Eric Losier, CTO
Planning an upgrade for your Cisco Unified Communications environment? Preparing technology budgets for next year? Look out for CUCM 14 deprecated phones.
Cisco had a surprise in store for long-time customers of their UC platform. They announced that a large selection of IP phone models would be deprecated with CUCM release 14.0.
TL;DR
- Before making budget decisions, have a look at the list of CUCM 14 deprecated phones listed below.
- Although Cisco backtracked on its decision to deprecate all the IP phones on the original list, the writing may be on the wall for those phones too.
- That said, Cisco does not plan to support any End of Life (EOL) phones.
- Cisco deprecates phones due to security issues, new features, and sustainability standards.
- There are cloud and on-premises options to help you migrate deprecated phones to current models.
The silver lining: Cisco ultimately reversed its decision. According to Cisco, this “allowed their customers to get additional usage from working models of Cisco IP Phones and delayed a forced migration to alternate clients or phones during challenging business timeframes.” Their customers could move to newer phone models and clients at a reasonable pace.
The initial announcement of CUCM 14 deprecated phones showed which models were on the chopping block. It’s possible these phones will be deprecated when CUCM 15 is released. Check out our round-up of what those were, as well as which previous deprecations will carry over so that you’ll be prepared.
CUCM 14 deprecated phones
While Cisco ultimately decided not to deprecate any additional endpoints in Release 14, their policy to end of life phones hasn’t changed:
“Cisco will not issue bug fixes or security enhancements for endpoints that have reached End of Software Maintenance or End of Support status, regardless of whether those endpoints are deprecated or not deprecated. Cisco will not test Unified Communications Manager with End of Life phones. Nor will we fix Unified Communications Manager bugs that are related to End of Life phones unless the issue can be replicated on a phone that is not End of Life.”
CUCM 11.x and 12.x deprecated phones
Deprecated phones in these releases remain deprecated in all future releases.
Switching to Cisco CUCM 14 blocks you from registering the following phone models:
- Cisco Unified Wireless IP Phone 7921
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 7970
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 7971
- Cisco IP Phone 12 S
- Cisco IP Phone 12 SP
- Cisco IP Phone 12 SP+
- Cisco IP Phone 30 SP+
- Cisco IP Phone 30 VIP
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 7902G
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 7905G
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 7910
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 7910G
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 7910+SW
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 7910G+SW
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 7912G
- Cisco Unified Wireless IP Phone 7920
- Cisco Unified IP Conference Station 7935
Announced CUCM 14 deprecated phones
The phones below were NOT deprecated with Release 14. It’s possible that they could be once CUCM 15 arrives (TBA).
3900 Series
- Cisco Unified SIP Phone 3911
- Cisco Unified SIP Phone 3951
6900 Series
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 6911
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 6921
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 6941
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 6945
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 6961
7900 Series
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 7906G
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 7911G
- Cisco Unified Wireless IP Phone 7925
- Cisco Unified Wireless IP Phone 7925G-EX
- Cisco Unified Wireless IP Phone 7926
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 7931
- Cisco Unified IP Conference Station 7936
- Cisco Unified IP Conference Station 7937G
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 7940
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 7941
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 7960
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 7961
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 7985
8900 Series
- Cisco Unified IP Phone 8941
Why does Cisco deprecate IP phones?
According to Cisco, there are several reasons why some phone models end up in the legacy bin:
- Security: Legacy phone models are not updated with critical software fixes. Cisco’s ability to protect customers from security issues is limited.
- New feature implementation: Some phone models were introduced more than ten years ago (e.g, 7900 series). Their old hardware makes implementing new features and new security features difficult or even impossible.
- Sustainability: Cisco isn’t providing any development support or doing any regression testing for these older phones.
What can you do?
- Check your inventory of IP phones, including phones that are currently not in use.
- Plan the migration to other phone series like the 7800 and 8800 before moving to CUCM 14.
- Look at alternative options, like migrating to cloud technology. ZIRO Parlay Cloud UC, powered by Cisco BroadCloud, could be exactly what you need.
Having deprecated Cisco IP phone challenges? The ZIRO team can help! We’ll work with you to find the ideal solution for your unique requirements. Let’s talk.
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Editor’s note: This article was originally published on March 26, 2019.
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