Roddy Matheson 
United Kingdom
Member since
9/18/2006
Platinum Membership
Posts: 71
 |
| 8/07/2008 01:58 PM |
|
I've already started planning the upgrade from SBS2003 to SBS2008 and naturally one of the things that came to mind was cost. I would expect that the upgrade of the actual OS will be around £300 or less, going by previous editions. What I'm concerned about though is the Client Access Licences. I remember there was a bit of a fiddle involving a licence converter (on floppy disk(!)) when upgrading from SBS2000 to SBS2003 but there wasn't a cost involved in the upgrade of CALs.
Does anyone know if SBS2003 CALs will continue to work on SBS2008 or whether they need to be converted of even if there are any costs likely to be involved?
Roddy
|
|
|
|
|
|
william warren
United States
Member since
12/8/2005
Registered Users
Posts: 601
|
| 8/10/2008 04:29 PM |
|
| only if you buy software assurance for your sbs 2k3 setup including the cals will they port over. right now SA for sbs is a substantial savings over having to buy cougar and repurchasing the cals as well. |
|
Registered Microsoft Partner |
|
|
|
Roddy Matheson
United Kingdom
Member since
9/18/2006
Platinum Membership
Posts: 71
|
| 8/10/2008 07:22 PM |
|
So basically I will have to buy SBS2008 and the 30 odd CAL that I need?
Sounds like I'll be sticking with SBS2003 then as SBS2008 doesn't offer enough over SBS2003 to warrant that kind of outlay. SA on SBS doesn't appear to make things any cheaper as I would have had to maintain SA for 6 years (by the time it is available) which wipes out any cost benefit.
I hear Apple have a very good alternative in their OSX server - with unlimited clients. I wonder if Microsoft will take that into account when they decide on their upgrade strategy for existing customers.
|
|
|
|
|
|
william warren
United States
Member since
12/8/2005
Registered Users
Posts: 601
|
| 8/10/2008 10:48 PM |
|
| huh? sbs2008 is going to be available in nov so you only have to do SA once per client and the cost of SA is less than half of what you'll pay for buying sbs 2k8 by itself. I would advise your clients to purchase SA for sbs 2k8 now and the instant it's available use SA to get cougar. Considering primary support for 2k3 ends in mid 2k9 migrating to 2k8 is a near term project not one to put off.
|
|
Registered Microsoft Partner |
|
|
|
Marina Roos
The Netherlands
Member since
3/24/2005
Forum Admins
Posts: 12523
|
| 8/11/2008 01:29 AM |
|
Hi Roddy,
You would have needed to buy upgrade cals when upgrading from SBS 2000 to SBS 2003, so that wasn't free at all. At this moment the upgrade prices from SBS 200x to SBS 2008 aren't published yet.
|
|
| Marina Roos Smallbizserver.Net Administrator | Mission accomplished. We have joined the branch office to our SBS 2003 Headquarters and have the same user experience on the branch office as we have on our local network at the Headquarters. Want to know how? Signup up for a subscription and get instant access to the article series 'How to add an additional Domain Controller from a remote office to the SBS domain' |
|
|
|
|
william warren
United States
Member since
12/8/2005
Registered Users
Posts: 601
|
| 8/11/2008 03:43 AM |
|
| not according to my vendors(CDW being one of them).
|
|
Registered Microsoft Partner |
|
|
|
Roddy Matheson
United Kingdom
Member since
9/18/2006
Platinum Membership
Posts: 71
|
| 8/11/2008 10:47 AM |
|
Hi Marina, my SBS2000CAL upgrades were free when I got SBS2003 - I just had to send off the SBS2003 box top and receipt.
I just realises that what I wrote before regarding SA for 6 years didn't make a huge amount of sense. I was under the impression that you could only buy SA for a product with 90 days of purchase and have to subscribe to open licencing (please let me know if this is wrong) and as I have had SBS2003 since its first release, by the time SBS2008 is available almost 6 years will have passed.
If I'm wrong about the 90 day thing then I'll definitely look into it but it doesn't seem to make financial sense for MS to allow you to simply buy SA whenever you want to upgrade to the latest version of whatever software. I'm not using any open licencing scheme by the way. |
|
|
|
|
|
william warren
United States
Member since
12/8/2005
Registered Users
Posts: 601
|
| 8/12/2008 03:08 AM |
|
| I have talked with my vendors and i can SA even an OEM version of 2k3. The pricing is roughly the price of 2k8 and that's not a subscription.
|
|
Registered Microsoft Partner |
|
|
|
Roddy Matheson
United Kingdom
Member since
9/18/2006
Platinum Membership
Posts: 71
|
| 8/12/2008 04:15 PM |
|
[quote]The pricing is roughly the price of 2k8 and that's not a subscription.[/quote]
In that case, I'm not sure what is the point in buying SA for SBS2003 if it is going to be the same price as SBS2008 anyway... I may as well just buy SBS2008. I think the bottom line is I just need to wait until official pricing is announced and then see what upgrade paths, if any, Microsoft offers. Let's hope it's reasonably soon.
|
|
|
|
|
|
william warren
United States
Member since
12/8/2005
Registered Users
Posts: 601
|
| 8/13/2008 12:04 AM |
|
| I'm assuming you already have an sbs system running. If that's the case then you purchase SA for that system. The cost of sa for that will be roughly 1/2 the cost of buying 2k8 separately. You'll get media and whatnot and then purchase a separate server to perform the migration(or wait for the swing kit to be updated for cougar). Purchasing SA for an existing system is a no-brainer in terms of cost, convience and eas of procurement.
|
|
Registered Microsoft Partner |
|
|
|
Roddy Matheson
United Kingdom
Member since
9/18/2006
Platinum Membership
Posts: 71
|
| 8/13/2008 12:23 AM |
|
Hi William
I've had an SBS2003 Premium system running since it first became available 5 years ago. My concern is that, as you quite rightly said, support runs out mid-2009 for SBS2003 and there are some nice features available in SBS2008. But all this does come at a cost and I know you said that you suggested I could get SA for my existing system but Microsoft clearly state on their website that "Software Assurance can only be bought when you buy a new licence, or renew the Software Assurance on an existing one."
http://www.microsoft.com/uk/licensing/lessthan250/software-assurance/buy.mspx
Are you suggesting I buy another copy of SBS2003 (OEM) simply to register it for SA? Presumably with this approach I would also have to buy the CALs again (plus SA). Unless there is a loop hole which you know of (please let me know if there is!) which gets around this licensing restriction for SA, I'm not sure that simply purchasing it all again will be any cheaper than just buying SBS2008 and the CALs... |
|
|
|
|
|
william warren
United States
Member since
12/8/2005
Registered Users
Posts: 601
|
| 8/13/2008 12:40 AM |
|
| i am going by what my vendors(one of them is cdw) are saying. I ahve quotes for the scenarios i have talked about. If it's not legit then ms is going to nail a huge company like cdw. considering how long cdw has been in the pocket of MS i think this is legit. Talk to your vendors..talk to CDW. right now this is what i'm hearing and what is being made available for me to purchase.
|
|
Registered Microsoft Partner |
|
|
|
Roddy Matheson
United Kingdom
Member since
9/18/2006
Platinum Membership
Posts: 71
|
| 8/13/2008 12:48 AM |
|
| OK, I'll take a look at CDW, but as they're a US vendor I suspect MS will allow them to bend the rules a little bit - the rest of us in Europe (and especially UK) tend to get some pretty poor software deals comparatively. Thanks for the suggestion though, hope I can get the benefit of it before MS get wise! |
|
|
|
|
|
Marina Roos
The Netherlands
Member since
3/24/2005
Forum Admins
Posts: 12523
|
| 8/13/2008 01:08 PM |
|
Hi Roddy,
Your first post doesn't mention that you had bought SBS 2000 with SA, so I assumed you had bought retail, which means you would have to buy the SBS 2003 upgrade as well as the 2003 upgrade CALs.
You can add SA to an OEM system within 90 days after purchase.
|
|
| Marina Roos Smallbizserver.Net Administrator | Mission accomplished. We have joined the branch office to our SBS 2003 Headquarters and have the same user experience on the branch office as we have on our local network at the Headquarters. Want to know how? Signup up for a subscription and get instant access to the article series 'How to add an additional Domain Controller from a remote office to the SBS domain' |
|
|
|
|
william warren
United States
Member since
12/8/2005
Registered Users
Posts: 601
|
| 8/13/2008 02:03 PM |
|
| That's interesting because that's not what CDW among others are telling me. I can purchase SA for 2k3 and SA for the cals and everything comes with it. since there is no upgrade path with 2k3 i don't thinkupgrade pricing is going to be available. You can migrate to sbs 2k8 with another machine and a chage of domain going the microsoft way. That i bet is the tack vendors are taking i bet since there is no drop in upgrade path only a migration path.
|
|
Registered Microsoft Partner |
|
|
|
Marina Roos
The Netherlands
Member since
3/24/2005
Forum Admins
Posts: 12523
|
| 8/13/2008 02:16 PM |
|
Hi William,
Purchasing SA license would mean you buy a new SBS 2003 license with the SA. Only an OEM can be changed to have SA within 90 days.
|
|
| Marina Roos Smallbizserver.Net Administrator | Mission accomplished. We have joined the branch office to our SBS 2003 Headquarters and have the same user experience on the branch office as we have on our local network at the Headquarters. Want to know how? Signup up for a subscription and get instant access to the article series 'How to add an additional Domain Controller from a remote office to the SBS domain' |
|
|
|
|
william warren
United States
Member since
12/8/2005
Registered Users
Posts: 601
|
| 8/13/2008 02:22 PM |
|
That's not what I am being quoted.. |
|
Registered Microsoft Partner |
|
|
|
Marina Roos
The Netherlands
Member since
3/24/2005
Forum Admins
Posts: 12523
|
|
Roddy Matheson
United Kingdom
Member since
9/18/2006
Platinum Membership
Posts: 71
|
| 8/13/2008 05:59 PM |
|
Hi Marina, I did consider getting SA when I first bought SBS2003 (I didn't have SA on SBS2K but was able to take advantage of a deal to upgrade CALs for free). My understanding of SA is that you have purchase it as part of an Open Licencing scheme which you have to maintain over 2 or 3 years. As it will be almost six years between versions of SBS, maintaining SA would mean buying it two or three times over which annuls any cost benefit.
What I think William is intimating is that he has a supplier who is prepared to bypass the SA subscription requirements (whether this is legal or not, I'm not so sure). I do know that Microsoft Partners are getting a cash-back incentive to encourage take up of SA on SBS2003 but I doubt that this works retrospectively (including OEM software bought outside 90 days). This cash-back offer expires at the end of October so it would be interesting to see if the deal that William is talking about also expires then.
I'd like to take the the deal that William is talking about but the dubious legality behind it is putting me off a bit. |
|
|
|
|
|
william warren
United States
Member since
12/8/2005
Registered Users
Posts: 601
|
| 8/14/2008 01:31 AM |
|
| it very wlel may..i'll rquote in nov and see what happens. I requote usually once a month and so far it hasn't changed. |
|
Registered Microsoft Partner |
|
|
|