OT: Re: Alternative to MS Exchange

[Rashkae]

Joshua Martin wrote:
> Um... I don't think Exchange is so inexpensive....
> 
> According to the Microsoft website, the cost of Exchange 2007 STANDARD is
> $699, that's all well and good but when you calculate that you also have to
> purchase a CAL for each user that needs to connect to the server (let's say
> you have 25 users at Microsoft's cost of $67 per user or device), then you
> have a total cost of $2374!
> 
> Zimbra does not operate under a service license + CAL for each connecting
> user; instead you make one purchase of support based on your number of
> users. This means that for 25 users connecting to the STANDARD edition of
> Zimbra, with one year of support, you'll only pay $875!
> 

875 * 5 years (I usually deploy a server for longer) = 4375.  You need
to pay annually for the commercial version of Zimbra that includes the
Outlook connector.  And you really don't want to the same comparison
for, say, 30 users :)

> Factoring in the cost of Windows Server (do you need CALs for users
> connecting to the server?), the cost of the Exchange CALs, and the cost of
> Microsoft's support year after year, MICROSOFT EXCHANGE IS NOT INEXPENSIVE
> COMPARED TO OTHER GROUPWARE SOLUTIONS...

Microsoft Support? you'd have to be a sucker to buy into that :)  But I
agree that cost of server + server Cal's is the devil in the details..
that's why I said earlier that Exchange is not expensive *if* you
already have server and Active Directory for your users.