Senior Consultant at Unify Square

Jul 4, 2016

Why Lync Server 2013 is Interesting

Disclaimer - Time flies, and I received a message from IT Central Station to update my past reviews, including the one I wrote some months ago about Lync Server 2013. Honestly, it would have been easy to just update a few lines here and there and keeping the contents (that were still good) online. However, I have tried to use wisely the aforementioned period of time and my knowledge of Lync and of his potential is now deeper. So, I decided to throw away the previous review (including a good number of views it had) and to write a completely new post.

What is Lync Server 2013

Lync is a Unified Communications (U.C.) product. It means that in a single product you have a native integration between many different communication tools (IM, conferencing, telephony, e-mail). Lync adds to the standard U.C. capabilities the integration with other Microsoft solutions (SharePoint, Exchange and Active Directory). The aforementioned integration uses information already available in your corporate software to give a better and more complete communication experience to the users. A remarkable example of the aforementioned capability, that I often use as an example, is the so called Skill Search. Skill search is a feature included in the user search of the Lync client that enables the use of working skills information coming from SharePoint as a filter.

Why Lync is Interesting

Lync Server 2013, from a certain point of view, is like two different solutions in a single product (also if a strong point of Lync is that you can move seamlessly inside the different available features). I will try to explain my point of view:

First “aspect” of Lync is the part dedicated to communication tools like IM and conferencing. From this point of view you could find similarities (and important dissimilarities) with other U.C. products. Lync is able to federate different companies and (also) external networks like Skype adds a flexibility that gives value for Lync enabled companies. User experience is really good, with great clients/apps available for almost any existing platform and device. Again, integration with other Microsoft services, adds communication tools, like scheduling a Lync meeting from the Outlook calendar or seeing presence and launching a Lync IM from the Exchange Outlook Web Access (OWA) interface.
Second “aspect” of Lync is the Enterprise Voice, a modern VOIP system that is able to replace the existing Private Branch Exchange (PBX) telephony and to overtake it with many additional features.
Lync has many mechanisms dedicated to grant high availability (see my Lync 2013 High Availability post here on IT Central Station, http://www.itcentralstation.com/product_reviews/lync-server-review-by-fabrizio-volpe) so that your telephony system will never let you down.
The client is really easy to use and it is powerful, giving users access to features like Call Via Work (enabling outgoing calls from any Lync client, including the apps for mobile devices, always showing your work phone number and not the real one) or Call Parking (put a call on hold from one telephone and then retrieve the call later, also from another phone, dialing an internal number).
Last (but not least) there are many voice routing mechanisms inside Lync, so that you are able to select the path that has the lower cost for a call or the one that is compliant with your company policy with a lot of flexibility

Both the aforementioned points are different faces of the same product, but also looking at them as separate solutions, we have a Lync is great competitor in the U.C. field.

Weak Points of Lync Server 2013

Lync on-premises is costly (you have to pay both user and server licenses).
A deployment of Lync is never trivial and, if we include the Enterprise Voice features, it requires real experts to obtain the best results.
The Office 365 version of Lync (Lync Online), less costly and complex than the on-premises solution, at the moment is not a viable solution, if you require telephony features.
Lync hybrid (on-premises and Cloud mixing) is constrained by the aforementioned limits in Lync Online
Large meetings on-premises require an infrastructure sizing that many companies could not be able to deploy

What Will Change for Lync in the Future

If you look at the list of the weak points, you can easily imagine that a solution for the pain points in the list is something that Microsoft is working on. The new “Mobile-First, Cloud-First” strategy that Microsoft has embraced involves all its products and it will have for sure an impact on VNext, the temporary name experts use for the forthcoming release of Lync.

Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.

it_user639537Works

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Apr 2, 2017

spot on

it_user6528

Infrastructure Expert at a comms service provider with 51-200 employees

May 16, 2013

It is easy to integrate with Call Centers and doesn’t need separate appliances or hardware but several aspects have room for improvement

For how long have you used this product?
- 2 years

Which features of this product are most valuable to you?
- VoIP, IM Chat, Conferencing, Mobility

Can you give an example of how this product has improved the way your organization functions?
- Make it easy to communicate between colleagues, partners and even other companies. It is easy to integrate with Call Centers and doesn’t need separate appliances or hardware. It all can be virtualized. It also allows you to call anytime and anywhere from within your PC or Mobile phone.

What areas of this product have room for improvement?
- IM and file transfer, Conferencing, Persistent Chat, Monitoring and Archiving, Quality of voice and video and Mobility.

Did you encounter any issues with deployment, stability or scalability?
- Integration with Office 365 can be difficult sometimes if migrating users from Lync on cloud to Lync on premise.

Did you previously use a different solution and if so, why did you switch?
- We used to have Openfire, but since we are partners of Microsoft and Lync was a unified communication solution for enterprises which gather everything in it. Then we decided to migrate and deployed our first Lync in 2010.

Before choosing this product, did you evaluate other options? If so, which ones?
- No, we have just choose to go for Microsoft Lync and so as many of our enterprise customers who previously had OCS deployed on their premise.

How would you rate the level of customer service and technical support?
- Overall the level of customer service for Lync is good however, for Microsoft Office 365 it has been improved from getting support on forums to exchanging e-mails and even following up on issues by phone calls.

Was the initial setup straightforward or complex? In what ways?
- Initial setup was some how complicated with the edge part as you have to understand the trick of getting two NICs working and routing the traffic on internal NIC to Lync front end while the other NIC which is external has to face the Firewall DMZ lan.

Did you implement through a vendor team or an in-house one? If through a vendor team, how would you rate their level of expertise?
- We have deployed an in-house server and it’s currently still up and running, also we have evaluated the Office 365 and support was extremely good.

What is your ROI on this product?
- Lync has many features that would save your enterprise money, time and effort. Starting with the money, it lessens the cost of communication by using less PSTN lines for VoIP calls when using the Enterprise Voice feature for Lync, It saves you time since you can have conference calls with your clients on Lync using Multiple Conferencing capability along with Multi-Video as well saving the time of going to the customer’s main office for the meeting. Also it can be integrated with other various application servers providing you features which you probably don’t know about yet.

What was your original setup cost for this product and what is your day-to-day cost of using this product?
- Total cost of the project may vary depending on the requirements of the setup, The number of clients who will be using it and what kind of features would they require on it. It may start from $5000 up to $50,000.

What advice would you give to others looking into implementing this product?
- I have recommended Microsoft Lync to one of the customers who had Asterisk and used to have lot of voice quality issue even though they are using the generic audio codecs that are used by majority of VoIP applications. Microsoft Lync uses a different Codec which makes it unique and has better quality in this case.

Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.

it_user6528Infrastructure Expert at a comms service provider with 51-200 employees

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May 16, 2013

Hi Fabrizio,

Yes this review is dedicated to Lync 2010 more than 2013 however, I have migrated to 2013 about few months ago and noticed the big difference and change between both 2010 and 2013. as you mentioned Monitoring and Archiving are now part of the FE but require a separate SQL server. Mobility has been improved that it actually makes you not in need to use your desktop sometimes.

WAC server supports PowerPoint slides share for multi-point conferencing. I have deployed WAC couple of times in dedicated server (Internal) use and had great results.

Overall I can say a lot of my clients were very satisfied about the results.

I think I have to write another review about Lync 2013.

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it_user4386

Engineer at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees

Feb 20, 2013

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Very effective communication tool

Valuable Features:

Integration with other MS products such as outlook, OWA, SharePoint Support for various client devices, gateways etc. Support for federation with third party.Lync Client allows users access to presence, instant messaging, voice, audio, video, and Web conferencing

Room for Improvement:

Voice telephony and video calls utilize lots of bandwidth.

Other Advice:

It's is a very good product to have -- a solution for IM, voice telephony and video communication bundled into one.

Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.

it_user4401Developer at a transportation company with 1,001-5,000 employees

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Jan 11, 2014

I agree with you, and I would like to add three pros that Microsoft Lync 2013 has. First one is referring to HD video conferencing, because Lync delivers support for 1080p HD resolution for video conferencing, so participants have a sharp, clear display. Second one refers to mobile apps, because Microsoft has developed Lync mobile apps for Windows Phone, iOS and Android. The Lync mobile apps allow users to instant message, call, or join a Lync meeting from virtually anywhere. And the third pro refers to web app, because Microsoft also introduced a web app for Lync.

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it_user1020

Head of Data Center at a tech company with 51-200 employees

Dec 1, 2012

Question regarding Microsoft's Lync server

Hi,

I have been tasked to prepare a plan to upgrade our analogue telephone system into a full-IP unified communications system. Since we have a subscription-based licensing deal with Microsoft, Microsoft's Lync server offers a compelling product for this purpose.

For those of you who have experience using this as your IP communications system, I would like to know your experiences with using this product. Any comment or suggestion would be highly appreciated.

Francis

Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.

it_user3483Senior Consultant at Unify Square

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Jan 5, 2013

Hi Francis.
It is a really good product (I am sort of Lync fanboy :-D ) and Lync gives a lot of features that other product do not have.
Also, it gives an extremely powerful and easy to use client interface (voice operatons like call parking and call forward, for a example, are really simple to make).

The administrative part is not too difficult and the high integration with Active Directory, Exchange and SharePoint is something you will love if you have the aforementioned products in your company.

The costs, however, are not so low.
a) You have to pay client licenses and they are more costly for enterprise voice
b) You have to pay for every single frontend server and if you use Lync voice you need more than one f.e. for high availability (we want our telephones alway up and running, don't we ? :-P )

Ankita Mandowara

Senior Software Engineer at Ace Infoway Pvt. Ltd

Nov 10, 2023

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An easy-to-use tool with a straightforward setup phase

Pros and Cons

"The most valuable features of the solution are that it is quick and easy to use. It is a good tool for group calls."

"I feel bored with the look and feel of the tool, so it should be changed."

What is our primary use case?

I use Skype for Business for my office's internal communications.

What is most valuable?

The most valuable features of the solution are that it is quick and easy to use. It is a good tool for group calls.

What needs improvement?

I feel bored with the look and feel of the tool, so it should be changed.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Skype for Business for five months. I am a customer of the product.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

It is a scalable solution.

Around 400 employees in my company use Skype for Business.

How are customer service and support?

I never had any requirements or needed to contact the technical support team of Skype.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

I have previously worked with Slack, and it was not easy to use, while Skype has been comparatively much better. Compared to Skype, Slack was only providing my company with a free trial, after the expiry of which we could not make calls.

How was the initial setup?

I don't know about the time taken for the product's installation process since my company's technical team managed it.

The product's installation phase was easy.

I think that one of the technical team members was involved in the product's installation process.

The solution is deployed on the devices in our company.

What other advice do I have?

There is no maintenance required for the solution.

I recommend the solution to those who plan to use it.

I rate the overall solution a ten out of ten.

Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.

reviewer2057283

Software architect at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees

Jan 7, 2023

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Easy to use , with nice integration, and very scalable

Pros and Cons

"The integration with Microsoft Outlook for creating and scheduling meetings is nice."

"I would like to see an updated user interface and layout even though no functionality is missing."

What is our primary use case?

Our primary use case is for meetings, online meetings, internal meetings, and with vendors.

How has it helped my organization?

The integration with Microsoft Outlook for creating and scheduling meetings is nice. I believe that this software is very much like the others, for example, Microsoft teams.

What needs improvement?

I would like to see an updated user interface and layout even though no functionality is missing.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Skype for Business for the past two months.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The stability is very good.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

There is excellent scalability and we have five hundred users currently.

What other advice do I have?

I would highly recommend Skype for Business and give it a nine out of ten.

Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.