IBM DevOps Test Performance vs. Spirent TestCenter

Go for IBM RPT if: 1. You're testing a Java-based Web application with HTTP protocol 2. You wanted to distribute the load across machines easily 3. Your team is in learning phase/not really introduced to a wide range of performance testing tools Do not go for IBM RPT if: 1. You wanted to test REST or any other advanced protocols 2. Your system under test demands a very high user load 3. Your application is written in .NET or any other platform except Java.

Incentivized

Spirent solution is well suited to qualify a Lan infrastructure bandwidth capacity or a device itself capacity such as a router or a firewall for example. But this solution in our case is also well suited to test a complex and numbered mpls environment. I would not recommend it to a small business as the solution is very expensive: châssis and card cost are expensive and the solution requires to be an advanced user in system, not only on network devices

Incentivized

• Data Parameterisation/ Data Correlation is made simpler compared to its competitors
• Distributed Load Testing is easier to set up
• Performance metric gathering while a test is in progress
• Th look and Feel really helps a beginner to understand and work with.

Incentivized

• Bandwidth test
• QoS and traffic type generation
• Software platform availability
• Technical Support

Incentivized

• Memory utilization could have been improved.(Eats up system's RAM)! It may crash if a test is conducted with the heavy load if adequate RAM is not available in the VM/host machine.
• Licensing could have been made simpler. IBM's licensing method is difficult to follow.
• Support for protocols other than HTTP. Not really up to the current trend.

Incentivized

• QA
• Various bugs to fix on software installation
• Technical documentation
• No Spirent classes available
• Lack to fix major issues such as ntp for latency calculation

Incentivized

7 because they lack to improve some major bugs we have exchanged about with them

Incentivized

Cost/Licensing: While JMeter is an opensource testing tool from Apache, compared to IBM RPT and HP LoadRunner, RPT is much cheaper than Loadrunner. Functionality: JMeter provides basic functionalities which are adequate for performance testing, however advanced features are not available (such as load testing with GUI, reporting is very basic etc.). But when it comes to Loadrunner, it offers very broad features and supports a variety of protocols. So in this category, Loadrunner is a winner, but RPT is better than JMeter. Ease of operating: JMeter is easy compared to LoadRunner, but it has old GUI and look and feel is not that great to understand. Also, most of the things are to be done in a command line, non-GUI mode. While LoadRunner is very advanced with many options, which also confusing sometimes. But RPT, on the other hand, maintains a balance between simplicity and offering of different features. So winner: RPT.

Incentivized

I wasn't able to specifically test other big products but I did use other free products in the past such as iperf, but free softwares don't allow the same level of support ans ease to use than Spirent

Incentivized

• Accuracy in metrics, thus improving system's performance
• Costs less compared to competitor like HP LoadRunner
• Helped the team of beginners learn things quickly

Incentivized

• Allows to qualify a link or a project to validate end of this one
• Allowed to detect various configuration issues that were fixed right after
• Allow to use virtual machines for easy remote deploykents
• Neharive: upgrade can depreciate products and newer products have sometimes better bandwidth capacity but less features

Incentivized