh Patel | Posted: March 18, 2008 at 4:00 PM

Very nice, good research.

re: unity scalability

By: Matthew McGillen | Posted: December 21, 2007 at 4:27 PM

Hi Johan, Thanks for pointing out the 144 - I'll have to check into that. I was under the impression that in failover mode, you can have 144 ports, but divided between 2 servers (72 a piece). That might have change with unity 5.x though. As for multi-language support- Unity and Exchange UM both support many languages. But as I reference in my chart, Exchange UM only has Automatic Speech Recognition for En-US. Support for more languages is on the horizon though. -Matt

unity scalability

Posted: December 20, 2007 at 6:25 AM

I think Unity can go up to 144 ports per server (depending on platform) http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/sw/voicesw/ps2237/products_data_sheet0900aecd805e6e12.html furthermore it would be interesting to know if both systems support multiple languages (important for multinational companies) and how this is licensed. Cheers, Johan (Belgium)

Re: Exchange 2007 Vs Cisco UUM

By: Matthew McGillen | Posted: November 8, 2007 at 9:17 PM

>> is there any walk through for this point? Yep - I have it as the 3rd from bottom in my list.

Exchange 2007 Vs Cisco UUM

Posted: November 8, 2007 at 3:30 AM

Thank You, it's very useful, However I think Versions Of Exchange Supported is Only Exchange 2007 as Cisco supports Exchange 2000,2003,2007 is a score one against Exchange 2007 UM, is there any walk through for this point?

Cisco UM

Posted: September 12, 2007 at 11:53 AM

A good comparitive analysis! Thanks for posting it. Carmelo Lisciotto

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About Matt McGillen

Practice Manager - Unified CommunicationsMatt McGillen is the practice manager for Unified Communications at PointBridge. He has over 10 years of IT consulting experience, focusing mainly on the government, legal, financial and health care s... [more]

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