SmartDraw vs. Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
SmartDraw
Score 5.0 out of 10
N/A
SmartDraw is a diagramming and flow chart building tool from SmartDraw Software in San Diego, California.
$5.95
per user/per month
Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect
Score 6.0 out of 10
N/A
Enterprise Architect is the flagship architecture management platform from global, Australian-headquartered company Sparx Systems.
$229
per license
Pricing
SmartDrawSparx Systems Enterprise Architect
Editions & Modules
Multiple-Users (for 5+ users)
$5.95
per user/per month
Single-User
$9.95
per month
Professional
$229
per license
Corporate
$299
per license
Unified
$499
per license
Ultimate
$699
per license
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
SmartDrawSparx Systems Enterprise Architect
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
SmartDrawSparx Systems Enterprise Architect
Top Pros
Top Cons
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User Ratings
SmartDrawSparx Systems Enterprise Architect
Likelihood to Recommend
3.8
(14 ratings)
9.0
(5 ratings)
Support Rating
8.4
(2 ratings)
7.5
(2 ratings)
User Testimonials
SmartDrawSparx Systems Enterprise Architect
Likelihood to Recommend
SmartDraw Software
I believe SmartDraw is a great tool for small- to mid-sized organizations for simplifying the production and management of org charts. We've also had the PMO experiment with the use of some of their flow charts as well. If an organization has an HCM with the capability of producing (good!) org charts, that is likely the best option... but many that I have used in my 30-year HR career don't. So there is definitely a need for SmartDraw in the market!
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Sparx Systems
Enterprise Architect can be used to capture business requirements, design and management of all successive models, algorithms, process flows/workflows, design of business data objects and other artifacts. The strong point is the ability to link the items in all models with each other, the more time the analysts and designers "invest" into making nice and clearly defined models, the higher the future pay-off by any successive changes to the systems. Enterprise Architect is not a good tool for capturing rather unstructured business requirements, use e.g. Confluence or other solutions instead. EA should comprise the extracted models with very little unstructured information. Management of the changes process should not be done in Enterprise Architect, rather use JIRA/Confluence or similar.
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Pros
SmartDraw Software
  • Provides examples to work off of--these are helpful when you don't know exactly where to start.
  • Provides a number of stylistic options without making things too complex, so you can be creative without getting overwhelmed.
  • Provides a wide variety of templates, meets a wide variety of needs.
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Sparx Systems
  • Open Architecture - A wide and extensive set of options, plug-ins and customization options make Sparx EA more of a tool kit than just a tool. Most tools allow customization but Sparx EA is built from the ground up with this in mind.
  • Wide variety of formats, lexicons, standards and data import export capabilities allow different roles to interact with the information in different ways.
  • Automated report generation allows architects and designers to spend less taking on word processing and more time on performing architecture and design.
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Cons
SmartDraw Software
  • A month-to-month plan would be ideal for users that don't have a need to create many projects
  • The sidebar navigation can be a little confusing with all of the tools listed.
  • Offering customizable plans with only the feature you need would simplify navigation
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Sparx Systems
  • Needs someone that is very conversant with business modelling terminology
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Support Rating
SmartDraw Software
They are always very helpful, we get computers every two years and I have to call them to move the license from one computer to another and they do it with a smile in their voice!
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Sparx Systems
The support team of Sparx EA, based in Australia, is always willing to help and give direction.
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Alternatives Considered
SmartDraw Software
We have used Corel Draw and Adobe Acrobat. Both of those tools were good when they came out but the abilities of SmartDraw far outweigh both those tools. Corel Draw was also more complex to operate and do tasks, as was Adobe Acrobat in which some basic tasks took additional steps to complete.
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Sparx Systems
BiZZdesign represents a different new concept to enterprise architecture, its gravity center is not technical modelling, but rather a view on capturing the whole end-user experience or customer journey. It also allows to grasp areas as internal company capabilities, required for adoption/changes and operation of the solution, uses the same Archimate modelling language. This solution is in my opinion a new generation enabling to not only design the solutions, but also manage the whole application portfolio with respect to capabilities and requirement parameters.
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Return on Investment
SmartDraw Software
  • SmartDraw has provided good return for our internal purposes. Using it to understand an organization's structure and inner workings has been valuable. On the client side, creating steps and businesses processes has also been a big plus. It has helped decrease confusing reporting structures and has provided a detailed map for individuals to understand where they fit within their organization.
  • Unfortunately, SmartDraw has been somewhat inefficient with some of the more complex projects on our plate and has really deterred certain employees from even wanting to use it.
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Sparx Systems
  • This program speed up the development process. It generates the actual code with my model classes after modeling
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