SSIS Reviews, Competitors and Pricing

KirillSlivchikov

Owner at 7Spring Consult

Aug 5, 2019

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Offers excellent integration and has great simplicity

Pros and Cons

"The simplicity of the solution is great. The solution also offers excellent integration."

"The interface could use improvement, as well as the administrative tools. Jobs fail from time to time for different reasons. It's not a problem with Microsoft, or SSIS itself. The problems are external, but to find the problems and analyze them it takes too much time."

What is most valuable?

The simplicity of the solution is great. The solution also offers excellent integration.

What needs improvement?

The interface could use improvement, as well as the administrative tools. Jobs fail from time to time for different reasons. It's not a problem with Microsoft, or SSIS itself. The problems are external, but to find the problems and analyze them it takes too much time. If SSIS could make some new monitors or new features for finding the reasons for the problems in the processes and analyzing it for how to correct the issues, that would be great.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using the solution for over six months.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The solution is stable.

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What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Right now we're working with Azure, and it's scalable, but it's expensive to do so. If we had features to scale the software part of the solution, it would be great.

How are customer service and support?

We have support not only for SSIS but Microsoft as a whole because we're an official partner of Microsoft in data warehousing and have a partnership agreement with the company. However, support seems to be connected with sales, and if I call with technical problems and ask if they have some feature to solve the problem, months can go by with no results.

They do, however, have a professional community online and in 95% of our incidents, we can find the solution there instead of calling.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup was simple and straightforward.

What other advice do I have?

I would recommend the solution. It's always worked for me and it's usually a top choice for my clients.

I would rate this solution at seven or eight out of ten. It's not a perfect solution, but it works well.

Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner.

Shivani Pandey

Consultant at Veear Analytics pvt limited

Dec 15, 2022

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A useful solution, but the stability is a big problem

Pros and Cons

"The data reader is the most valuable feature."

"We have a stability problem because when something works, it works one time. The next time, it doesn't work."

What is our primary use case?

I have used this solution for integrating SQL into life insurance projects.

What is most valuable?

The data reader is the most valuable feature.

What needs improvement?

If something is working, and then it doesn't work after it goes live, that creates a big problem. This solution is a useful tool, but the stability is a problem.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been working with this solution for eight or nine months.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

We have a stability problem because when something works, it works one time. The next time, it doesn't work. We don't know what is causing that problem.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The solution is scalable. In the current use case, we have about 25 users of the solution.

How was the initial setup?

I found the setup comparatively easy. Within a day, anybody can start using it. Two or three people are more than enough for deployment and maintenance.

What other advice do I have?

The solution is working fine and it is useful. The only problem is the stability.

I rate this solution as a seven out of ten.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Public Cloud

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.

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December 2024

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it_user91536

Architect at a marketing services firm with 51-200 employees

Feb 20, 2014

SSIS vs Hadoop

On one corner we have Hadoop, a massively distributed JVM-based data processing engine with a Map & Reduce API and a proven track record in handling huge data-sets. On the other corner we have SSIS, a natively non-distributed ETL engine part of the SQL Server family tool-set with .NET code extensibility features and a drag and drop UI (for the most part anyway). Two sweet technologies, probably shouldn’t be compared to each other but we’re doing it anyway, pitted head to head against a data mapping task to the death (or at least to the recycling of my test VMs)… Now FIGHT!

Recently I have been tasked with building a data processing layer tracking social signals with the following characteristics:

Input data is flat files. Although initially the amount of data might not be classified under “Big Data” per-say, but certainly had the potential to grow very quickly. Files were very small JSON format (1 KB average).
Output data is flat files. Delimited file which will be queried through a Hive Warehouse layer.
Data is only Mapped and not Reduced.Which means data is only extracted from the flat files and processed but never aggregated, and in any case SSIS is not capable of reducing (or aggregating) data in a scale-out architecture without building a custom intermediary layer (such as temporarily placing data in a database).
Data Latency into Hive is of Paramount Importance.

Both technologies are capable of iterating through a large number of flat files, extracting information and building an output, and when we take the Reduce operation out of the equation, we level the playing field and now both technologies can be scaled out, albeit Hadoop in a perhaps more friendly manner.

Although these technologies have a wider application and usage that they might be better suited to, in this experiment I was only interested in performance figures on this basic task.

In order to test these technologies against the mapping task, I have built two test machines, one for SSIS with SQL Server to support the SSIS Catalogue database, and another for a simple 3 node Hadoop cluster, the technical specification for each scenario is as follows:

Integration Service (SSIS)	Hadoop
CPU	4 Cores / Node	2 Cores / Node
RAM	8 GB / Node	3 GB / Node
Nodes	1 VM	3 VMs
OS	Windows Server 2012	CentOS
Edition	SQL Server 2012	Cloudera CDH 4

Although the specifications for each test setup is slightly different, which makes the comparison fairly “unscientific”, the over-all processing resources available for each test scenario should be fairly comparable, with the Hadoop cluster gaining a slight edge in terms of over-all CPU cores and RAM. Besides, we are only looking for a really considerable difference in the result to warrant a favouritism of one technology over the other in this business requirement.

I ran two test scenarios:

Scenario 1: 33,000 small (1KB) JSON input files, each file will have about 5 – 10 values to extract against a key (mapping).
Scenario 2: 33 input files (every 1,000 files in scenario 1 is concatenated)

The results of the test were as follows:

Scenario 1 (33,000)	Scenario 2 (33)
SSIS	14.5 (Min)	3.94 (Sec)
Hadoop Cluster	957 (Min)	134 (Sec)

As can be deduced from the results above, 1 SSIS instance showed up to 66X better performance in handling and processing flat files than the same job running in a Hadoop cluster.

Learnings from SSIS vs Hadoop Test

There are a few key learnings that has been gained by doing this experiment:

Hadoop has a terrible start time when operating on a file, the processing engine could take up-to 5 seconds before it could actually start processing the file, were SSIS takes less than 0.2 of a second. Java has never been a very agile language in my opinion.
Hadoop is not intended to handle a large number of small files, instead try combining smaller files into bigger concatenations. Sometimes it is considerably faster to have a pre-processing step that concatenates files into smaller batches.
Although the number of “Reducers” for a Hadoop job could be easily controlled, it is more difficult to control how many “Mappers” available for a job across the cluster, and Hadoop does not always adhere to the user-set number of Mappers.
Although SSIS outperforms Hadoop by an average of 50X on this simple task, Hadoop scales in a much more user-friendly manner, and allows users to “Reduce” or aggregate the data across all nodes for a particular job, a feature that is not supported by the out-of-the-box Integration Service.
Don’t just jump on new technologies, you need to test it and ensure that it is suitable for your particular business requirement, Hadoop is a great distributed processing engine when used in the correct context. It is too easy these days for managers and BI people to band around the term “Hadoop” for everything “Big Data”, from data processing to warehousing, but you need to take the time to separate the wheat from the chaff.
HDInsight (Microsoft’s Hadoop distribution which runs on Windows and Azure) was another technology that we were investigating at the time, although performance was extremely terrible that it was eliminated from the race fairly quickly.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.

GaryMData Architect at World Vision

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May 5, 2015

Thanks Ibrahim, that's hilarious "Two sweet technologies, probably shouldn’t be compared to each other but we’re doing it anyway" - thanks for doing this comparison! Very nicely written and summarized. Good work.

it_user1080627

Senior Director Business Intelligence at Xtivia

May 2, 2019

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An inexpensive tool with a short learning curve

Pros and Cons

"The most valuables features are the relatively short learning curve, and the automation capabilities provided through the BIML add-in for SSDT."

"I would like to see more standard components out of the box, such as SFTP, and Data Compression components."

What is our primary use case?

The primary use case for this solution varies according to the customer, but it typically involves moving data from OLTP systems into a data warehouse and/or data marts.

How has it helped my organization?

This solution has provided an inexpensive tool and it is easy to find experienced developers.

What is most valuable?

The most valuable features are the relatively short learning curve, and the automation capabilities provided through the BIML add-in for SSDT.

What needs improvement?

The UI could use refinement. I would like to see more standard components out of the box, such as SFTP, and data compression components.

For how long have I used the solution?

More than five years.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.

DevoSft67

Software Developer at a transportation company with 1,001-5,000 employees

Aug 6, 2019

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Offers good data integration but there was an incident where data extraction crashed

Pros and Cons

"It has good data integration and good processes."

"I would also like to see full integration with our BI because then our full load of data will be available in our organization. They should incorporate an ATL process."

What is most valuable?

It has good data integration and good processes.

What needs improvement?

I would like to see an auto-scheduler feature in the Developer version of this solution.

I would also like to see full integration with our BI because then our full load of data will be available in our organization. They should incorporate an ATL process.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using this solution for the last three years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

It is stable.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Compared to other solutions, this solution is scalable.

We only have three users using this solution.

How are customer service and technical support?

We haven't had to use their technical support. We don't really have any issues. We only had a problem with the data extraction.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

This is the first tool of this sort that we've used in my company.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup was complex.

What about the implementation team?

We implemented it ourselves. We did the ATL. It was nice in the previous version. There was an issue where we were extracting a big load of data and the system crashed.

What other advice do I have?

I would rate it a seven out of ten. Not a ten because of the data extraction that crashed. Tableau is better in this aspect. The transformation of data is very good in SSIS.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.

it_user275646

Senior Consultant with 51-200 employees

Sep 23, 2015

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It allows us to add C# or other code into ETL flow, but it doesn't have a built-in version control, so you have to get that from other vendors too (so it lacks support for multiple developers).

What is most valuable?

Its easy to use, fast to develop. Quite easy to also add C# or other code into ETL flow. Transfer to production is much faster than for example with IBM Infosphere Datastage, you can just copy the packages. Haven't found bugs much at all. Its license cost is also quite cheap compared to IBM and Informatica offerings. Overall when choosing a new ETL software I would look into SSIS or one of the open source tools.

What needs improvement?

-If you want to connect to SAP for example you have to buy add-in from other company and the same applies to many other sources.

-It doesn't have a built-in version control, so you have to get that from other vendors too (so it lacks support for multiple developers).

-Visual studio crashes sometimes.

-Doesn't have good ELT functionality, though ofcourse one can just do SQL.

-Overall there's many small things that could be done to make development faster and the product is not definitely perfect, but one has to compare to offerings of other vendors, which are not 'perfect' from usability and performance standpoint eather.

For how long have I used the solution?

Been using it for 5 years now.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Scalability not on the same level as with IBM Datastage.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

Many customers are switching from IBM Datastage to SSIS. Think its the ease of use and license costs.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.

Alexander Samuel Larico

Teaching Professional at Next Idea Lab

Feb 19, 2021

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Straightforward to set up, easy to operated with a user-friendly interface

Pros and Cons

"The interface is very user-friendly."

"I would like to see better integration with Power BI."

What is our primary use case?

We are a software development company and implement solutions like SQL Server SSIS for our clients. We do not use this product ourselves in the company but have experience with it because our client asked for it.

Our clients use it to transform data and generate reports. The use cases are generally simple, and not advanced or complex.

What is most valuable?

The interface is very user-friendly.

What needs improvement?

It runs a little bit slowly, although this may be because of our laptops.

I would like to see better integration with Power BI.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The stability is okay. It is easy to support.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

There are approximately 10 users. At this time, there are no plans to increase usage.

How are customer service and technical support?

I have not used technical support. Instead, I read blogs and the support that is available online.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is easy, and we did not find it complex.

What about the implementation team?

Our in-house team was responsible for deployment.

What other advice do I have?

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.

it_user4014

Developer at a tech consulting company with 51-200 employees

Sep 15, 2014

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Microsoft SQL Server Integration Services is one of the most effective ETL tools available in the market

Valuable Features:

Microsoft SQL Server Integration Services provides you the ability to build ETL solutions with very minimum background knowledge. If you are already familiar with DTS packages or fairly new to ETL, it is very easy for you to start with your first assignment using SSIS.Microsoft SSIS not only provides you the traditional ETL tasks for loading data from source to destination, it also provides you the ability to send emails using it and write your custom code using Script task and offers to process SSAS task, which makes it stand out from its competitors.It is specifically designed to provide high data transfer using parallel computational logic.Very easy to configure and deploy and maintenance is very low.

Room for Improvement:

It is unable to provide separate user account for each user like Data Hub. Actually Microsoft SSIS is more designed to build ETL solutions for enterprise level unlike Data Hub where each user can access the database and have their own sets of databases.Need to improve error logging although it does provide error logs but there is still more room for improvement in this area. Microsoft SQL Server Integration Services is one of the most effective ETL tools available in the market.Microsoft SQL Server Integration Services is very low cost compared to the market’s leader Informatica (Power Center) and almost offers everything you need to build your ETL solution.

Other Advice:

You need to have Microsoft SQL Server (Enterprise Edition) licensed to run Microsoft SSIS on your production environment. Like every other Microsoft product, It offers a very vibrant MSDN community along with Microsoft support staff for assistance.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.

GaryMData Architect at World Vision

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Jan 27, 2016

2016 version due out in a few months is even much better and the first significant upgrade since 2012...if you haven't yet used SSIS I'd wait until 2016 and start there if you can. 2014 is unchanged from 2012.

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