GS500 Can Not Join Some Skype Meetings

[Anonymous]

TLDR: New Group Series 500 is able to use the “Join” button for SfB meetings created by users with video call features enabled but cannot join SfB meetings created by users without the video call features enabled.

I have a New Group Series 500 (Hardware rev - 18, Release - 5.1.2-320034) that has registered with no issues to on prem SfB 2015 and Exchange servers. The calendar for the room shows up and can join some users Skype for Business meetings.

The issue I am having is when a user that does not have the video calling features enabled for their SfB account makes a Skype meeting and invites the room with the Group Series 500 it will not stay connected. In the desktop SfB client the room will show up briefly then automatically disconnect. The Group Series will show an error that “The call was rejected for unknown reasons” or something along those lines. When trying to add the room manually in the SfB client it will behave the same way. Enabling video for all users is currently not an option due to network load.

I am unsure of the relevance but we have had a Trio 8800 with Visual+ and Skype license that is registered to the same servers running for a few months with no issues.

[Anonymous]

Following up after researching and speaking with Polycom.  This occurs with GS endpoints and, upon further testing, with Trios as well when registered to Skype for Business where users do not have video enabled within SfB.

Essentially it boils down to this is working as intended.  

Whether video is available for a meeting is controlled by the SfB policy applied to the user account on the server side since they are creating the meeting.  So if a room account has video enabled it can call direct room to room within SfB and video will work. The same is true for the Meet Now function if initiated by the Trio.  However if the room with video enabled joins a SfB meeting created by a user with out video the GS will attempt to connect and fail with an error and the Trio with connect but video will not start.

In the interest of preserving the workflow we are looking into enabling video for all users server side but some how still having it disabled on the desktop client.

I will follow up when I hear back from the SfB admin.

[Anonymous · Accepted solution]

After review the solution we are moving forward will be to up date the Skype policy to allow meeting video for all users but disable peer to peer video.