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IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact vs SCOM comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 23, 2025

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

IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact
Ranking in Event Monitoring
11th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SCOM
Ranking in Event Monitoring
4th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
82
Ranking in other categories
Network Monitoring Software (14th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2025, in the Event Monitoring category, the mindshare of IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact is 2.9%, down from 3.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SCOM is 7.9%, down from 9.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Event Monitoring
 

Featured Reviews

VD
Supports APA through ISPF and lets us easily integrate with other apps for ticketing purposes
For improvement, I'd say the dashboard and the overall GUI could use some work. Although, I don't think that there's much improvement that Netcool really needs to achieve in this area, because when we're talking GUI, Impact is able to integrate with any third-party system and it comes with ISPF APA. It's more beneficial than Netcool/OMNIbus in this respect, and it's quite easy to handle. Some statistics around the products would also be nice. For example, to see how it performs. So when the bulk copy has been processed by Impact, through a kind of dashboard, it could indicate to the user: ""This many events have been process this many times, and this particular event may cause trouble. This many events are in testing, etc." Basically, I'd like more visibility into the details and particulars through Impact itself, so that we can take action on what's happening, and we can automate. For instance, we could maybe send the events to some kind of server or monitoring program, and perform automation on them.
MarcMermuys - PeerSpot reviewer
Has efficient monitoring with robust integration capabilities
We use SCOM to configure different monitors using several management packs. It integrates systems like Active Directory and correlates them, and it is used for monitoring and managing systems SCOM allows integration of several systems, providing correlation between different systems such as…

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 feature that comes with Netcool/Impact is the ISPF APA support. It is inherent to Netcool/Impact, so I can use the ISPF of any other product, which I can invoke and consume through Impact, and do integrations, which is great. I run the Netcool desktop application so I can integrate with other applications in the ticketing system. It's a great ability being able to invoke ISPF and integrate."
"It is easy to integrate with other models such as Oracle, other systems, external systems, and to reach events."
"The solution is great at being able to fetch almost any kind of file."
"This product allows us to make use of open-source products, including running Java code."
"The solution's reporting engine has given me detailed information on which applications or services I've either failed or about to fail in terms of the predictive makeup on Azure cloud."
"Availability monitoring is the feature I have found most valuable, as well as the capacity and ability to send notifications."
"The inbuilt management pack that Microsoft provides is really helpful. I know it's a mature product, and they keep upgrading the management pack."
"SCOM has improved our organization by simplifying the monitoring process. The system tells you what the bi-weekly or monthly usage was and that enables us to report this information to the manager. It shows if there was a connectivity issue that needs to be fixed and it's easier to concentrate on what needs to get fixed. System errors, therefore, get fixed faster."
"This solution satisfies all of the requirements that we need for our Windows-based systems, so if you are using the Windows platform then this is an easy solution."
"Because it's Windows-based, it actually reports quite well. It reports everything you can think of on the Windows server and allows you to monitor anything. It's excellent for those in the Windows world as it's very good at it."
"This is a product that does more generally than any of the competing solutions."
"It is very good at monitoring Microsoft Server."
 

Cons

"For improvement, I'd say the dashboard and the overall GUI could use some work. Although, I don't think that there's much improvement that Netcool really needs to achieve in this area, because when we're talking GUI, Impact is able to integrate with any third-party system and it comes with ISPF APA. It's more beneficial than Netcool/OMNIbus in this respect, and it's quite easy to handle."
"IBM is not investing in the development of the on-premise version of this solution."
"The solution is somewhat complicated. It's not exactly straightforward."
"Stability-wise, this product needs to be improved."
"SCOM is not as straightforward in terms of user interface or general experience, which could be improved."
"The management of the servers could be better."
"Application monitoring must be improved."
"On-prem network monitoring is something that could be improved drastically."
"In terms of features that could be improved, I would say the agent integration into the operating system. We are having difficulties integrating Linux into some of the networking devices."
"The solution should have more tools for monitoring the cloud engine versus on-premise."
"Direct integration with third-party tools, like ticketing systems, is lacking but would be beneficial."
"SCOM needs to improve its usability."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Licensing of IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact depends on the number of nodes on the element that you are monitoring."
"The licensing is yearly, and although I'm happy with the pricing I do think it could be better."
"It is the cheapest product available in the market."
"There is a license needed to use this solution and it is paid annually."
"Two customers bought the enterprise agreement with Microsoft and paid for Software Assurance. But few customers don't buy it for Software Assurance. They just buy it and deploy it, and they think that we will be using it for the next five years."
"The pricing and licensing are fair."
"The pricing is good, and it's part of their system center suite."
"We have an enterprise agreement that includes this product as part of it."
"If you have a Microsoft Enterprise Agreement, then this is part of the agreement."
"We have an EA with Microsoft, and it comes as part of the EA."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
19%
Computer Software Company
10%
Real Estate/Law Firm
9%
Retailer
9%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

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What do you like most about SCOM?
The tool helps to monitor Windows servers. It offers alerts from a central location.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SCOM?
I am not aware of the exact pricing as it is managed by my supervisor. As an academic institution, we receive substantial discounts.
What needs improvement with SCOM?
SCOM is likely to be phased out in favor of more compatible tools like Icinga ( /products/icinga-reviews ) for application monitoring or when moving to cloud solutions like CloudWatch and Azure ( /...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Tivoli NetCool Impact
System Center Operations Manager, SCOM 2012
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Claranet, Consolidated Communications, Telus, €sterreichische Bundesbahnen (€BB), Telekom Srbija, Bendigo Community Telco, Capgemini, Schweizerische Bundesbahnen (SBB)
Dialog Telekom
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact vs. SCOM and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
842,388 professionals have used our research since 2012.