ScreenConnect vs. SolarWinds Dameware Remote Support (DRS)

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
ScreenConnect
Score 8.5 out of 10
N/A
ConnectWise ScreenConnect is a remote support, access, and meeting solution. With it, users can utilize remote support and access to repair computers, provide updates, and manage machines. Users can also conduct online seminars and presentations using remote meetings.
$39
per month
SolarWinds Dameware Remote Support (DRS)
Score 7.3 out of 10
N/A
DameWare Remote Support from Austin IT company SolarWinds is remote administration software for the remote control of desktops, laptops, and servers behind or outside the firewall, allowing registry editing, restart services, logging activity, account and password management, and more. The mobile app also provides access from a phone or tablet. DameWare Remote Support licensing is per technician, the number of end-user remote machines is irrelevant; one technician may receive a license for…
$370
one-time fee
Pricing
ScreenConnectSolarWinds Dameware Remote Support (DRS)
Editions & Modules
One
$39
per month
Standard
$59
per month
Premium
$69
per month
Dameware Mini Remote Control
$370
one-time fee
Dameware Remote Support
$520
one-time fee
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
ScreenConnectSolarWinds Dameware Remote Support (DRS)
Free Trial
YesYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional DetailsDameWare Remote Support and Mini Remote Control are licensed based on the number of technician users that use the software for remote administration. There are no limits or restrictions for the number of end-users supported or the number of remote endpoints/computers supported. As you buy higher counts of licenses, the per-seat pricing goes down giving you a reduced total price.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
ScreenConnectSolarWinds Dameware Remote Support (DRS)
Features
ScreenConnectSolarWinds Dameware Remote Support (DRS)
Remote Administration
Comparison of Remote Administration features of Product A and Product B
ScreenConnect
7.0
Ratings
15% below category average
SolarWinds Dameware Remote Support (DRS)
8.6
Ratings
6% above category average
Screen sharing10.00 Ratings10.00 Ratings
File transfer9.40 Ratings10.00 Ratings
Instant message6.20 Ratings8.30 Ratings
Secure remote access with Smart Card authentication7.00 Ratings8.70 Ratings
Access to sleeping/powered-off computers4.50 Ratings9.00 Ratings
Over-the-Internet remote session10.00 Ratings8.50 Ratings
Initiate remote control from mobile8.00 Ratings9.00 Ratings
Remote management of servers & workstations9.00 Ratings9.10 Ratings
Remote Active Directory® management5.00 Ratings7.20 Ratings
Centralized management dashboard7.20 Ratings8.20 Ratings
Session record5.50 Ratings8.50 Ratings
Annotations5.50 Ratings7.90 Ratings
Monitoring and Alerts5.60 Ratings8.70 Ratings
Multi-platform remote control4.90 Ratings7.10 Ratings
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ScreenConnectSolarWinds Dameware Remote Support (DRS)
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User Ratings
ScreenConnectSolarWinds Dameware Remote Support (DRS)
Likelihood to Recommend
9.0
(0 ratings)
8.3
(0 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
10.0
(0 ratings)
9.0
(0 ratings)
Usability
7.9
(0 ratings)
9.0
(0 ratings)
Availability
10.0
(0 ratings)
9.0
(0 ratings)
Performance
10.0
(0 ratings)
8.5
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
8.2
(0 ratings)
5.0
(0 ratings)
In-Person Training
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(0 ratings)
Online Training
7.5
(0 ratings)
9.0
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
10.0
(0 ratings)
5.0
(0 ratings)
Configurability
10.0
(0 ratings)
9.5
(0 ratings)
Ease of integration
-
(0 ratings)
9.5
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
10.0
(0 ratings)
8.0
(0 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
10.0
(0 ratings)
9.5
(0 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
5.0
(0 ratings)
9.5
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
ScreenConnectSolarWinds Dameware Remote Support (DRS)
Likelihood to Recommend
I feel [ConnectWise Control (formerly ScreenConnect)] works on all sizes of implementations. I've used it with about 1000 endpoints and I've even used it for managing a couple family machines to make remote support easier. It works super well and does exactly what you want it to. It has not disappointed me at all and I'd recommend it to any employers I work for as well.
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I feel like this is a very robust solution that I would recommend to anyone who relies heavily on remote support. Most of the colleagues I work with already use SolarWinds products to one extent or the other. I feel the price for the solution is very fair and a good value for the product.
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Pros
  • Self-hosted - this is great for me and makes it easy to control my data, which is important for my clients.
  • Mobile Access - being able to quickly diagnose and resolve an issue while on the road is great.
  • Persistent - "always on" connections with screen capture.
  • Great User Interface and chat works exceptionally well.
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  • DameWare Remote Support allows us to connect to the desktop of a user very easily and quickly. It can be configured to use different levels of security making it both fast and secure.
  • DameWare Remote Support can be deployed to all computers in the environment quickly using the built in capabilities of DameWare.
  • DameWare provides the ability to get system information as well using the full client not the mini remote control. This is handy in finding running services, events logs, etc and all based on our AD structure.
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Cons
  • If CWC integrated with more RMM software other than LabTech it would be great as LabTech is way too expensive and convoluted at this point so we discontinued using it in favor of a simpler and much less expensive option.
  • Though it does support multiple monitors well, it would be nice to have the ability to have it automatically pop each remote monitor out to the local monitors if so desired.
  • Right now it uses email for multifactor authentication, I would rather it use an electronic key that can be stored on cell phone or user desktop.
  • The ability for it to automatically login to a Windows desktop would be a big help as well. It will store a username and password but you must manually send a control-alt-delete and then click a button to have it fill. Tying to something like Lastpass along with an autologin feature would be great.
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  • Connecting to last session is not always the last session.
  • Saving your position in the Personal Host List would be helpful. I have a folder structure 3 levels deep and when I'm going through a list of computers it is frustrating to have to browse down through the same levels each time.
  • When connecting to a host, an entry is saved in Saved Host List (even duplicates). I would be nice to have an option to save or not save like a quick connect option.
  • DameWare Mobile has separate password than desktop and cannot be linked to Active Directory password like desktop.
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Likelihood to Renew
I would recommend this product for both internal remote control of end user workstations and remote access to other clients over the internet. It provides a secure and feature rich product that allows me to complete any necessary tasks without ever leaving the office. I will continue to renew as I'm eager to see what they do next. I would however wish the cloud service had a better API to work in conjunction with team collaboration or chat services to make it easier to connect with end users who use multiple workstations. (Slack or Stride provide this functionality)
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We like DRS for remote support and have been using it for several years. It has made it easy to support our on network users when "hands on" support is required. We currently don't use DRS to its fullest simply because there are other tools that are easier to use, for instance we use AD Manager Plus to handle our AD tasks. I've not found DRS to be all that intuitive to use for anything other than remote support with the Mini Remote Control.
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Usability
If you're a support noobie or a seasoned admin, this product is everything you are looking for. Join with a code - CHECK! Hop onto a permanent session installed on a PC/Server - YOU GOT IT! Wake up a remote sleeping computer - no problem. Need to customize access to different roles in your organization - BUILT RIGHT IN!
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It's effective and easy. It'll do what you want it to do as long as you don't expect the world. I expect it would be even better if you were a Solar Wind shop; for us this is the only thing we use from them, mainly due to price point on other components
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Reliability and Availability
In my 5 years of using the product, I am only aware of one time when the service was down and is was due to a backbone outage upstream.
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Yes, always available.
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Performance
It performs well. It also has full control over windows security and does not get hung up like GoToMeeting when trying to install remote software at the prompt to install as admin / override. I have used TeamViewer, WebEx, LogMeIn and GoToMeeting. This is by far the best at spontaneous, remote control. It is also very easy to get a novice user connected to the session.
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The application always seems responsive to me
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Support Rating
There have been two times when something has went wrong and I needed immediate assistance in order to be able to use Screenconnect to be able to help clients and response has not been immediate. The response time has been within 24 hours. Both times if there had been easier to navigate self help I would have been able to help myself. With better self help and a speedier response it would definitely be a 10 as they always respond and help. Just a little more difficult or slow than it should be at times
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I use a Samsung mobile device; DameWare Mobile was working and then after an Android update it started crashing. I reported the issue to DameWare and worked with the technicians and developers to gather data for them to correct the issue. They quickly published a beta release for me to test (which corrected the crashes) and then published an update to the Google Play Store.
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In-Person Training
No answers on this topic
It was excellent
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Online Training
the one I attended didn't grab my attention the way I thought it would. Maybe because of the way I use the product; or because of how I am using an online instance, not a locally installed version. Some of the discussion got more technical and off the topic, it seemed.
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The videos were more than sufficient to learn the product
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Implementation Rating
ConnectWise has done everything they could to help us in any situation. Great support team and their new updates are always providing features that we need. Its a simple solution that works the way we need it to. Their legacy pricing model is still much better than their subscription based model however it is still fair pricing
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It helps greatly if you know someone already using DameWare Remote Support. I was fortunate as my tech support guys were using it at their hospital and assisted me through the purchase, download and implementation of remote support. As well as, knowing how many licenses to purchase at the time. You have to make sure that anyone assisting in IT can have access to the program with their own license.
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Alternatives Considered
We have used Beyond Trust occasionally for one of our White Label clients, but have found it is not as robust as ConnectWise Control. The seamless integration of Control with ConnectWise Automate makes it the best and most effective choice for our technical teams to deploy and manage our client machines.
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SCCM is pretty decent as a Remote Support tool, the main difference is that, as SCCM is much more, it takes long time to load and uses u lots of resources that are wasted if you only uses it to Remote. Dameware Remote Support is specialized software, so it is powerful enough for all your needs, while being light enough to barely make a dent on the system resources.
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Scalability
As far as I can see there are no real barriers to scaling up - as and when we need more subscriptions, we can add them in with no negative impact to the existing way that we're using the tool
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You get an 8 because of the constant initial freeze on most connections. Takes a reconnect to have it work.
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Return on Investment
  • Quite simply our business could not function without a form of remote control software. Control has done an amazing job at filling a core foundation pillar of our business model as an MSP, having some clients in very remote destinations, we can still service them through the use of Control.
  • We pay per technician for an unlimited number of endpoints, and this pricing model has served us very admirably. As a smaller startup MSP, the cost of paying per endpoint would only serve to hurt our growth. Being able to pay a flat rate based on staffing is very desirable.
  • The whole experience using Control is polished and speedy. I couldn't imaging going back to a slower solution, the value Control brings is palpable in our business model.
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  • DameWare has allowed us to maintain our non-traditional approach to IT support. It allows our administrators to work from anywhere and has extended their reach to clients domestic and abroad.
  • Return on investment was realized as soon as we purchased the licenses. We don't have to maintain a large office space or overhead costs due to the flexibility it allows our administrators.
  • First call resolution has increased drastically since implementing DameWare company-wide. The user no longer has to wait to reproduce an error. We can screen share and view it as it happens and mitigate the issues.
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ScreenShots

ScreenConnect Screenshots

Screenshot of the guest page, where end-users enter a code to join a session with a technicianScreenshot of connecting from a Windows machine to a macOS machineScreenshot of the Extension Marketplace, where administrators can install and configure new features and integrationsScreenshot of the Access view of the Host page, where a technician can connect to unattended machinesScreenshot of the toolbox menu, which allows technicians to store and run executables, scripts, and other frequently-used filesScreenshot of the Host page, where a command can be run directly without connecting to the machine

SolarWinds Dameware Remote Support (DRS) Screenshots

Screenshot of DameWare Remote Support Management ConsoleScreenshot of Remotely Connect to Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X ComputersScreenshot of Over-the-Internet Remote Session via Secure Proxy ServerScreenshot of Connect to Remote Computers from iOS and Android Mobile Devices