TrustRadius: an HG Insights company

CA Service Management, with CA Service Desk Manager vs. Microsoft System Center

Save this comparison

Save this comparison

Add Product

Recommended Comparisons

    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    CA Service Management

    Score6.8 out of 10
    N/ACA Service Management, including CA Desk Manager, is a fully-featured ITSM platform, now from Broadcom. It competes with BMC Remedy, ServiceNow, FrontRange ITSM, Cherwell Service Management etc. It is based on technology acquired by CA in 2010 with Nimsoft, and is now supported by Broadcom since the 2018 acquisition.N/A

    Microsoft System Center

    Score9 out of 10
    N/AMicrosoft System Center Suite is a family of IT management software for network monitoring, updating and patching, endpoint protection with anti-malware, data protection and backup, ITIL- structured IT service management, remote administration and more. It is available in two editions: standard and datacenter. Datacenter provides unlimited virtualization for high density private clouds, while standard is for lightly or non-virtualized private cloud workloads.

    $1,323

    per month

    Pricing
    CA Service ManagementMicrosoft System Center
    Editions & Modules
    No answers on this topic
    Standard Edition
    $1323
    Datacenter Edition
    $3607
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    CA Service ManagementMicrosoft System Center
    Free Trial
    NoNo
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional Details——
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    CA Service ManagementMicrosoft System Center
    Considered Both Products
    Broadcom
    Chose CA Service Management
    CA is easier and faster to implement than Service Now, BMC Remedy/ITSM etc. It is more costly than off the shelf solutions, however much more worth it for large enterprises.
    Incentivized
    Microsoft
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Would buy again
    13 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Delivers good value for the price
    13 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Happy with the feature set
    13 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    10 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Implementation went as expected
    10 Answers
    Features
    CA Service ManagementMicrosoft System Center
    Incident and problem management
    Comparison of Incident and problem management features of CA Service Management, with CA Service Desk Manager and Microsoft System Center
    Feature
    CA Service Management, with CA Service Desk Manager
    8.6
    6 Ratings
    6% above category average
    Microsoft System Center
    -
    Ratings
    Organize and prioritize service tickets9.76 Ratings00 Ratings
    Expert directory8.75 Ratings00 Ratings
    Service restoration8.46 Ratings00 Ratings
    Self-service tools8.66 Ratings00 Ratings
    Subscription-based notifications7.96 Ratings00 Ratings
    ITSM collaboration and documentation9.76 Ratings00 Ratings
    ITSM reports and dashboards7.55 Ratings00 Ratings
    ITSM asset management
    Comparison of ITSM asset management features of CA Service Management, with CA Service Desk Manager and Microsoft System Center
    Feature
    CA Service Management, with CA Service Desk Manager
    9.2
    6 Ratings
    11% above category average
    Microsoft System Center
    -
    Ratings
    Configuration mangement9.76 Ratings00 Ratings
    Asset management dashboard10.03 Ratings00 Ratings
    Policy and contract enforcement8.03 Ratings00 Ratings
    Change management
    Comparison of Change management features of CA Service Management, with CA Service Desk Manager and Microsoft System Center
    Feature
    CA Service Management, with CA Service Desk Manager
    9.1
    6 Ratings
    8% above category average
    Microsoft System Center
    -
    Ratings
    Change requests repository9.06 Ratings00 Ratings
    Change calendar8.64 Ratings00 Ratings
    Service-level management9.55 Ratings00 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    CA Service ManagementMicrosoft System Center
    Small Businesses
    Agiloft Service Desk (discontinued)
    Score9 out of 10
    No answers on this topic
    Medium-sized Companies
    ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus
    Score9.2 out of 10
    No answers on this topic
    Enterprises
    Ivanti Neurons for ITSM
    Score4.5 out of 10
    No answers on this topic
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    CA Service ManagementMicrosoft System Center
    Likelihood to Recommend
    9.0
    (12 ratings)
    9.0
    (21 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    4.1
    (6 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Usability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.0
    (2 ratings)
    Support Rating
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    CA Service ManagementMicrosoft System Center
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Broadcom
    It is a suitable tool for a large organization with extensive user needs. It is not for a small shop as it may be over-engineered for smaller organizations that don't have teams that can manage a solution of this size. It does have some significant hardware and configuration needs, but that should not deter customers from deploying it in-house. I've seen it deployed in the cloud as well as in-house; the downside to deploying it as a hosted solution is you're forever at the mercy of the vendor for customizations, and they cost an arm and a leg. The simplest things take a long time and cost much more money than necessary, so you can't truly get a custom solution and end up with mostly vanilla services (unless you have very deep pockets.)
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Microsoft
    For companies with more than 10 Windows devices and needing to standardize the OS, AV, access, share resources, and install software. SCCM is the way to go. This software is unnecessary if the business is all remote users and not in an office-type setting. There are cloud offerings or none to accomplish what a business needs.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    Broadcom
    • A large community where, if help is needed, is usually very helpful and quick to respond.
    • Various sites with good information on various issues. If you have a problem, there's a good chance some else already had it and documented it.
    • Fairly easy installation of the product if recommendations are followed and prep-work is done.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Microsoft
    • Allows the grouping of devices by user.
    • Allows controlling updates being deployed to user devices.
    • Allows for the repurposing of machines by being able to load new or updated software on machines that already are in the system.
    • Allows us the ability to wipe a machine clean and restore it back to the configuration that was assigned the machine.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Broadcom
    • The right-click feature is disabled in this application and users are unable to copy and paste with mouse or touchpad.
    • The application also freezes quite a bit and a user will have to quite often close and reopen browser to get it functioning properly.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Microsoft
    • Needs web based storefront for requesting new software
    • Needs ability to manage the packaging work flow better
    • Sometimes is slow to download and there is no indication the entire catalog is being loaded, resulting in confused users not being able to find common software in the available list.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Broadcom
    While the concepts of Service Desk and EITM were solid. The user interface, tool capabilities, and integrations fell behind the rest of the industry. Too often it seemed like CA bought and rebranded products without fully integrated them with their other products. It was a coat of paint, without the parts under the hood being updated. The overhead for administration was too high and the reporting capabilities were absolutely amongst the worst I've seen.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Microsoft
    No answers on this topic
    Usability
    Broadcom
    No answers on this topic
    Microsoft
    It is not user-friendly for the most part. With IT infrastructure, sometimes it cannot handle excess requests. Every few months, you will need an upgrade in terms of server resources to keep up with incoming alerts and requests. This does not happen all of the time, but it does happen when there are too many requests.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Support Rating
    Broadcom
    No answers on this topic
    Microsoft
    If I had to dislike something about the system it would be how much it changes once you upgrade. This could be more of a problem of mine since I get used to one way and don't like it when it changes so much. I am enjoying the newest update, but it is a mess when you are actually going through the upgrades.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Alternatives Considered
    Broadcom
    We are too integrated with CA Service Desk Manager to disassociate anytime soon. We found the more we used the product the more we needed to customize it in order to better integrate with our business processes. There are other alternatives that have many built-in features that had we have foreseen our future requirements... would have chosen ServiceNow or Remedy as our "go-to" ticketing product.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Microsoft
    We previously used a mix of FOG and Clonezilla to image machines. The biggest issues with these products is that changing one piece of the image required you to rebuild the entire image itself. These pieces of software also did not allow you to manage applications and Windows Updates, causing IT to have to constantly touch machines after they were imaged and update or manage them with a much more hands on approach.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Return on Investment
    Broadcom
    • Having CA Service Desk Manager within the company has increased the satisfaction of customer service from 68% to 95%. Teams are getting better customer survey scores and making better efforts to meet their SLAs.
    • CA Mobile app has provided agility and collaboration among IT Users and Customers.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Microsoft
    • We have been able to automate our patch management, firmware and other security concerns.
    • We have a standardized "image" ensuring our setup is consistent across the enterprise. This alone has saved us in time to support and time to understand how to use our desktops.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots