ConnectWise Automate vs. N-able N-central

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
ConnectWise Automate
Score 7.9 out of 10
N/A
ConnectWise Automate, formerly LabTech, is a remote monitoring and management (RMM) platform. It provides powerful automation to discover and manage devices, monitor for problems, and scripts repetitive action.
$700
N-able N-central
Score 7.1 out of 10
N/A
MSPs and IT professionals use N-able™ N-central® to monitor and manage devices and complex networks remotely. N-central provides visibility and efficiency as the user's needs scale. N-central can help users: 1. Proactively monitor everything on a customer network—not just servers and workstations—and troubleshoot. 2. Stay on top of threats with features like MFA, antivirus, integrated endpoint detection and response, data backup, disk encryption, email protection,…N/A
Pricing
ConnectWise AutomateN-able N-central
Editions & Modules
Agents
$1.00-$6.00
per month/per agent
Implementation Fee
$700
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
ConnectWise AutomateN-able N-central
Free Trial
YesNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
ConnectWise AutomateN-able N-central
Considered Both Products
ConnectWise Automate
Chose ConnectWise Automate
I believe the monitoring and alerts in Continuum command is better, but [ConnectWise Automate (formerly LabTech)] does have stronger scripting, and perhaps a better interface. N-Central is inferior on all fronts to both. I did not make the purchasing decision. I would myself …
Chose ConnectWise Automate
Automate is a far superior software with more features built-into the application without extra costs. There is an annual convention designed around improving the usage of the software. MSPs are highly recommended to attend to get the most out of the software. It takes years …
Chose ConnectWise Automate
Labtech is a more advanced system than N-central but with the features comes complexity for an advanced MSP Labtech is better, for someone getting started N-central is faster to get setup and running.
N-able N-central
Chose N-able N-central
Since I came in to manage the product, we have only tested one other product. The main reason for not switching was that it would take a considerable amount of time and resources to convert everything to a new service. Additionally N-able's interface, while it does have much …
Chose N-able N-central
N-Central has automation manager, which allows you to automate multiple tasks, thereby saving time and effort through Automated patching. AV and Backups are built into the system, and can be deployed by checking a box. It's easy to update and keep secure. File transfer and …
Chose N-able N-central
Overall, for the Average MSP, none of the RMM solutions is going to be perfect, they will all have their strengths and weaknesses and N-Able is no exception. It is a great solution if you are looking for something that is not super cryptic to use and want something relatively …
Chose N-able N-central
Automate has the best scripting engine. There is no conversation there, the scripting is taken to another level. N-central and VSA both have the ability to run scripts, but Automate runs away with it. Automate also has the best remote access tool. VSA and N-central remote …
Top Pros
Top Cons
Features
ConnectWise AutomateN-able N-central
Monitoring Tasks
Comparison of Monitoring Tasks features of Product A and Product B
ConnectWise Automate
6.1
21 Ratings
18% below category average
N-able N-central
5.9
3 Ratings
22% below category average
Remote monitoring7.221 Ratings5.43 Ratings
Network device monitoring5.120 Ratings5.03 Ratings
Management Tasks
Comparison of Management Tasks features of Product A and Product B
ConnectWise Automate
6.3
21 Ratings
13% below category average
N-able N-central
6.0
4 Ratings
18% below category average
Patch Management5.920 Ratings6.04 Ratings
Policy-based automation6.921 Ratings00 Ratings
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ConnectWise AutomateN-able N-central
Small Businesses
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Medium-sized Companies
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Enterprises

No answers on this topic

No answers on this topic

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User Ratings
ConnectWise AutomateN-able N-central
Likelihood to Recommend
7.5
(58 ratings)
4.9
(22 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
10.0
(4 ratings)
9.1
(2 ratings)
Usability
7.0
(4 ratings)
2.0
(4 ratings)
Performance
3.0
(4 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
7.0
(14 ratings)
1.0
(8 ratings)
Online Training
9.0
(3 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
5.0
(2 ratings)
8.4
(2 ratings)
Configurability
10.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Ease of integration
7.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
ConnectWise AutomateN-able N-central
Likelihood to Recommend
ConnectWise
I recommend it to all IT colleagues; regardless of the size of the PCs with which you work most of the time, the application allows connection stability between computers that make it possible to continue working or taking care of the infrastructure from afar.
Read full review
N-able
In my opinion, N-able N-central is a good "learn your lesson and move onto something better" tool. I've used many RMM tools over the years and I feel that this one is slow, does a terrible job with reporting, alerting, monitoring, software deployments, etc. The ability to turn on services like AV, backup, etc easily is cute, but you're not going to be able to use your own tools with this easily. In my experience, if you do turn those tools on for testing during the trial, you'll be charged later (despite it being a trial). They also turn off your ability to monitor these increased costs or to turn them off yourself. As a company, I found that they were impossible to work with. The sales team is right there if you want to buy something - but if you need anything other than to buy something, in my experience, they take days or weeks to navigate. I found that they are not a terribly ethical company and are more concerned with making a few dollars than creating a partnerships with MSPs. I can see value is in the advertised price of $99 for a hundred endpoints. However, you need to remember to not trial any other tools (like AV, backup, etc).
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Pros
ConnectWise
  • Desktop sharing / view with chat to the operator, file sharing and pass-through for keyboard strokes
  • Computer/server monitoring with thresholds and warning
  • Search - tracking down computers when you have many by name, logged in user, IP
  • End user ticket raising is built into the tray icon which make access really easy
Read full review
N-able
  • Remote tasks - entry-level techs can run basic tasks without physically touching a piece of equipment.
  • Remote support - remote controlling user devices is easy and saves a lot of time with having to initiate a remote session.
  • Management of devices, particularly patch management and anti-virus management - you can automatically approve and deploy patches and schedule automatic AV scans.
Read full review
Cons
ConnectWise
  • They have conflicting scheduling paradigms. When scheduling patching for clients, the 1st Friday is interpreted as the very first Friday of the month, even if this is the 1st of the month. For scripting, the 1st Friday of the month is interpreted as the 1st Friday of the 1st FULL WEEK of the month. This makes no sense to have two different interpretations, and makes it unreliable to schedule recurring scripts to fall when recurring maintenance does. The scripts need to be done manually because of this.
  • There is no way to dictate reboot orders for patch policies. This tied directly in with my first point. We have some clients that require reboot orders. This is not possible without having different patch policies for each server and specifying a time this way. But, there aren't small enough increments of time to make this reliable, plus patching duration might vary. Excluding reboots with patching and scheduling reboot scripts fixes this. However, this can't be done once on a recurring schedule due to the different scheduling paradigms already discussed. We have to schedule these manually each month.
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N-able
  • Expensive software
  • The support team are terrible
  • Sales team will promise the world to get you over the line
  • Subscription management is tedious
  • Old software with very little development and the support team will not provide any further information on this - no roadmap
  • Integrations galore - but none of them are effective
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Likelihood to Renew
ConnectWise
The primary reason for this rating is that ConnectWise Automate is currently so integral to our operations that moving away would involve more man hours than we would realistically have to invest. However, ConnectWise Automate is also completely capable of meeting all of our business needs and customizable to the point where if something is not meeting those needs out of the box, it can be modified to do what we want. From only installing software on machines if a different software package exists, to push a new version of that software is available, to check if credentials for user/machine have been updated to our new standards and then updating them if they have not, ConnectWise Automate is capable of doing everything we ask of it.
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N-able
Overall we have liked our solar winds experience, however, as our company has grown to support larger enterprises, this product does not have the functionality that our teams need in order to fully support them. The lack of granularity with backups and lack of ability to support nutanix environments is slowly drawing us into the use of other tools.
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Usability
ConnectWise
Basic use of the product is fairly easy. Information about the machines you manage can be found in customizable dashboards, which can be unique for each user, and, therefore, properly suited to the users' needs/job function. This is not a 10 because some of the interfaces are very clunky (Patch Management), and some features are not intuitive and not well documented (reporting). Scripting and Patch Management have a fairly steep learning curve (For structure in patch management and syntax in scripting), but once learned, they work well.
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N-able
The user interface is fairly straight forward, with logic groupings for objects. I did not deploy this software, but am one of the daily administrators. Once you get the correct agent package (Which can be a challenge) the integration into AD is not bad. The UI could be more customized, but that may have been a design choice.
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Performance
ConnectWise
It used to be great, but then they broke reporting, speed and responsiveness with version 11 and the new Patch Manager. It's really bad and their support people are way behind on fixing so many bugs. They have really gone downhill. If they don't get it together soon, we'll start looking around.
Read full review
N-able
No answers on this topic
Support Rating
ConnectWise
ConnectWise Automate lets you manage more endpoints, with enhanced productivity and improved service, all without increasing expenses. It can manage patches and updates across thousands of computers. We also use it for customized monitoring and alerting on workstations and servers. Monitoring is really robust and granular. It does a great job of gathering a TON of data about the network, and that data is searchable. There are a bunch of different reports built in. Integrates with Manage, Control, and other applications. It does a ton of stuff out of the box, and has endless customization options.
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N-able
Every time we have reached out to SolarWinds they are quick to respond, even offering support chat 24/7. Their support team is great and works with you to find solutions to issues. They have taken items we had issues with before and used those to create updates so that the issue is handled better in the future.
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Online Training
ConnectWise
The Online training has been re-done and needs a lot more work. When you look at training in different roles, it shows a lot of the same topics but no explanation to what is different about them. Several times that topics are the exact same, but they make you re-take the same information for a different topic, instead of marking that you have already completed that portion of training.
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N-able
No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating
ConnectWise
Start small and learn the in's and out's before making policies and rolling things out company wide. Ask the questions of why if you don't agree with something or your company does things a different way. Usually they are done a certain way for a reason. Start simple with roll out and slowly enable or add on the functionality that is needed.
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N-able
Make sure if you your using a vm you follow the instructions for provisioning to the letter or it will be starting from square one
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Alternatives Considered
ConnectWise
I believe the monitoring and alerts in Continuum command is better, but [ConnectWise Automate (formerly LabTech)] does have stronger scripting, and perhaps a better interface. N-Central is inferior on all fronts to both. I did not make the purchasing decision. I would myself likely pick Continuum if I had to make a on the spot choice.
Read full review
N-able
Our version of SolarWinds was old and running on old hardware, but it was way easier to setup and do things with. It did not do everything N-able does such as patch management, or at least we didn't have a module to do so if one existed. However it definitely seemed easier to use and possibly more stable.
Read full review
Return on Investment
ConnectWise
  • We found we were able to provide good monitoring of our customers sites which was an objective. However, that came at a significant time investment that never seemed to be finished.
  • We were able to negotiate a price that worked for us for an up-front purchase which was nice.
  • We found the pricing to be very competitive.
  • Bottom line for us was despite the pros of the product, we found other RMM solutions to be a better overall "value" due to not having to dedicate technicians to maintaining the product.
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N-able
  • Reduced time to manage and support servers and endpoints.
  • Provides support dept with more accurate information to assess and resolve issues quicker and more efficiently.
  • The subscription cost associated with N-central, to our clients has a good profit margin for us.
Read full review
ScreenShots

ConnectWise Automate Screenshots

Screenshot of Monitor: Find problemsScreenshot of Screenshot of Screenshot of Screenshot of Screenshot of

N-able N-central Screenshots

Screenshot of N-able N-central DashboardScreenshot of Remote desktop access with Take Control