Advise needed from the Zimbra Community

[hspcd]

Hi All -
We're running ZCS NE and have been for nearly 2 1/2 years. We've been using Windows Mobile (Samsung Jack) phones for corporate mobile access and there have been a lot of issues with the stability and reliability of these phones and we're not sure if it's an issue with Windows phones in general or if the Samsung Jack is simply an inferior phone.

Anyway, we've been getting a lot of pressure from users and management to find a new solution. Some like Blackberry devices and really want this to be the end solution. Blackberry devices are acceptable to our IT staff and management but what concerns us is that Zimbra is not listed as a supported platform in the Blackberry documentation and the thought of calling RIM with a support question and being denied support because we're not running a supported mail server is very scary.

So I have a few questions to pose to the community about your experience with BES and Zimbra NE. Hopefully your responses will help us make a better informed decision.

1. Has anyone here called RIM for support and actually received support?
2. What major problems have you run into with ZCB and BES? Which versions?
3. How many mailboxes/devices do you support in a production environment?
4. How has adding BES and ZCB complicated your environment?
5. Has adding BES and ZCB increased calls for support from your end users at all?
6. Have you had any issues with respect to applying device security policies?
7. Were you using Zimbra Mobile with other devices before moving to BB devices and BES/ZCB?
8. Has anyone's organization moved away from BES/ZCB in favor of Zimbra Mobile and devices that support ActiveSync? If so, why?

Thanks for taking the time to help!

- Clay

[xeon]

Originally Posted by hspcd

1. Has anyone here called RIM for support and actually received support?
   Nope, never had a need to call RIM for support
2. What major problems have you run into with ZCB and BES? Which versions?
   No major problems. Just have to watch out permissions on the services and the cache files. I had to re-activate all my users once when I changed a password, long day... oops
3. How many mailboxes/devices do you support in a production environment?
   35 mailboxes and 22 BES users
4. How has adding BES and ZCB complicated your environment?
   I added a virtual machine to me ESXi infrastructure, easy as pie.
5. Has adding BES and ZCB increased calls for support from your end users at all?
   Yes and no. Yes to the point where during upgrades of ZCB and BES I have had weird sync issues with just a few users. After restart of services and ensure ZCB was repaired all was well.
6. Have you had any issues with respect to applying device security policies?
   No issues. BlackBerry has MUCH MUCH better policy management compared to ActiveSync. ActiveSync is a free for all compared to BlackBerry.
7. Were you using Zimbra Mobile with other devices before moving to BB devices and BES/ZCB?
   No. All BlackBerrys when we moved from hosted Exchange.
8. Has anyone's organization moved away from BES/ZCB in favor of Zimbra Mobile and devices that support ActiveSync? If so, why?
   I have moved to ActiveSync because the Android phone is able to do much more. We are currently looking and hoping for better BlackBerry devices that can view and modify attachments with much more ease. This is not a problem with Zimbra or BES but BlackBerry limitations.

I added my responses in the quote. We have about 10 heavy users and since moving from a hosted Exchange to Zimbra (with BES) I have not had many problems if any. My users really have seen no difference besides quicker mail delivery and my ability to actually troubleshoot mail problems.

I will say every time I need to upgrade or do maintenance on the BES server I get a little nervous. Its always a if its not broke don't fix deal. Zimbra and BES seem to be a little touchy, so make sure you do a lot of testing and document any little caveats.

I upgraded from ZCB 6.0.x to 6.5.3 and BES 4.1.16 to 5.0.2 MR3 without issues. Users only noticed the downtime which I notified them before hand. Had one device not sync after the upgrade a day later. Stopped services, repaired ZCB, and started services no issues since.

I am happy with Zimbra and BES. Only thing my users miss is Memopad (BlackBerry) not synced with server and Outlook. My "fix" for that is to suggest they create a contact and put notes in that instead. Zimbra keeps adding abilities. The latest was syncing Contact pictures. Works awesome.

[hspcd]

Xeon,
Thanks for your time in responding. It is truly appreciated. Hopefully others will as well.