IBM Spectrum Control vs. SolarWinds Storage Resource Monitor (SRM)

IBM Spectrum Control is very well suited for the large enterprise where there is multi vendor environment in terms of storage and host virtualization. It is not suited at all where file storage is dominant. It is capable of providing very detailed reports as it leverages the IBM Cognos for that purpose and offers very detailed customization as well. It can even provide the enterprise with the SAN management capabilities as well.

SolarWinds Storage Resource Monitor (SRM) is pretty good at forecasting capacity consumption, which was a must for us. If you have LUNs that have high latency in a normal environment (user shares, for instance), you'll need to customize the alerts to tune out the noise. As with all SW modules and most other products, there is a time lag between what is in the console and what's happening now. Data in the console and alerts are typically 5 to 15 minutes old.

Incentivized

• Monitoring data from our storage servers
• Provision of data analytics

Incentivized

• Unmasks storage performance metrics and gives a common dashboard for monitoring.
• A simple, intuitive interface for adding supported storage frames.
• Lineage -- "The guest OS is connected to the virtual host and the virtual host is connected to the ... wait, what LUN is that?!?" #SOLVED.

Incentivized

• Must extend the management and monitoring to File storage.
• Performance monitoring of non IBM equipment may also be added.

• Issues getting SMI working correctly to monitor Compellents through SRM.
• The ability to break down alerts to a more granular level.

Incentivized

It has helped me prove that we need more storage as well as faster storage to management

Incentivized

Easy to set up and start. Out of the box alerts which you can tweak to your needs. Easy to use interfaces as well

Incentivized

Do not have to contact support for issues often and when i do it is fast to get response and resolve my issues

Incentivized

Easy to use set up wizard went off without a hitch.

Incentivized

IBM Spectrum Control has highly influenced our decision-making process and planning based on the analytics we receive from data. It is the only unique product that I have worked with offering great services under different environments. It monitors data both inside and outside our company and vives feedback on time for planning on different programs. Optimization of data is reliable and the storage planning is done to enhance easy access.

Incentivized

We have a full suite of SolarWinds products and did not evaluate other options for a full package. For selective monitoring we log into the devices, but this has made that much easier as we have a dashboard rather than logging into devices one at a time.

Incentivized

• The high licensing cost if offset buy the capacity savings and the accuracy of the analytics.
• It has a positive impact on our ROI and as improved it almost 9%.

• Real-time monitoring and alerting to surpass those of native vSphere and in some occasions, better than manufacturer written software.
• Historical monitoring of environment with charts and graphs to assist with ever changing environment loads.

Incentivized