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DX Spectrum vs IBM Tivoli NetCool comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 2, 2025

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

DX Spectrum
Ranking in Network Management Applications
7th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
117
Ranking in other categories
Network Monitoring Software (20th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (19th), Network Troubleshooting (6th), DX NetOps (1st)
IBM Tivoli NetCool
Ranking in Network Management Applications
14th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Network Management Applications category, the mindshare of DX Spectrum is 3.7%, up from 1.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM Tivoli NetCool is 2.2%, up from 1.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Management Applications Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
DX Spectrum3.7%
IBM Tivoli NetCool2.2%
Other94.1%
Network Management Applications
 

Featured Reviews

DickBaker - PeerSpot reviewer
An all-inclusive monitoring solution that adapts to emerging technologies
The product helps to correlate events.  The solution's most valuable features are its integration with Broadcom tools and scalability. DX Spectrum needs better documentation on its complex features.  I have been using the product since 2005.  I rate DX Spectrum's stability an eight point five…
Petar Ganev - PeerSpot reviewer
Reliable for enterprise monitoring but no longer actively developed
There are problems with the latest security requirements because many things have changed in recent years, and now the security audits are very strict. And we need to switch to something else. We need to patch it constantly. Moreover, it is a very old tool and a little bit difficult to support. Otherwise, they work okay.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"The solution's most valuable features are its integration with Broadcom tools and scalability."
"The tool is very mature, and its valuable features are monitoring and configuration management."
"The integration point."
"​It covers a lot of different types of hardware. It can do a lot and saves us time.​"
"It does correlation so instead of producing 20 alarms if a site goes down, it only creates one."
"I have found the cross analysis feature to be the most valuable."
"The most valuable feature is the auto-discovery, which is nice because you don't have to do anything to add a new component."
"Offers a lot of functionality."
"It's very easy to use."
"NetCool has a huge database that can collect and process about one million alarms a day."
"The tool is much easier to manage than running scripts and figuring out how many endpoints have been exceeded."
"The feature I have found most valuable with NetCool is how it collaborates all the alarms, and then it does a predictive analysis, providing a consolidated alarm view and management."
"Support is one of the best aspects of this solution. NetCool is a good product that has good flexibility. There are a lot of documents available online which is one of the best features of IBM Tivoli Suite. Whenever an issue happens, rather than going to technical support, if you find the exact issue in Google, you can get tech notes for that particular issue."
"It's very easy to use."
"Anything is possible with Tivoli. It's quite a robust system."
"The solution has very good integration capabilities."
 

Cons

"DX Spectrum should have an automatic ticketing mechanism with ServiceNow. I need to use other tools for event management."
"We want to make our own choice for the AIOps solution and do not want to be forced to use the Broadcom OI solution by default."
"DX Spectrum needs to incorporate faster support."
"It was somewhat complex to implement."
"The solution's stability needs improvement."
"Make it easier to certify devices."
"There should be better integration with other Broadcom products, like network performance manager. Currently, for every part of a product, you need a separate server environment. You have something for Spectrum, you have something for network performance, and you have something for NetFlow. There are a lot of islands and server farms with different technologies. They should be redeveloped to get one platform for all."
"DX Spectrum should have an automatic ticketing mechanism with ServiceNow."
"Tivoli NetCool is based on a Linux platform, it would be beneficial if they moved it to Windows because not everyone is acquainted with Linux."
"The solution is too expensive."
"UI is outdated, very old legacy."
"Tivoli NetCool's has medium scalability - there are some problems with its replications not being mature."
"Customization and integration that you need to do to make the product fit your needs is very complex. It is not a product that somebody could easily pick up without any prior training or experience."
"In terms of improvement, I would like to see more AIOps, Artificial Intelligent Operations in the next release. IBM develops new features for Power BI or Cognos Analytics, which is good. As of now, we use Cognos Analytics, we are not using Power BI. They have the Insight concept but we don't like that."
"The installation could be simplified, and technical support could be faster."
"The installation could be simplified, and technical support could be faster."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price is very high."
"It is expensive compared to other tools in the market."
"It is very pricey. With the current trend of enterprises moving towards cheaper and more modern looking solutions like ManageEngine, SevOne, ServicePilot, and Paesller."
"Spectrum is expensive."
"Currently, a perpetual license but some services are moving to a subscription"
"The cost of some of these products are a little cost prohibitive, which is unfortunate. We have to find lower cost solutions for some of the things that we have to pull in. For the most part, CA has capabilities in pretty much everything that you would need. You just have to figure out where are you going to spend the most money for what you have to actually get done. You can do all these things but, which ones do you have to do? And that's hard to choose sometimes because you want to do them all."
"The price of the solution is reasonable."
"The solution's pricing could be better."
"Licensing fees are paid on a yearly basis."
"Customers are required to pay a licensing fee."
"It costs around 100k for every ten servers, which is lower than similar products from other vendors."
"The price of the product is too expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
16%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Computer Software Company
32%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Educational Organization
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business26
Midsize Enterprise19
Large Enterprise88
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise4
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about DX Spectrum?
The solution's most valuable features are its integration with Broadcom tools and scalability.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for DX Spectrum?
The price of DX Spectrum is not competitive when compared to other solutions, such as SolarWinds. The high price has caused us to lose many deals.
What needs improvement with DX Spectrum?
I would like to see improvements in making the interface more user-friendly. Many people find it not simple to use. One of the common customer complaints is about the alarm notifications. Currently...
What is the best network monitoring software for large enterprises?
I have worked from 1973 with all kind of systems in large enterprises across the world. And have experience with all kind of software in monitoring from infra to end to end, it depends on the funct...
What do you like most about IBM Tivoli NetCool?
The tool had many built-in automation capabilities.
What needs improvement with IBM Tivoli NetCool?
The main challenge is its licensing model, which is very complicated.
 

Also Known As

CA Spectrum
Tivoli NetCool
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

National Informatics Centre India, Banese, Olympus, AlphaServe Technologies, Sicredi
Claranet, Consolidated Communications, Telus, €sterreichische Bundesbahnen (€BB), Telekom Srbija, Bendigo Community Telco, Capgemini, Schweizerische Bundesbahnen (SBB)
Find out what your peers are saying about DX Spectrum vs. IBM Tivoli NetCool and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
869,089 professionals have used our research since 2012.