TrustRadius: an HG Insights company

F5 BIG-IQ Centralized Management vs. SmartDeploy

Save this comparison

Save this comparison

Add Product

Recommended Comparisons

    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    F5 BIG-IQ Centralized Management

    Score8.8 out of 10
    N/AF5's BIG-IQ provides centralized management of app services and security policies.N/A

    SmartDeploy

    Score9.7 out of 10
    N/ASmartDeploy, now from PDQ.com (acquired January 2022), provides a software deployment solution supporting computer imaging, app deployment, driver management, and Windows migration.

    $960

    per year

    Pricing
    F5 BIG-IQ Centralized ManagementSmartDeploy
    Editions & Modules
    No answers on this topic
    Starter
    $960
    per year
    Plus
    Contact sales team
    Pro
    Contact sales team
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    F5 BIG-IQ Centralized ManagementSmartDeploy
    Free Trial
    NoYes
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoYes
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup fee$96,050
    Additional Details
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    F5 BIG-IQ Centralized ManagementSmartDeploy
    Considered Both Products
    F5
    No answer on this topic
    PDQ
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    33%
    Would buy again
    5 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Delivers good value for the price
    40%
    Delivers good value for the price
    4 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Happy with the feature set
    20%
    Happy with the feature set
    3 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    11%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    1 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Implementation went as expected
    55%
    Implementation went as expected
    6 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    User Ratings
    F5 BIG-IQ Centralized ManagementSmartDeploy
    Likelihood to Recommend
    4.2
    (15 ratings)
    8.0
    (2 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    7.3
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Usability
    4.3
    (12 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Support Rating
    6.4
    (1 ratings)
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    F5 BIG-IQ Centralized ManagementSmartDeploy
    Likelihood to Recommend
    F5
    F5 BIG-IQ Centralized Management works perfectly in Software upgrades and simple daily changes. We are successfully using it to create and or delete objects. It doesn`t works well when we need reports. I usually have to create custom scripts to get a list of objects, for example. Performance is also something that could be improved in Big-IQ
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    PDQ
    Well suited scenarios : One of the situations SmartDeploy helped immensly was in application deployment and management for our projects , making it and instant favorite for the deployment process. Also in one situation where we had a high flying app development which did'nt had much time to develop, deployment thorugh smart deploy made it quick and less involvement. Easier to understand major functionalities and onboard new projects. Less appropriate scenarios: We faced issues while utilising by DevOps team for monitoring every system for issue resolving in linux update on every employees system. This created alot of delay in every employees work front as systems were not working as expected
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    F5
    • Common system level changes like cipher suite customization, ssh protocol settings etc can be pushed to all F5 gear through one click of a button
    • Enterprise standard templates for profiles/protocols etc., can be efficiently managed across F5 gear through a single interface
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    PDQ
    • It allows us to maintain only one image. Much less effort required than storing and maintaining multiple images.
    • LAN deployment works very well with few issues.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    F5
    • There a lack of the going forward to next
    • The second site product does not do what we need and we are forced to write our own scripts
    • Many of the alerting that was in enterprise management is no longer in F5 BIG-IQ Centralized Management
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    PDQ
    • Remote monitoring is useful but has some lagging and functionalities are not upfront to use , making it complicated for new users to be aware just by using the application
    • Windows migration was quite difficult in terms of updates of softwares to be migrated to new system
    • Integration with client systems can be tough as major usage of other softwares is done in most of client systems causing us difficulties to integrate with smart deploy on the same platform
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    F5
    There is some room for improvement around RBAC. The access to certain features, options and menus is not straightforward and not that granular.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    PDQ
    No answers on this topic
    Usability
    F5
    I feel pinning policies are killing you guys when it comes to being able to add multiple LTMs that have different naming conventions.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    PDQ
    No answers on this topic
    Support Rating
    F5
    The support is a bit complex and not straightforward. It seems there aren't many engineers supporting this platform. There are many components in the solution that makes it complex for troubleshooting. Documentation needs to be more in depth, and I have opened a few cases around cluster sync issues and objects stalled. In the end I was able to find and fix the problem.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    PDQ
    SmartDeploy customer support has been very good. Although we do not always get a super-fast response (though always within the time stated). The tech support folks at SmartDeploy always go the extra mile to see that our immediate issues are taken care of in as timely a manner as possible. They have always been attentive to our needs and frustrations.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Alternatives Considered
    F5
    Of all the centralized Management platforms I have ever used, BIG-IQ is the worst. It constantly breaks and requires fixing in some way or another.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    PDQ
    SmartDeploy has a fantastic deployment process management with detailed and configurable aspects. Even though it has detailed configuration it still somehow makes it easy to understand and implement compared to other services which need special learning and courses to understand them completelya and use them efficiently. This is one quality highly appreciated and stacks up against any other services I have used for deployment
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Return on Investment
    F5
    • Cut costs by requiring less manual hours to manage F5 OS installations
    • Great monitoring and alerting tool for general F5 gear health
    • Provides critical information for capacity planning of the F5 resources
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    PDQ
    • Very fast as an image deployment solution for new PCs. We do not have to create a completely new image when new hardware comes out. This is an amazing time-saver on its own.
    • With offline deployment and some workarounds, this is allowing us to migrate many Windows 7 units, rather than having to upgrade each one or load from scratch or replace it with new hardware.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots