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DX Spectrum vs IBM Tivoli NetCool OMNIbus comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary
 

Categories and Ranking

DX Spectrum
Average Rating
8.4
Number of Reviews
116
Ranking in other categories
Network Management Applications (6th), Network Monitoring Software (20th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (18th), Network Troubleshooting (6th), DX NetOps (1st)
IBM Tivoli NetCool OMNIbus
Average Rating
7.2
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
Event Monitoring (6th)
 

Mindshare comparison

DX Spectrum and IBM Tivoli NetCool OMNIbus aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. DX Spectrum is designed for DX NetOps and holds a mindshare of 28.3%, down 46.4% compared to last year.
IBM Tivoli NetCool OMNIbus, on the other hand, focuses on Event Monitoring, holds 7.5% mindshare, down 9.7% since last year.
DX NetOps
Event Monitoring
 

Featured Reviews

DickBaker - PeerSpot reviewer
Jan 19, 2024
An all-inclusive monitoring solution that adapts to emerging technologies
The product helps to correlate events.  The solution's most valuable features are its integration with Broadcom tools and scalability. DX Spectrum needs better documentation on its complex features.  I have been using the product since 2005.  I rate DX Spectrum's stability an eight point five…
DimitriosArvanitakis - PeerSpot reviewer
Aug 28, 2024
Quality support, intuitive GUI, and helpful alerting
We use the solution for monitoring the HW and network infrastructure of several key corporate applications and network domains in an InsurTech environment. A plethora of HW and network elements are monitored, including the infrastructure of the CRM, ERP, Citrix and Cisco systems, along with the…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Spectrum does such a great job of discovering our network that we have a high confidence in what our inventory is."
"The quick notification of issues, quick alerting because timeliness is always valuable, it's very important for us."
"The containerization of different objects was very helpful in building an org structure. Being able to separately manage your MSP clients with separate visibility was also helpful."
"The fault management is perfect."
"The Spectrum tool improved our network assurance levels for our business units."
"This product provides good visibility into applications at the backend."
"We use Spectrum for network analysis, failure detection, and sending information to our service management tool."
"Scalable and stable network monitoring tool with a simple setup."
"It's good for managed systems. The end query on the user interface is good. You can view lots of charts and graphs."
"Offers very good event/alert drill-down and statistical reporting capabilities."
"The most valuable feature is the event management capability."
"The biggest plus points for me are the configurability and scalability of the solution, as well as the multi-tenancy of the platform."
"The monitoring is the solution's most valuable feature."
"It is an easy-to-use solution."
"Probes are the best feature because they are well written which rarely requires you to write additional rules. These probes monitor activity within your environment."
"It is customer-centric. Customers can access the event list from their location or desktop and view the event. There is no need to go and connect to any other server and run events to have a view of all the events happening in the environment. We get a good response from customers about this feature and the main architecture of NetCool. Its processing is very good. Deduplication and correlation functionalities are good in this solution as compared to other solutions. A big advantage of NetCool is that it also supports multi-layered protocols. We can receive multiple events from different protocols like UDP, HTTP, and those events can be captured in NetCool."
 

Cons

"There should be better integration with other Broadcom products, like network performance manager. Currently, for every part of a product, you need a separate server environment. You have something for Spectrum, you have something for network performance, and you have something for NetFlow. There are a lot of islands and server farms with different technologies. They should be redeveloped to get one platform for all."
"The visual is a little archaic."
"I would like to see better scalability, and maybe, a more intuitive user interface. ​"
"If nobody else has said the documentation needs improvement, let's go there. I understand, you can either write about it or you can do it. And most of us would rather they do it, but now that they've done it, those of us that didn't do it, we need to go and find: "Where did they write about this to tell us how to do it?" That's always lacking."
"I would suggest improving the web GUI to improve the device monitor configuration and to improve or to integrate the new tool for reporting."
"The biggest issue is our integration right now between UIM and Spectrum is lacking."
"I think the management or configuration of devices needs some improvement."
"The Spectrum OneClick is a Java-based client, and that's aging. Really, before any new feature integration, I'd love to see a comprehensive rebuild of the UI."
"There should be an easier-to-understand model, more of a flat-structured model rather than different tiers of licenses which complicates licensing."
"The solution needs to invest in the development of a knowledge base and use of AI services for providing event resolution and intervention directions."
"They could enhance the visibility to give us a unified view of our entire IT infrastructure."
"Its technical support team takes longer to reply."
"I would like for the next release to be more user-friendly and out of date. The next release should focus on the cloud, AI, and ML technologies."
"Its integration could be better. They should provide an easier integration for all the monitoring stuff, and it will make things easier for us. Currently, there is a complexity in integrating it with a vendor application, and we have to use another tool to integrate it with a vendor application. To integrate some applications with NetCool, I need to install an IBM tool on top of it. It would be good if they can provide an API or any kind of interface that we can leverage while developing a new protocol interface or application. We should be able to use an API or interface with NetCool. Its GUI can also be better. As compared to other tools, it is not user friendly, and it is not easy to do stuff through GUI. Whenever we do anything on the GUI, it takes time. They need to focus on the GUI part, especially the dashboard. They should focus on how users can effectively drill down from one box to another. The visual appeal of the dashboard is as important as the data and functionality."
"The cost of the product is quite high. They should work to adjust their pricing models."
"The web portal and typical event controls are a little outdated."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price is good enough to expect an ideal solution. It's expensive."
"DX Spectrum's pricing depends on the license number. It is affordable."
"In general, the license cost will be about 30% of the total TCO for this tool (hardware/support team, OS costs, and OS management)."
"Currently, a perpetual license but some services are moving to a subscription"
"The cost of some of these products are a little cost prohibitive, which is unfortunate. We have to find lower cost solutions for some of the things that we have to pull in. For the most part, CA has capabilities in pretty much everything that you would need. You just have to figure out where are you going to spend the most money for what you have to actually get done. You can do all these things but, which ones do you have to do? And that's hard to choose sometimes because you want to do them all."
"Spectrum is expensive."
"DX Spectrum's pricing is neither expensive nor cheap."
"It is very pricey. With the current trend of enterprises moving towards cheaper and more modern looking solutions like ManageEngine, SevOne, ServicePilot, and Paesller."
"Its license cost is a little bit more than other solutions. Our customers expect a standard market price that is comparative to other products. For each and every NetCool OMNIbus component, we have to purchase a separate license. These components are not free with the product."
"It is a costly solution."
"You have to have the right level of budget to afford this solution."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
17%
Manufacturing Company
16%
Computer Software Company
13%
Government
7%
Financial Services Firm
28%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Energy/Utilities Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about DX Spectrum?
The solution's most valuable features are its integration with Broadcom tools and scalability.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for DX Spectrum?
We are a customer of Broadcom, we use a group license that covers various CA products, including DX Spectrum. The company purchases the licenses they need from this group license, and we do not hav...
What needs improvement with DX Spectrum?
Support from Broadcom could be better. Sometimes we wait a very long time for a solution to level three problems. Challenges and Limitations The only other challenge is the price, which is the main...
What do you like most about IBM Tivoli NetCool OMNIbus?
The biggest plus points for me are the configurability and scalability of the solution, as well as the multi-tenancy of the platform.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Tivoli NetCool OMNIbus?
If the various HW elements are from the same vendor, a monitoring solution provided by that vendor or its partners will potentially result in lower licensing and operational costs. Moreover, for ve...
What needs improvement with IBM Tivoli NetCool OMNIbus?
The solution needs to invest in the development of a knowledge base and use of AI services for providing event resolution and intervention directions based on: - The HW vendor - The alert type - Th...
 

Also Known As

CA Spectrum
Tivoli NetCool OMNIbus
 

Learn More

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

National Informatics Centre India, Banese, Olympus, AlphaServe Technologies, Sicredi
Consolidated Communications, €sterreichische Bundesbahnen (€BB), Capgemini