Anyone using/planning to use Office 365?

OCdude

OCdude

OCdude

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My company is thinking of moving over to it so i'm curious to see what peoples experiences are.

I've played around with a trial and i'm in two minds about it at the moment. Moving everything to a web based platform, to me, seems a bit scary (in terms of management). Not sure if i'll go insane managing Exchange/file permissions/users via a web page!

Also, I can't for the life of me, see where you can import your company's data. I can see a simple crappy "upload files" section in the "Team site" section, but yeaaaaaaah i'm not about to upload 50 GB+ of data via some web site! Surely there's a better way?! (Or am I missing something here?!)
 
When you're talking about 50GB data, you mean on a SharePoint installation, or mailboxes?

There's a mailbox migration tool that will import mailboxes for you, presume there will be something similar for SP.

We were set to move over to it, but then backed out when they announced they were subject to the Patriot Act. Ended up going with a UK based company called Cobweb :)
 
Hmm yeah it'll be about 50 GB of data i'll be waiting to put into sharepoint (the usual, Word/Excel docs etc.

One possible caveat with email, is that we currently use a hosted Exchange, so i'm guessing that will make things less straight forward when/if we migrate our email as well!

EDIT: As for Cobweb, we've used them in the past and had some total nightmares :/
 
OCdude said:
Hmm yeah it'll be about 50 GB of data i'll be waiting to put into sharepoint (the usual, Word/Excel docs etc.

One possible caveat with email, is that we currently use a hosted Exchange, so i'm guessing that will make things less straight forward when/if we migrate our email as well!

EDIT: As for Cobweb, we've used them in the past and had some total nightmares :/
Click to expand...

I work for Cobweb, I'd be interested to hear what problems you had?
 
Eulogy said:
I work for Cobweb, I'd be interested to hear what problems you had?
Click to expand...

Well I don't want to be too specific, but we used to experience quite a lot of downtime (this would have been 2007-2008) And we also had problems when we were migrated over to the new 2007 platform a few months back.

Also Parallels, while powerful Seems a bit.. Non user friendly (navigating three various menu levels was a bit confusing).

This was just email though. Didn't look at Sharepoint.

I'd probably consider going back to Cobweb if there was a decent Competing 365 type offering... Msybe!
 
OCdude said:
Well I don't want to be too specific, but we used to experience quite a lot of downtime (this would have been 2007-2008) And we also had problems when we were migrated over to the new 2007 platform a few months back.

Also Parallels, while powerful Seems a bit.. Non user friendly (navigating three various menu levels was a bit confusing).

This was just email though. Didn't look at Sharepoint.

I'd probably consider going back to Cobweb if there was a decent Competing 365 type offering... Msybe!
Click to expand...

Understood, yeah we had a few problems back then but that should all be better now, the 2007 servers for the large part are a lot more reliable. Generally don't get downtime on the backends except for scheduled outages/maintenance work :)

Regards Parallels, as you said it's not bad but can be confusing at times, I agree with your assesment as well, however Parallels is also used by a number of hosters such as Aptix, I can't honestly see Parallels being ditched in favour of something else in the near future.

It would be nice if we could offer services in the same way as MS do with Office365 but the chances are slim for this version of Exchange because we use Parallels and have a lot invested in that at the moment.

Saying all of this though, we are seeing very good mailbox growth at the moment, migrations are just about done and we are taking actions to improve service where we can without waiting until things become problems! :)
 
does 365 offer any kind of service level agreement?


Cobwebs migration team is a complete joke.

After 4-5years they decided our connector broke message labs t&c's so disconnected us without telling us or making any notes on the system. No one on the phone could understand a network setup to save there lifes. Now all communication has ceased from cobweb. not a happy customer as we are having to run in a unrecommended setup by cobweb them selfs.

Im ranting on the internet because they are ignoring all our emails.
 
clade said:
does 365 offer any kind of service level agreement?


Cobwebs migration team is a complete joke.

After 4-5years they decided our connector broke message labs t&c's so disconnected us without telling us or making any notes on the system. No one on the phone could understand a network setup to save there lifes. Now all communication has ceased from cobweb. not a happy customer as we are having to run in a unrecommended setup by cobweb them selfs.

Im ranting on the internet because they are ignoring all our emails.
Click to expand...

My email is in trust if you want to take this up with me off the forums, will be in work tomorrow so can dig deeper for you if you want?
 
I am actually in the processing of moving my own personal email account over, at £3.50 a month its far cheaper than any hosted exchange I have come across.

Just waiting for DNS MX records to change over so hopefully should know tomorrow...
 
I was all set to move my person email over to an Enterprise account - mainly so i can get Office Pro Plus (Subscription ed) too, but the patriot act stuff is really rather annoying, i'm not sure i will or not, (not that i've got anything to hide)
 
Moved mine over, at the end of the day theres nothing in my email account thats illegal and even then you would probably have to be pretty deep into illegal actions to get patriot act used against u
 
Bry said:
Moved mine over, at the end of the day theres nothing in my email account thats illegal and even then you would probably have to be pretty deep into illegal actions to get patriot act used against u
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That's pretty naive.

1. They decide what is deemed acceptable reason for accessing your data under the Patriot Act
2. You never find out your data is being accessed
3. Would you be willing to have someone listen in on your phone calls?

I hate the expression, but it's the 'thin end of the wedge', with our rights to privacy gradually being eroded.
 
Though with that said, it is an entirely personal decision - data on you/all of us is being (ab)used by companies across the world at this very moment. I guess you just have to decide if you're that bothered.
 
slylittlefox said:
That's pretty naive.

1. They decide what is deemed acceptable reason for accessing your data under the Patriot Act
2. You never find out your data is being accessed
3. Would you be willing to have someone listen in on your phone calls?

I hate the expression, but it's the 'thin end of the wedge', with our rights to privacy gradually being eroded.
Click to expand...


not naive at all. The Government can look at my email if they want there is nothing in there that can get me arrested. If the Government did start looking at mass into people's emails then I think the law might change anyway.

I wouldnt be surprised if they are already monitoring our phone calls. Listening to them all probably not but monitoring I wouldn't be surprised.

Anyway more of a discussion for another thread. But ask yourself this, Microsoft have servers in the USA, so does google and so does a lot of other companies. I think you would find it nigh on impossible to avoid that law.
Anyway more of a discussion for a different thread as it doesn't really apply soley to office365
 
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