Migrating InformaCast off VMware?
Posted by darkfeetduck@reddit | sysadmin | View on Reddit | 33 comments
Hey All,
We are nearly complete with our project to retire our vSphere cluster. We run the gamut of Cisco phone systems on-prem, so with the latest update to Unified Attendant Console, Unity, etc. we were able to migrate all that to our new Nutanix cluster.
At this point, the only system remaining is InformaCast. Their support has stated to me outright that they do not support Nutanix or any other hypervisors, and that it is not on their roadmap to change this. Their official compatibility matrix lists only ESXi related platforms, and states they do not support other VMware platforms. I do not plan on paying the Broadcom rates to renew our support for a single VM, so I am looking for any alternatives.
Even though it is explicitly listed as not supported, the first thing I plan on trying is to export the OVF and run it on VMware Workstation or similar on a dedicated desktop. Gross as that is, that seems to have the highest chance of working smoothly.
Has anyone successfully moved their InformaCast off of VMware? I have found a handful of conversations with people experimenting, but I haven't found a case of anyone having any success. I'm open to anything at this point. Alternatively, if anyone has an InformaCast alternative with better platform support to recommend, I'm all ears.
HanSolo71@reddit
Watching this as a Singlewire employee.
flakpyro@reddit
It would be nice for it to run officially on Xen/KVM platforms like XCP-NG/XenServer, and the various KVM options out there (Proxmox, HPE, etc) Drivers for these (lke xen-blkfront and xen-netfront) are baked into the Linux kernel so simply not removing them would go a long way. We've has zero issues for over 2 years with our hacked together VMs at multiple locations. Working in Education, paying for VMware at all these locations was no longer an option, nor is buying the expensive appliance for every location either.
HanSolo71@reddit
Your request has been heard and noted.
ifq29311@reddit
how big are the VMs? free esxi version would be able to run them?
darkfeetduck@reddit (OP)
InformaCast is miniscule, one VM, one CPU core, 4GB RAM, 80GB HDD. Hence why I am not looking to renew our whole licensing agreement over it.
Unless I misunderstand something, the free version of ESXi is for eduactional/home use only. No commercial usage.
ifq29311@reddit
https://knowledge.broadcom.com/external/article/399823/vmware-esxi-80-update-3e-now-available-a.html
nothing here that would suggest its not applicable for produciton workloads. only thats "ideal for" home labs and test envs. you'd have to drill inside ToC to confirm but it looks like nothing changed from before Broadcom acquisition.
ifq29311@reddit
you only have to agree to general ToC that are not product specific, and by searching for "production" the only limitation i see for non-production workloads is for evaluation software - which this is not.
throw it at your legal to confirm but i'm pretty sure you're good to go.
darkfeetduck@reddit (OP)
The official statement has some basic terms and conditions info, linked at the bottom of that page: VMware ESXi 8.0 Update 3e Release Notes
"Broadcom makes available the VMware vSphere Hypervisor version 8, an entry-level hypervisor. No Broadcom support is available for this offering and it is for non-production use"
Unfortunately, I think that option is out.
ifq29311@reddit
this is not not actual license/agreement that you agree to when downloading the product. only that document matters.
for me it kinda looks like trying to hide actual license terms with vague description so people pay up instead ("for non-production" does not mean "for non-production only" - and since its not a document you are agreeing to when you download, its not really enforceable)
not sure whats your next best option, but i'm pretty sure it aint cheaper than 2-3h work hours of someone at legal dept verifying the licesnse terms.
thehuntzman@reddit
Broadcom killed free ESXi in 2024 AFAIK
darkfeetduck@reddit (OP)
They brought it back later, but I believe it's not allowed for production environments. Only home use or testing.
mattk84@reddit
We are looking to move our fusion VMs off ESXi and just purchase their IPTA-IFS hardware appliance. We have 2 VMs currently and 2 hardware appliances cost less then $3000.
https://www.cdwg.com/product/singlewire-informacast-fusion-hardware-appliance/5065663?enkwrd=IPTA-IFS
This way its supported by Singlewire and we don't have to send Broadcom another cent. Food for thought.
darkfeetduck@reddit (OP)
My understanding of those dedicated appliances is that they were still running ESXi on the bare metal, so you were still stuck paying a recurring fee. Am I wrong on that? Are there any other ongoing costs associated with the physical hardware aside from support?
HanSolo71@reddit
They do not run ESXi. - A singlewire employee.
mattk84@reddit
My understanding from talking with Singlewire support was no fees except support licensing. We originally asked them about any Hyper-V implementation, they said they have received a lot of requests for other hypervisors but they have nothing in the works just yet but the requests are coming in as people migrate away. We don't have the boxes currently but were looking at them as an option. They were listed here in their compatibility matrix.
https://support.singlewire.com/s/article/matrix-server-platforms
darkfeetduck@reddit (OP)
Hell, if it's that simple, that's the way I'll probably go. Thanks for the heads up, I'll chat with their support.
flakpyro@reddit
We do have InformaCast running on XCP-NG 8.3. It's less than ideal and probably completely unsupported but it does work. We asked 2 years ago about support for other hypervisors as well.
darkfeetduck@reddit (OP)
You are the first human I have found that has said they had success getting this running on an unsupported platform, even if it's sketchy.
I can't say this is the route I'll take, but there's some good info here. If I end up throwing this on VMware Workstation and it complains at all, I'll check out setting the BIOS options you mentioned. Thanks!
bakonpie@reddit
you planned a migration to another hypervisor and neglected to check if there was support for the systems running on it before starting the migration? am I on shittysysadmin?
darkfeetduck@reddit (OP)
The blame for that falls on someone else, though it is still my problem to solve unfortunately.
thehuntzman@reddit
There is a VERY LARGE caveat there that they have only added support for Nutanix AHV running on Cisco UCS. If you are running Cisco Unified Communications VM's on Nutanix using non-Cisco compute, you're SoL when it comes time to open a TAC case...
darkfeetduck@reddit (OP)
As far as I am aware, that isn't accurate. We already completed our migration from VMware to Nutanix for UCM and all that. Part of that was that we had to open a case with Cisco to get the Nutanix bootable ISOs. It would have been stated in that ticket that we were explicitly requesting the ISOs because we were moving to Nutanix, and we had third-party support involved in the migration as well. I'd be really surprised if everyone in that chain missed that memo.
To be clear, we're running full Nutanix AHV with Prism on their SuperMicro hosts.
thehuntzman@reddit
I work for a Cisco Preferred partner so I can tell you for 100% fact they only support it on Cisco Hardware. I have a customer who was going through the pre-work trying to figure out how or if they should make the jump to AHV but their existing Nutanix stack is Supermicro like yours.
Please reference page 27 of "Cisco Virtualization Guide for Cisco On-premises Calling Applications" here: https://www.cisco.com/c/dam/en/us/td/docs/voice_ip_comm/uc_system/Solution-guide-virtualization-guide/Cisco-Virtualization-Guide-for-Cisco-On-premises-Calling-Applications.pdf
It calls out:
darkfeetduck@reddit (OP)
Well that's certainly interesting to hear. Our third-party support is a Cisco Gold partner; I'll be following up with them on that.
Chalk one more up for "Not my fault but still my problem." We work through this partner for all our Cisco stuff, so barring any major compatibility issue, hopefully things can just coast until we move on to something else.
thehuntzman@reddit
I'm interested to hear how this plays out because if Cisco really will support UC on AHV with non Cisco hardware, that makes my life WAY easier.
FatBook-Air@reddit
We are actually thinking about migrating from Informacast for this exact reason. We haven't done a ton of research yet, but we are waiting to hear back from Alertus about whether they officially support Proxmox. The spec sheet they gave me just says that they support virtualization in general, which I think is a good sign.
darkfeetduck@reddit (OP)
We're keeping an eye out for alternatives as well, but due to timing, I think we're going to settle for a band-aid solution for now, then pursue a full replacement after.
I haven't come across Alertus yet, I'll have to throw them in the mix.
FatBook-Air@reddit
FWIW, I just got word back from Alertus technical support and they explicitly consent to using Proxmox and any other of the "big name" hypervisors.
sryan2k1@reddit
Do you have perpetual licenses left? Keep an ESX box around
darkfeetduck@reddit (OP)
The hellhole that is Broadcom licensing is not my strong suite, but didn't all those get killed off?
Our cluster is VxRail through Dell. If I could come up with a perpetual license, even for an older version, I would certainly take it. Remove one node from the cluster, wipe it, install whatever version of ESXi I can, firewall off the unit as best as possible, and call it good enough for a year or two.
sryan2k1@reddit
The license keys you had for ESX pre-subscription are valid "Forever" if you can find one.
IntrepidWelder8@reddit
We have a fusion sever and a number of paging gateways on VMware host across sites. Our plan was to move to their hardware paging gateways but they are expensive for what they are.
Fusion server not sure yet but again I think there a hardware option.
I did petition them 18 months ago to offer more than VMware…. As an option
darkfeetduck@reddit (OP)
Considering Cisco announced upcoming Nutanix support \~6 months ago, I was really hopeful that SignalWire would follow, but obviously nothing yet.
I glanced at the hardware appliances in the past. From my understanding, you're still stuck paying VMware a license since it's just a sized-down esxi host. Not sure if something like that would be exempt from their minimum core count licensing.