SYSPRO vs. Viewpoint Spectrum

If your company is an ISO or AS9100 type company that needs to maintain traceability of your products throughout the manufacturing process this is a good fit. Additionally, it performs well with inventory tracking and warehouse management. If you as just a basic job shop that just needs basic functions such as inventory, scheduling, work orders, etc...I would recommend using a product more manageable and less expensive such as ShopTech E2 Systems.

Incentivized

Viewpoint Spectrum would be fine for small to medium-sized companies. It would be great for transitioning from an in-house paper-based process, especially since it's designed with small construction companies in mind. They're making it even easier for smaller companies by offering additional features that you'd normally have to find in other products. However, companies can easily outgrow this system. We have about 15 years of data in the system, over 300 active jobs, and nearly 1,500 employees. In the past 3 years we've noticed slower performance and frequent locks in the system that require intervention from a system administrator. We moved to the cloud about 2 years ago and this has made troubleshooting even more difficult as we don't have the same access that we did before to resolve performance issues.

Incentivized

• Integrations with peripheral applications e.g. eCommerce websites.
• SYSPRO does this very well through the use of it's web services and e.NET business objects. This makes integrations very easy.
• Non-stocked configurable product production and management.
• Through the use of SYSPRO's product configurator, configurable products are easily set-up and managed by the use of selections, criteria and tying it to parts. This is particularly useful for companies that produce configurable products and want to give their customers the ability to customize.
• Document Management.
• Out of the box, SYSPRO provides document management through crystal reports (Syspro Reporting service Reports and Documents for invoices, order acknowledgements etc.).
• Accounting functions like Nightly Processing, Month end closing, General Ledger set-up etc. are easy to set-up and manage in SYSPRO.

Incentivized

• Dashboards make navigating to the crucial information quick and easy.
• The layout with what we affectionately call the job info bar helps our project teams to quickly get where they need to go in the system.
• Crystal reports are easily managed and integrated with Spectrum, giving us great flexibility in custom reports.
• With a little training, and I mean a little, Spectrum is user friendly. Easy to create favorites/shortcuts for ease of use.

Incentivized

• Their Projects and Contracts module is not as good as other ERP systems I have used. Tracking by Project for Sales and Purchases is cumbersome as it uses Jobs as the connecting point for the Projects and not the Project ID itself.
• They do not have a way to have system to allow Non-Stock Part Codes to be kept in a table that you can use in Purchasing that go to a particular GL code which you can use over and over again. It only has stocking items, and all Items in a Warehouse go to that Warehouse GL code.
• Similar to above the GL coding is not on the product but on the Warehouse that product is located in. I prefer it to be by Product not Warehouse.

Incentivized

• Subcontract Kiosk can be glitchy - allows subs to overbill on subcontract billing items
• Document Imaging can be glitchy - often says users do not have adequate security to view/add documents, but they do - if they sign out and back in, it works fine
• At times, support can be lacking - sometimes case responses are delayed or you get an incorrect answer

Incentivized

It checks all of our boxes at the moment.

Incentivized

I've heard many reports from our users stating how difficult Syspro is to use and navigate. From an average standpoint, the Syspro Administrator has to invest a lot of time in setting up the user for success. Once the groundwork is applied, SYSPRO's overall usability becomes fair easier to the average user.

Incentivized

Some things in Spectrum are NOT that intuitive, but I think knowledge of the software just comes with time. There are still some things I need assistance with in Spectrum but I'm very comfortable with my day to day items now that I've been using it for years. However, if there is something I don't do often or haven't done before, I don't find the software to be that intuitive, I actually find the logic on some things to be a little weird but it's fine once I know how to do it.

Incentivized

Very little down time. They host our system.

Incentivized

For the most part the product is very reliable. Since we are hosted we sometimes have connectivity issues but I would say that is more our ISP than Spectrum.

Incentivized

The support has recently changed. Last year, you could call in and get an immediate response. Now that doesn't seem possible unless you have an urgent situation with access to the software, payroll or payables. I have found that using chat or e-mail works nicely for the most part, but sometimes I feel it would be easier if someone from support would jump on our site and take a first-hand look rather than going back and forth

Incentivized

Our trainer was excellent and navigated the time zone differences expertly. She gave us test assignments to complete and was available for questions at any time.

Incentivized

It is important to have a strong implementation partner. It made the transition from our old system to the new system easier.

Incentivized

I believe Syspro has more meat to it than the other software I have used in the past. I have worked with software programs that were in-house written and prepackaged programs as well. Our company is unique in many ways but is also pretty standard for manufacturing. We are too large for a program like QuickBooks but too small for a much bigger ERP. Syspro is about the right size program for our company. The program has the ability to turn modules on that we need and customize whatever we choose we want at the time.

Incentivized

Spectrum, when compared to Simply accounting, is better. It has more options, and it is easy to navigate. Spectrum meets our needs better. Spectrum, when compared to Sage 300 Construction and Real Estate, is better. Spectrum has better connectivity between its project management system compared to Sage 300 Construction and Real Estate. Spectrum, when compared to CMIC, I believe they are equal. CMiC has a better project management system, but Spectrum has an easier accounting system to navigate.

Incentivized

You can grant user specific access which is nice. Project managers do not need all the same modules as Accounting. But Accounting does need access to PM modules as well

• Our resent upgrade from Syspro 6 to Syspro 7 has had a few bumps in the road and the response time from the support time can be frustrating at times.
• The reporting systems are a powerful tool that we take advantage off often.
• The rest of the product is working as the people that use it.

Incentivized

• Viewpoint Spectrum has allowed us the opportunity to be proactive in analyzing the costs for a project in time to make a difference in the outcome of the project. It has allowed us defense in supporting our communications with the project owners.
• Viewpoint Spectrum has allowed us to become more productive with its accounting software and the cohesion between the modules. It has definitely streamlined the processing necessary to account for the business.

Incentivized