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BMC Client Management vs Quest KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 27, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

BMC Client Management
Ranking in Endpoint Compliance
8th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
7
Ranking in other categories
Mobile Device Management (MDM) (8th)
Quest KACE Systems Manageme...
Ranking in Endpoint Compliance
7th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
39
Ranking in other categories
Client Desktop Management (5th), Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM) (12th), Patch Management (10th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the Endpoint Compliance category, the mindshare of BMC Client Management is 2.1%, up from 1.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Quest KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) is 3.5%, up from 2.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Endpoint Compliance
 

Featured Reviews

Shirish Kamalapurkar - PeerSpot reviewer
Very Valuable Automation Product for Clients/Endpoint Management like Desktops and Laptops
Our company provides implementation and support services for customers. The solution provides the entire automation of desktops or laptops for our clients. It can provide detailed inventory like software and hardware details, automate the deployment of software, automate patch management, and…
Scott Tweed - PeerSpot reviewer
Low maintenance, reliable, and easy to create packages
I like how when you click on the device, it shows you everything that has changed as well as the software versioning. I am really enjoying the inventory aspect of it. The deployment process for both deploying and creating a package is straightforward. I believe the inventory in KACE is superior to SCCM's. I know with SCCM I could do things like remote console into machines via the agent's remote console, but that is not a feature that is provided in KACE. I know that at least in the Systems Management Appliance, I can't get to it. I'm not sure how distribution works, with distribution points. I'm not sure if KACE has that feature. You could use an SCCM to set up distribution points at remote sites so that they don't have to download patches or software from across the country. If you have a DP or something similar, they could pull it down.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"The most valuable features of the solution are its patching capabilities and the help it offers when it comes to use cases, like prompting for the reboot after a certain period of time."
"The support from BMC Client Management is very good."
"It's a scalable solution. We have deployed it for customers using 3000 nodes to those using 300,000 nodes."
"One feature I like, that was especially valuable during the pandemic, is remote control. Remote control grants administrators and support personnel access to the laptops and PCs of employees (who might be working from home) in order to fix any issues that come up as and when they come up, even without having to wait for a support request."
"The most valuable features of the solution are patch management and software license management."
"The inventory and patch management tools are very valuable."
"BMC Client Management is a stable solution and one of the best in the market. It allows me to manage all recipe endpoints, including iOS, Android, Linux, Unix, and Windows, all within the same solution."
"We're able to deploy software and push out fixes to endpoints faster than ever."
"The solution provides us a single pane of glass with everything that we need for endpoint management of all devices. It definitely has made our endpoint management process much easier."
"Patching is definitely the most valuable feature. It gives us good, centralized software, which comes in very handy since we are doing 400 servers at a time. It enables us to manage all the servers, and to deal with the application team regarding reboots and scheduling."
"The ability to push an image to a machine, wake that image up, and just blast a new image to a computer without even having to touch it, and then push the software to that machine. This just made things so much more convenient for us and so much more efficient."
"It is excellent in terms of updating and configuring everything the way we need. For anything more complex, we do professional service engagements, and they're exceptional. For anything less complex, we just need to ask questions. Their support division is extremely good too."
"The information available via KACE is up to date, critical to our normal operations, and has become the go-to tool of our IT teams for extended support."
"There is one place for a lot of different things. If somebody has a problem with their computer, they will put in a ticket. From there, we will know who it is and the assets assigned to them, because there is one place to go look for what we are talking about and with whom we are talking. Just having one place for everything is really convenient. For example, we are able to deploy software to hundreds of computers. We don't need to go to each individual device."
"The ability to build scripts right on the deployment center itself, as well as building groups that take those scripts/task chains has been absolutely invaluable and one of the most important parts of my whole environment."
 

Cons

"The on-premises version of BMC Client Management has powerful remote control functionality and decent compliance features, but these features both rely on the discovery tool in order to gain a complete set of insights about the endpoint's environment. Now, BMC's discovery solution depends on having an agent installed in each endpoint and sometimes the agent doesn't work properly, making it difficult to get an accurate understanding of the environment (including special topologies) even with BMC's discovery tool."
"BMC Client Management could improve in the area of integration."
"The solution needs to add whitelisting because many customers request it."
"The solution does not offer the functionality of remote access to users."
"BMC Client Management supports only iOS devices. It would be good if they would support Android as well."
"In BMC Client Management, I would like to see more features for executing commands remotely. For example, with SAP, there isn't the capability to execute all the commands available in the console. The latest version includes more endpoints, but they do not cover everything the operations team needs. Additionally, I think improving the hierarchy for managing endpoints is crucial. Extending the endpoint capabilities would be highly beneficial."
"It would be good if BMC Client Management can perform vulnerability assessment scanning at the endpoint on its own and mitigate that. Then, we wouldn't have to rely on a third party VA tool. I would like to see this application move to being a web-based one."
"We had issues with the tool's support. We are a Dutch firm and everything has to be in Dutch. We were not able to do the alerts. You were required to tweak them a lot to get them in the language that you preferred. The solution's support depended on the person that you got online. Sometimes, the response was fast and other times you needed to wait a long time. The support also depended on the levels of support that you had requested."
"There isn't a lot they need to improve with the solution itself at this point. It is pretty close to providing a single pane of glass for everything that we need for endpoint management specifically on all devices. There is very little that it doesn't provide for us, and for those, we have to go to other methods. There are some of the patching solutions that it doesn't take care of for us. So, we have to do those manually on the devices, and that's really the biggest thing. It doesn't do patching really well for non-Microsoft applications. The major application updates, particularly Windows updates, don't function nearly as well, but, for the vast majority of things, it does just fine. If they could improve in this aspect, that'd be great, but I don't know if they're going to be able to do that."
"It could be designed a little bit more intuitively in terms of administration."
"It took a little bit of time to figure out how to use the KACE Service Desk. I like the way that I'm able to customize it. But when it comes to how our techs are able to use it, it's not as functional as our current solution, which is BMC FootPrints Service Desk."
"There should be a mini toolbox, like the competitors of KACE have, with the small features for KACE administrators. That would make their lives easier. If you are troubleshooting a specific endpoint, remote control is available as is Wake-on-LAN. But if you want to execute some commands, you have to use a third-party tool, the PS tool. If they would integrate those small things, it would make KACE more powerful."
"The labeling process should be more streamlined. It should be easier to do. It gets confusing at times."
"Its dashboard needs improvement. Currently, there is no way to modify the dashboard. There should be more flexibility so that we can create views according to our use case."
"I would like them to implement VBScript language in KACE Systems Management. Currently, we can only use PowerShell."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"BMC Client Management is a high-priced solution, but given its performance and capabilities, I think it offers great value. I don't have the exact number for the yearly licensing costs. I believe there is an additional cost of around two hundred dollars."
"The solution is low cost."
"BMC Client Management is a very affordable solution. There is one main server license which I believe is around $1,000 per year, and then there is the license for the actual solution. With the solution license, you can opt for a suite license where you get access to all the features and benefits, or alternatively you can buy any of the five main components of the suite license individually."
"To use BMC Client Management they charge annually per node."
"Its pricing model is good for what it offers. Nobody here gives me a hard time about renewing the contract every year. It might be a little cost prohibitive for a smaller company who has to stand up a virtual environment as well as have virtual environment licensing and the hardware. If you have a smaller environment, it might be cost prohibitive. If you only have a couple of hundred computers, you might be more willing to do those manually. In our environment, the cost savings of having KACE far outweigh the licensing costs. We are okay with its pricing model."
"Based on other solutions that we had implemented, its pricing seems to be quite competitive. It is not inexpensive, but it is also not more expensive than any other solution. They have the standard licensing fees and support fees."
"The pricing is great. It's billed annually and it's very reasonable."
"It is expensive in Brazil."
"We pay annually for technical support."
"Licensing is very straightforward. They don't overcomplicate it. This is not a Cisco product where you have to have 30 different licenses just to open the box. It's pretty much set-and-forget. You pay an annual license... The cost is in the mid to upper range, but the ROI exceeds the outside cost, especially once you've had the system for a while."
"There are no costs in addition to the standard licensing fees."
"The pricing is fair."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
20%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Government
8%
Healthcare Company
7%
Computer Software Company
12%
University
12%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Government
10%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about BMC Client Management?
The most valuable features of the solution are its patching capabilities and the help it offers when it comes to use cases, like prompting for the reboot after a certain period of time.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for BMC Client Management?
BMC Client Management is a high-priced solution, but given its performance and capabilities, I think it offers great value. I don't have the exact number for the yearly licensing costs. I believe t...
What needs improvement with BMC Client Management?
In BMC Client Management, I would like to see more features for executing commands remotely. For example, with SAP, there isn't the capability to execute all the commands available in the console. ...
What do you like most about Quest KACE Systems Management?
KACE automatically tracks this information and saves it for me, allowing me to call it up on the dashboard. For example, if I need to find Juliano's computer in the system, I don't need to search t...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Quest KACE Systems Management?
The pricing is in the middle range of the market, not too expensive but not the cheapest either.
What needs improvement with Quest KACE Systems Management?
The user interface needs improvement as customers have mentioned they do not like the interface since it is not an SMA-based interface and lacks a manual configuration option.
 

Also Known As

BMC Helix Client Management, Helix Client Management, BMC Fromdistance Mobile Device Management
Dell KACE Systems Management
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Charter Manufacturing
Waypoint, Mattos Filho, Meetic, Gems Education, Green Clinic HealthSystem, Service King
Find out what your peers are saying about BMC Client Management vs. Quest KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
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