BMC FootPrints vs. SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
BMC FootPrints
Score 6.8 out of 10
N/A
BMC FootPrints is an IT service management (ITSM) solution featuring workload automation.N/A
SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor
Score 8.2 out of 10
N/A
SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor (SAM) delivers application and server monitoring capabilities. SAM allows for self-service for easy setup, 1200+ monitoring templates, and customization options, as well as integrate with other SolarWinds products.N/A
Pricing
BMC FootPrintsSolarWinds Server & Application Monitor
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
BMC FootPrintsSolarWinds Server & Application Monitor
Free Trial
NoYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional DetailsSAM pricing starts at $2,995.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
BMC FootPrintsSolarWinds Server & Application Monitor
Considered Both Products
BMC FootPrints

No answer on this topic

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor
Chose SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor
It does not give you near the detail SCOM does. The CA products are much harder to configure, but they give you a more fluid look and much more reliable information. Out of the four, I would rate SAM at the bottom.
Top Pros
Top Cons
Features
BMC FootPrintsSolarWinds Server & Application Monitor
Incident and problem management
Comparison of Incident and problem management features of Product A and Product B
BMC FootPrints
8.1
9 Ratings
1% below category average
SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor
-
Ratings
Organize and prioritize service tickets9.09 Ratings00 Ratings
Expert directory7.04 Ratings00 Ratings
Service restoration6.02 Ratings00 Ratings
Self-service tools7.07 Ratings00 Ratings
Subscription-based notifications10.06 Ratings00 Ratings
ITSM collaboration and documentation9.06 Ratings00 Ratings
ITSM reports and dashboards9.07 Ratings00 Ratings
ITSM asset management
Comparison of ITSM asset management features of Product A and Product B
BMC FootPrints
7.9
7 Ratings
4% below category average
SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor
-
Ratings
Configuration mangement7.77 Ratings00 Ratings
Asset management dashboard8.05 Ratings00 Ratings
Policy and contract enforcement8.04 Ratings00 Ratings
Change management
Comparison of Change management features of Product A and Product B
BMC FootPrints
9.0
4 Ratings
7% above category average
SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor
-
Ratings
Change requests repository9.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Change calendar9.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Service-level management9.04 Ratings00 Ratings
Application Performance Management
Comparison of Application Performance Management features of Product A and Product B
BMC FootPrints
-
Ratings
SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor
8.7
276 Ratings
13% above category average
Application monitoring00 Ratings9.0266 Ratings
Database monitoring00 Ratings8.5230 Ratings
Threshold alerts00 Ratings9.0271 Ratings
Predictive capabilities00 Ratings8.2215 Ratings
Application performance management console00 Ratings8.2239 Ratings
Collaboration tools00 Ratings7.8148 Ratings
Out-of-the box templates to monitor applications00 Ratings8.0256 Ratings
Application dependency mapping and thresholding00 Ratings8.7216 Ratings
Virtualization monitoring00 Ratings9.0234 Ratings
Server availability and performance monitoring00 Ratings9.8269 Ratings
Server usage monitoring and capacity forecasting00 Ratings9.1250 Ratings
IT Asset Discovery00 Ratings9.0199 Ratings
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BMC FootPrintsSolarWinds Server & Application Monitor
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Score 9.0 out of 10
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Score 8.9 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Agiloft Flexible Service Desk Suite
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Score 9.0 out of 10
ManageEngine Site24x7
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Score 9.1 out of 10
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Ivanti Neurons for ITSM
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Score 9.1 out of 10
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User Ratings
BMC FootPrintsSolarWinds Server & Application Monitor
Likelihood to Recommend
8.3
(18 ratings)
8.9
(278 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
8.6
(9 ratings)
8.9
(10 ratings)
Usability
8.0
(2 ratings)
8.6
(29 ratings)
Availability
-
(0 ratings)
9.9
(3 ratings)
Performance
-
(0 ratings)
6.0
(3 ratings)
Support Rating
8.0
(4 ratings)
9.0
(21 ratings)
Online Training
-
(0 ratings)
4.5
(1 ratings)
Implementation Rating
-
(0 ratings)
4.5
(3 ratings)
Configurability
-
(0 ratings)
1.0
(2 ratings)
Ease of integration
-
(0 ratings)
4.5
(2 ratings)
Product Scalability
-
(0 ratings)
9.9
(3 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
-
(0 ratings)
4.5
(2 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
4.5
(2 ratings)
User Testimonials
BMC FootPrintsSolarWinds Server & Application Monitor
Likelihood to Recommend
BMC Software Inc.
BMC Footprints is so well suited to keep the documentation easy to read and find, as same as typification. You can find specific documentation for an audit so fast and export a report using the specific criteria that you need to comply with your boss or audit needs. As I told before, BMC footprints need to be more friendly to the end users because they get lost many times trying to track some ticket or typing documentation.
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SolarWinds
For monitoring applications that run on Windows hosts on VMware or HyperV virtualization, SolarWindows offers a nice, vertical view of both the loads and the resources. In such an environment, this makes life really good! But if you have something else -- for example, Linux hosts -- you're on your own to some extent. That is, the things it does well, it does very well -- but everything else is much less polished.
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Pros
BMC Software Inc.
  • Documentation. We try to reduce the amount of paperwork needed for staff to do their job, so by automating certain tasks, we are able to speed up the resolution process for trouble tickets.
  • Reporting. We'll use the reporting tool to get the number of tickets opened, response times and can go into granular reports.
  • Surveys. When tickets are closed, we automatically send out surveys to end users to get valuable feedback on how we did and what we can improve.
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SolarWinds
  • Monitor Azure Cloud Severs- We use SolarWinds SAM to monitor Active Directory and DNS on Several DCs published on Azure Cloud.
  • Monitor Hyper V and VMware - SolarWinds SAM monitors applications on both Hyper V and VMware, while also monitoring the physical host machines.
  • It also helps us monitor Warranty expiration for physical servers.
Read full review
Cons
BMC Software Inc.
  • Purpose based configuration- It would be beneficial to see a more purposed based, out of the box, configuration option. For example, if you need PCI compliance, more intuitive reporting would make managing compliance much easier.
  • Initial design and implementation- Don't think that your experience as an IT professional will allow you to stand this system up on your own. To properly configure Footprints and set yourself up for success down the road, get Professional Services with this one.
  • Somewhat behind the times- Service Core is making a huge leap forward with the latest version, 12, but Asset Core is far behind. There are quite a few quirks to how the application works and how it is used.
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SolarWinds
  • Provides basic monitoring/visibility. Visibility into detailed/fine-grained issues best suited for more specialized/expensive solutions.
  • Licensing per monitored application rapidly uses up purchased license count.
  • More out-of-the-box templates or easier setup of monitoring less-common applications would make the solution more appealing given the target audience of the product.
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Likelihood to Renew
BMC Software Inc.
It has been the business decision to go with them and that is what we will do. Going back, this would have not been the choice, but nothing can be done about it now. We are stuck with this application for years to come. Wish there were other possibilities that could be done.
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SolarWinds
We are heavily invested in Solarwinds products for a reason. They are generally easy to setup and run with, requiring only some interfacing with support or help articles on rare occasions. They do what we bought them to do and we can't ask for more.
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Usability
BMC Software Inc.
It's so simple to use and customize however you want. You can create new workspaces and workflows with ease, set up new users, incoming email rules, customize the layout of the forms, and even change the colors and logos. It's just very easily customizable overall. It's also really straightforward to figure out how to use, you really almost don't have to show somebody how to use it. If you just sit them down in front of it and let them look it over, they could figure it out themselves easily.
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SolarWinds
SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor is quite easy to use and super versatile. It allows you to do just about anything you can through premade templates or through scripting. You can use an agent on the servers if you want to, or you can monitor through WMI or SNMP credentials. You can customize thresholds for alerting quickly, and you can configure alerts to be as complex or as simple as you want.
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Reliability and Availability
BMC Software Inc.
No answers on this topic
SolarWinds
The tool works and monitors items 24x7, it only requires maintenance a little more frequently due to security fixes in the Windows operating system.
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Performance
BMC Software Inc.
No answers on this topic
SolarWinds
The graphical interface and the performance of the database leave a little to be desired, they could be better explored.Some functionality and screens do not work well depending on the browser used. The integrations never had any problems or caused crashes in other systems.
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Support Rating
BMC Software Inc.
I've had no issues with the support for FootPrints. We haven't really had to use them all that much over the years, but when needed they have always been prompt and knowledgeable at dealing with any issue. I've worked with a lot of different support teams over the years, and they have been one of my favorites to work with.
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SolarWinds
I think there was only a couple times I had to open a support case for SAM and one time they got multiple engineers on the phone to get a better idea what I was trying to monitor and was able to point me in the best direction to monitor that system.
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Online Training
BMC Software Inc.
No answers on this topic
SolarWinds
It was sufficient to read their documentation and watch videos.
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Implementation Rating
BMC Software Inc.
No answers on this topic
SolarWinds
Make sure SNMP and WMI are configured ahead of time
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Alternatives Considered
BMC Software Inc.
I was not involved in the selection process but in my opinion either SQL or Access databases would have worked just as well without the same amount of cost. These two systems would have been much easier to manage and would have tracked the same information in a less convoluted process and expense.
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SolarWinds
It has been a while since we first purchased SolarWinds, but I looked over several other products that I can't remember now. Many other products tried to scan the network to find computers but given that our computers are located in various places across campus with other computers in our buildings that are not ours that type of network scanning was not what we needed. Other services have extra services that we had no need of and I liked the ability to add custom fields in SolarWinds so we can track the information on each computer that we need to know.
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Scalability
BMC Software Inc.
No answers on this topic
SolarWinds
It is hard to find the recommended SQL setup and convince others that is the way you should configure the server when you set it up
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Return on Investment
BMC Software Inc.
  • It helps us with keeping projects on track, which saves time
  • When someone wants to know about a project, they are able to without calling around
  • I have had a difficult time searching specifics, as how many tickets closed by me in 2021
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SolarWinds
  • Less time spent investigating causes of issues. We are alerted straight away and can find the root cause of the issue in less time.
  • We have been able to ditch all our previous individual monitoring solutions, none of which integrated with each other for a single solution which fully integrates with each of the different modules to provide a single portal for monitoring and alerting.
Read full review
ScreenShots

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor Screenshots

Screenshot of Multi-vendor application performance monitoringScreenshot of Multi-vendor server monitoringScreenshot of Application dependency mapping with AppStack™ dashboardScreenshot of Microsoft Exchange performance monitoring with AppInsight™ templateScreenshot of Microsoft IIS performance monitoring with AppInsight™ templateScreenshot of Server hardware health monitoring