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Microsoft Configuration Manager vs SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 9, 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

Microsoft Configuration Man...
Ranking in Server Monitoring
6th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
81
Ranking in other categories
Configuration Management (3rd), Patch Management (1st)
SolarWinds Server and Appli...
Ranking in Server Monitoring
9th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
5.0
Number of Reviews
42
Ranking in other categories
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (16th), Active Directory Management (12th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Server Monitoring category, the mindshare of Microsoft Configuration Manager is 6.0%, down from 8.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is 2.6%, down from 3.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Server Monitoring
 

Featured Reviews

MikeNelson2 - PeerSpot reviewer
Deployment recovery works well but requires configuration improvements
While I do not use the product frequently, many issues were due to configuration rather than the product itself. I cannot give an exact recommendation as it is not my area of responsibility. The team that uses it finds it adequate. It is presently good enough for us not to investigate other options. Overall, I rate the product a six out of ten.
Subhajit Nag - PeerSpot reviewer
The component and cable monitoring features are good, but the interface is slow
SolarWinds' interface is slow, and this is a global concern. Every SolarWinds user complains about the sluggishness. The response is slow. If you browse from one page to another, you have to wait. Our company is a massive user with plenty of licenses, so the performance issues could be due to the load per license. Ten thousand components can be mapped under one license. So SolarWinds needs to take care of the speed problem. It cannot be this slow. That is a huge complaint. Otherwise, the tool is good. It should also be easier to upgrade SolarWinds. AppDynamics is harder to deploy but easier to upgrade. So AppDynamics takes a lot of time and effort to install, but you can upgrade it in minutes. SolarWinds is the opposite. It's easy to deploy, but upgrades take forever. To date, nobody can complete it on time, so the production environment is sitting idle. The upgrade time matters because you only install the solution once, but you'll need to upgrade the solution repeatedly over the life of the product. A complex installation isn't an issue, but I mind if the upgrade takes too long because it's already in production.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Offers good patching."
"Patching is very effective and reporting is very good."
"What's valuable is the basic management of the systems, being able to control who can access the systems."
"The product is useful for patch management."
"Technical support was helpful and responsive."
"There is a faster time to rollout. If we get a new PC, it can be ready for productivity right away."
"The major features of this product are the reporting tools. The most valuable features are package deployment and application deployment. Security management is also good because any vulnerability will be identified, and you can fix it. It's the best tool because you never know what kind of client you will have. For example, you may have your offices in low bandwidth remote areas. But it's achievable because it accommodates the bandwidth that you have available. Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager is an excellent reporting tool for your environment. If you want to know the details about the hardware configuration, software configuration, what is causing a problem, or when a new feature update comes in for Windows, even that goes on SCCM itself. A lot of deployment stuff."
"The solution doesn't require any maintenance from our end because it is a cloud-based solution and Microsoft takes care of everything."
"Manage Groups: The capability to group appropriate devices gives better visibility of sites, categories, or critical regions. The same can be used to represent a dashboard for higher management."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is its interface, which is used for monitoring."
"SSL Certificate Monitoring and Expiry Alerting"
"Features like monitoring and infrastructure dependency mapping are valuable to us."
"AppInsight for SQL: Enables us to see the relevant error log entries on the same page as performance parameters."
"AppInsight. Provides a simple way to get very in-depth monitoring configured for our most popular applications. Exchange, SQL, and SharePoint."
"The most valuable feature of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is the network devices' performance monitor is the best."
"Monitoring of processes and services is the most valuable feature. It is not necessarily just the server alone in terms of the CPU or the memory. We can go in-depth into services and processes."
 

Cons

"Initial setup was complex. There's a lot that goes into it."
"The solution can be improved by speeding up the synchronizing of the policies on the devices."
"I want the system to provide some dependency relations. I would also like to see the relationship between different machines."
"The tool's deployment is difficult. Microsoft needs to improve documentation with videos."
"The main room for improvement is the on-screen display. I think it would be good if some improvements were made."
"SCCM does not scale well, which is one of the reasons we are not going to continue to use it."
"The assets have reached their end-of-life, and patching them is a complex and laborious task. It would be highly advantageous if there were an integrated solution that provided distinct options for each end-of-life asset, streamlining the process and facilitating comprehension."
"The product needs to improve scalability."
"The major concern in the product revolves around application performance monitoring since end-to-end application monitoring is not possible with the tool."
"Downside of the tools is the web console are hung or crash. It need to improve the performance."
"It lacks a user experience for measuring things like the end-to-end time for which a user waits for a specific response in the system. In the application layer, it has some very basic stuff. You have to build your own with manuscripts and things like that."
"In terms of the dashboards on offer, they should work to improve them. The types of dashboards that you get in terms of the graphs on offer aren't ideal right now."
"I would like to see support for non-Windows or non-Microsoft domains, especially Apache and other non-Windows servers."
"I believe that some of the trends, environmental maps, and items like those found in Orion would be very beneficial."
"Nodes in Azure are able to be monitored with the use of agents, but this does not apply to cloud service offerings that are not node based."
"The stability, flexibility, and ease of use could be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of SCCM depends on the size of the organization. The price is competitive."
"Pricing is negotiable with Microsoft, depending upon which of their packages you choose."
"For enterprises, there is an annual license required to use this solution. The price of the solution could be cheaper. However, this is mostly because of the exchange rate from the dollar to the Nigerian currency."
"I rate the price of Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager an eight out of ten."
"Pricing and licensing are a downside of SCCM. It's expensive. I'd have to confirm this, but I think they changed the licensing to core-based instead of socket-based. It's not cheap, because you have to buy the software, you have to buy SQL. Another thing we learned from talking to Microsoft is that they provide you a license for SQL if you run it on the same box as the primary server. If you run it outside that box, you have to buy SQL. Microsoft does recommend you running it on the same box because of performance. But then, in order to run SQL, SCCM, and everything on the same box, you better have some resources. It's an expensive solution. There's no doubt about it."
"I would rate the cost as eight out of ten."
"The licensing is good because they have various options, depending on what you are looking for."
"Microsoft provides a steep price for their enterprise products, but they offer very competitive pricing for their legacy customers."
"The price is too high."
"Its licensing is on a yearly basis. It is just the standard price, but it can vary depending on the current rate of the dollar."
"We pay around $ 2,000 to $ 5,000 yearly for the solution."
"Pricing and licensing is fair for what you get. It does have a great bang-for-the-buck appeal."
"The product might cost you $30,000 USD to buy, but scaling this solution requires the purchase of additional polling engines at $20,000 USD each."
"The solution's price is reasonable. Though it's on the higher side, the tool is worth the money."
"The solution is overpriced in terms of application management."
"I would rate the pricing for this solution a three out of five."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Educational Organization
45%
Computer Software Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
6%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

How does Ansible compare to Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager (SCCM)?
Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager takes knowledge and research to properly configure. The length of time that the set up will take depends on the kind of technical architecture that your org...
How to choose between ManageEngine Desktop Central and Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager (formerly SCCM)?
ManageEngine Desktop Central is very easy to set up, is scalable, stable, and also has very good patch management. What I like most about ManageEngine is that I can log on to every PC very easily a...
What do you like most about SCCM?
One of the standout features of SCCM is its application management capabilities. It allows us to create packages efficiently and deploy them to specific groups within our network. This streamlined ...
What needs improvement with SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor?
There are no specific features or functionality I would like to see improved or enhanced in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor at this time. I have not encountered any missing features or fu...
 

Also Known As

Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager, System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM )
SolarWinds SAM
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Bank Alfalah Ltd., Wªrth Handelsges.m.b.H, Dimension Data, Japan Business Systems, St. Lucie County Public Schools, MISC Berhad
Andr. L. Riis AS, NetSuite
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Configuration Manager vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
845,040 professionals have used our research since 2012.