Forum Discussion

Anjana_S's avatar
Anjana_S
Copper Contributor
Mar 11, 2019

Migration from Office 365 to Active Directory Domain

Hi, We use Office 365 (Business Premium) for email, sharepoint etc. with close to 120 users. But there is no on-premise Active Directory Domain. We plan to have Active Directory installed and all th...
office 365
ChrisWebbTech's avatar
ChrisWebbTech
MVP
Jun 19, 2019
Yeah, I was pointing out to original poster that there is some extra cost to managing via Cloud but it makes up for not needing to build out infrastructure and licensing either. You don't need an E5 but an intune license, but I prefer EMS since the pricing is bearly a dollar more per user and you get Azure AD P1 + Intune in it. Or the best license package is Microsoft 365 E3 which includes E3 + EMS + Windows 10 license.

But if you are talking out of the box, E3 or less only then yes, I would not recommend cloud only :).
CCG-IT's avatar
CCG-IT
Copper Contributor
Sep 03, 2019

ChrisWebbTechI think Chris is on the right track. There are certainly options to either approach but all the future development is going into the predictable recurring revenue models that cloud is giving to Microsoft, Google etc..

 

To clarify one item mentioned earlier you certainly can join/register Windows 10 machines to the Azure service included as part of Office 365 Business Premium. I have done this numerous times. It does not give you all the control an on prem would but you can login with user Office 365 accounts and do some very very basic management (recoverable bitlocker key for example). Full Intune certainly expands on your control options and as Chris said is almost in parity with on prem.

 

The challenge you have is planning out a path that provides a smooth migration with minimal disruptions for your business. That is probably the bigger picture over if one control methods has which bell or whistle for IT. They both provide a way to manage depending on your skill set but in the end one will be sun setting and the other will be getting improved over time.