DX Spectrum Reviews

• Event management
• Fault management
• NFV support

The companies in which I have deployed this solution have benefited in several ways. From the technical perspective, they have a clear picture of their monitored systems and their dependencies. From the business perspective, they have improved MTTR significantly, creating an elevated ROI ratio.

The GUI needs to be changed from Java to HTML5. This includes its integration with CA UIM, and the ability to dynamically move objects around.

We have been using the solution for 12 years.

We did not encounter any issues with stability when the solution was properly scaled.

We did not encounter any issues with scalability.

I would rate the technical support at 7/10.

We did not previously use a different solution, but I have done many migrations from other vendors. At the moment, the only thing which doesn't make CA Spectrum a market leader is its price.

The setup is quite straightforward.

I've worked with many environments, and price varies depending on how large the environment is. For small/medium companies, it is still too expensive, making the ideal candidates large enterprises, which would certainly benefit from the ROI within a year.

We evaluated Nagios, SCOM, Zabbix, the Tivoli suite, and Infovista.

If they have a large environment to monitor, CA Spectrum is certainly the better option, being ideal for OPS rooms, highly scalable and with very high availability.

• REST API: The single most undersold feature of CA Spectrum is the REST API!
• Customisation: Very customisable under the hood and using standard features.
• Reliable: It just works. I've been using Spectrum for more than five years and it just keeps getting better.

The REST API allowed us to automate a lot of the manual work required to add devices into Spectrum. This included:

• Installing the product via ‘silent installer’ based on one config file (installer would look at hostname and find out what role the server was and installed only those components. It also saves a DB if it’s a primary, and then loads the DB if it’s a secondary failover).
• Adding users from LDAP (you need to create the users in LDAP in spectrum, and then it uses LDAP after that).
• The automated deployment scripts we have first locally check if the devices are reachable via ICMP, SNMP, TFTP, etc., and then, if successful, it will add it to Spectrum in a specific container location. This contains logic which allows us to allocate which server in the Spectrum domain the device is deployed on and also checks to see if it exists on any other landscapes and deletes the devices that it’s not meant to be on only if the device exists on the correct landscape.

Other automation is the automatic creation of Global Collections, and a custom reporting ‘engine’ that allows us to query data from within Spectrum (e.g., 'Show me all alarms for devices running iOS version x which were created in the last hour' or 'Show me all devices which are running iOS versions not starting with 15.’).

Another thing that REST is good for is querying attributes for a specific model type. E.g., the VNM models contain info such as number of traps received, number of ignored traps, etc. When using tools like RRDTool, you can graph these over time and see how your Spectrum environment is doing.

These are the main areas and I’m looking to do a similar job for CA Performance Management. Once this is done, there is a lot of config management (i.e., management of Cisco configs) I want to do as even configs are stored in Spectrum models via attributes.

The best thing about Spectrum is the way it has been designed 'under the hood’. The concept of models with relationships to other models and each model having attributes. This makes a lot of information available that can be obtained very fast, instead of having to try do everything via VNM shell or GUI.

I was using VNM shell for years and typically ran scripts on each host and had to manage each host and the scripts (which were mostly always the same but nonetheless still a pain to administer). Most information is obtainable via VNMShell but you have to ‘stitch’ the info from each landscape together. With the REST API, it’s one call and it checks all landscapes.

What I also like about the REST API is that you can have a separate host running all the scripts. This allows for a much cleaner Spectrum build and less complications when upgrading.

Spectrum is what I like to call a good CMDB product. Once you have discovered the devices, you have a good CMDB to use to populate other tools. You can create custom attributes via the Model Type Editor and use Spectrum as your ‘single pane of glass’, which contains all the info a NOC/support team needs (e.g., you can import device reference numbers, circuit refs, addresses, contact numbers, etc.), so all the info is in one place. This can all be populated via REST API at discovery time.

It took me some time to get to understand the REST API and enjoy scripting, so the initial time investment was needed - but now it’s paying off and saving me a lot of time.

Back when I started to tinker with it, there was not a lot of documentation. This has vastly improved over the years and the APIs are getting better in terms of documentation and updated features.

The REST API work has allowed us to fully automate our deployment process, user creation, exception reporting, and much more.

The device support is very comprehensive and vendor agnostic. Device certifications are added almost quarterly or more frequently. This allows us to use Spectrum to manage new devices.

CA Spectrum is a good for network management (CMDB). While not a CMDB in it's own right, it is a good tool to use as the source of data for what is being monitored. Once Spectrum has the devices discovered, you get a lot of additional information such as software versions, serial numbers, interface info, module info, etc.

We also feed all of our alarms to it. You can feed traps/alarms from all over the place into Spectrum for that 'single pane of glass' functionality.

CABI was a major issue for us, but the newly added Jaspersoft is a better-suited reporting toolset, so this has already been addressed.

The OneClick UI is a little dated, but still very functional. They are also addressing this with the new web client. It's not quite where it can be, but it shows promise and looks pretty good for their first attempt at it.

One thing I would like to see is that all the IM products look similar in terms of UI design/widgets, etc. We are an MSP and would like our customers to have a seamless experience and not be able to notice moving between the various Infrastructure Management products.

I have used it since 1998, 17 years or so (since 5.0).

I have not encountered any deployment issues at all.

There was an issue with the REST API and a memory leak, but this was addressed very quickly and communicated via the CA Communities.

I have not encountered any scalability issues. Since 64-bit capability was added in Spectrum 10.x, we can add a lot more devices. However, we only populate up to about 60%, as we do quite a bit on the servers.

Customer service is very good. CA Support do a good job with communication and are always keen to assist. The CA Product team also continuously ask questions and look at the ideas posted on CA Communities. I don't think I've seen anything similar anywhere else. In most other cases, communities are run by users with little or no involvement by the vendor. CA are also always looking to include us with testing/new announcements.

I rate technical support very highly. Most of the tickets I've logged are API questions and these are answered fairly quickly, even though they are only P4's. I think I might have raised 2 or 3 Priority 1 cases in the 17 years I've been using it. It's a very robust product and has most certainly stood the test of time.

I've never had to switch from another product to CA Spectrum. Most places I have worked either already had Spectrum or I've recommended it/implemented it as a new tool.

The installation has always been simple. When I initially started using it, it was on Windows or Solaris. More recently, I've always suggested Linux. The move to Linux also didn't pose any issues and I've since done installations using custom scripts using the unassisted install. It just works!

Most implementations were done by myself but for some projects, we've used CA Professional Services and they are very professional. They usually have people with various skills (technical/management) and tap into their internal support structure very effectively (e.g., access to product managers/development team, etc.).

The automation we have in place saves us some head count and data is now more accurate. In some organisations I've worked before, we also used Spectrum as a sort of scaled-down ticket management system; that also saved time and the reporting we were able to generate was very good.

The other good thing about Spectrum is that it works out-of-the-box. You can run a discovery and once devices are added, you already begin to see value. The root-cause analysis is also one of the big pluses. I've used other tools from other vendors and I think CA Spectrum's root-cause analysis is the best one I've used across the most devices. The CA Spectrum team also keep adding more features and most of these don't come at any additional cost.

Additionally the API allows us to implement custom attributes so we can import data from a CMDB so NOC Operators, or other users can have all the information they need in one tool. Integration with other CA IM tools and Service Desk tools improves the workflows and saves a lot of time.

Work out exactly what you need and negotiate. CA are very flexible and are always happy to help. They are not very 'Big Brother' in terms of going over the license usage. They give you some play but expect you to be honest and report any additional licenses you use. E.g., if you go over 100 licenses, they don't mind that you go over but you need to let them know if you plan to continue using them. They don't necessarily want to do audits like other companies.

Renewals are also a good time to re-negotiate, especially if you plan to use more features or even other products in their portfolio.

I've used HP OpenView, Netcool, EMC Smarts and some others, and whilst specific products might have some 'better' or more-specific features that CA Spectrum might not have, CA Spectrum seemed to be the most vendor-agnostic solution and one that was pretty much ready to go, from install. It also seemed to provide a well-rounded set of features that didn't necessarily cover everything the others did but had essential capabilities and more advanced features too.

The CA Infrastructure tools on offer from CA work well with each other and are being more and more closely integrated every release. They use the Agile development methodology, so updates are frequent enough to keep up to date with new trends in technology. If you are not inclined to update too often, it is OK, as they do have a good support period. (I think it's 2-3 years or more in general, so you don't have to upgrade every time a new version is released.)

Invest in time and resources to utilise the REST APIs for their products; it will save a lot of time if you are an MSP or provider of any kind. Also, utilise your CA representative; they have a lot of experience with different industries (and technologies) and are valuable, fair and friendly.

A valuable feature is the topology view. You can view the topology. Other valuable features are the host configuration, the NCM feature, the policy manager that it has and the scalability. That's one of the biggest ones.

When I started working, we only had 35,000 devices in there. Because of the scalability and all that, we have over 100,000 in Spectrum right now. All of them are SNMP managed.

We have a DR site. We are testing the latest release right now. In our production, we have 9.3.3 and it's running good. With our requirements as they are expanding, for example, one of the issues that we have is the global collection, the real-time global collections. For example, let’s say, just the southwest region has 15,000 devices, and that group wants to have interface global collection; that's going to be over 300,000-400,000 interfaces, and they wanted real-time interfaces. That really bogs down the database, so we are looking at 10.1. In there, the scalability is going to improve a lot with that.

There are certain attributes that we would like to be able to send northbound to different applications or different API calls that we can use. That is one area for improvement.

Also, I would like to see a unified poller, which they have already talked about. If I have Performance Center in Spectrum, I don't need to have separate servers for those same applications. I could have one unified poller, which is getting the traps and also polling information.

I have been using it for two years.

It is a very stable solution. Once you launch it correctly, you barely have to manage it.

The level-one support is the same as the support you get everywhere with every vendor, but the layer two and above, they are very good.

I am not sure how they knew they needed to invest in a new solution, but when I got in, Spectrum was on the rise of being implemented. Before this, we had NetCool.

When I select a vendor, first, I look at the product; how viable it is. Second, I look at the support that I'm going to get from the vendor. Those are the two major things that I look for.

Initial setup complexity depends on how big your environment is. If you're doing a distributed setup, then you need little bit of architecture help on how it's going to be built, but on a scale from one to ten, with one being easy and ten being hard, initial setup is between six and seven.

My company, they looked at vendors before Spectrum, but now Spectrum is the primary vendor for fault management.

My rating reflects its scalability and reliability. There are some minor issues, but that can be resolved.

Root-cause analysis and modelling pinpoint the exact cause of problems, which makes life easier.

It was implemented for a customer and it helped reduce turnaround time.

I have used it for 3+ years.

It was very easy to deploy and configure.

I rate technical support 6/10.

Straightforward installation and setup.

An in-house team implemented it. A complete implementation requires a certain level of hands-on training.

CA Spectrum provides value, but it can be very expensive.

I played around with SolarWinds and some others, but CA Spectrum gave me a more detailed analysis for fault identification.

The newer versions are easier to deploy and they have more features.

• Network Configuration Manager
• MPLS & VPN Manager
• Southbound Gateway
• Event rules
• Event procedures

Using event rules and procedures, we improved our event management process. CA Spectrum is very useful for event handling and offers a robust manager of managers console.

Like SpectroSERVER's fault tolerance (FT) functionality, the OneClick console should have a native HA or FT functionality. Actually, the only way to get this is by using a load balancer.

Spectroserver is the core component in CA Spectrum arquitecture that polls devices in to network, you can use multiple servers to build some kind of "cluster" to provide continued device polling when some server fail. Oneclick console ( web server) is front end of CA Spectrum it do not have an option to provide continued user access when a oneclick server fail ( High Availability). You can use a Load Balancer but is very expensive.

I have been using it for seven years.

No deployment issues encountered.

SpectroSERVER and reporting databases can grow quickly if you don't keep track of trap storms; this can cause SpectroSERVER to crash and performance issues with reporting.

No scalability issues encountered.

Customer service is very good (10/10).

The North America support team is excellent (10/10). The LATAM support team have some things to improve (6/10).

We did not previously use a different solution.

Initial setup was complex because deep knowledge about tool architecture and proprietary software is required. In some cases, if you make a mistake during installation or initial setup, the better solution is to reinstall it or reinitialize a DB.

We implemented it through a vendor team. Their level of expertise is high (9/10).

Licensing usually is expensive but cost efficient.

Before choosing this product, we evaluated Tivoli monitoring.

I recommend you use CA Spectrum mainly to monitor network infrastructure. Use this tool as a manager of managers. Event monitoring is a very powerful functionality. If you want to monitor servers, app and databases, use CA UIM probes instead of the CA SystemEDGE agent.

It makes sure that the company network is doing what it's supposed to do.

The way our network is structured, CA Spectrum seems to be able to deal with problems that we have coming up in real time. There are parts of the product we are still not using yet because we are still kind of green, so I know there is more that it can do; but right now it's the fault management side of things.

I am not sure I can address areas with room for improvement because right now, it is doing everything we need.

See my tech support comments below.

It's pretty stable for a Windows product.

It scales pretty well especially with the new 10.1. We are actually going to be able to consolidate and shut down some of the servers just because they've increased capacity.

I used to do support for Spectrum, so I know it really well. Sometimes the front-line people need to push it up to the second-level quicker. But because I know people on the inside, I can usually get it moved up when I need to.

I don't believe they were using anything prior to this. I think it was on an "on-call, this-is-down" basis.

Definitely demo it. Have them PoC it for you. Once they show you what it can do, it can really make a person's decision a lot easier.

Our most important criteria when selecting a vendor is definitely supportability. Obviously, it needs to do what we need it to do. If it didn't, we wouldn't have picked them to begin with; but for me, it's supportability.

The valuable features of this tool are its scalability and ability to automate inputs and outputs of a closed system.

This solution provides critical data to our network engineers about performance of our infrastructure.

I’d like to see better access to data elements via the API as well as better elements for the UIs. The UIs are somewhat inflexible and we'd like to see that improve.

The tool is very stable.

The tool scales very well.

I have used technical support and I would give them a rating of 3 out of 5.

We were using another CA product. We had to integrate that system with other systems, but it lacked the API. We decided to upgrade to APM for that reason.

I was involved in the setup and it was straightforward.

The alternatives that we considered besides CA were EMC, SevOne, and a variety of other products.

When selecting a vendor, I look for stability, the ability to meet our needs, and the ability for their products to integrate with other products that we use.

If you are looking for a product, make sure that the solution you chose integrates well with your other systems.

It's a mature product and has been around for a long time. The technical support is up to speed and it has been well designed.

It gives us a visual representation of what's going on in the network. It hasn't helped me personally but it has helped the network. We haven't moved on to the latest version yet but integration with UIM will be one of it's benefits.

It is not so much in regards to the product itself. In my opinion, it's the documentation that I find is not up to the mark. Instead of reading 400 pages, if they could just give me one simple example, it would make things a lot easier because it's a very complex product that does a lot of complex things. I would like to have illustrations on how to do the simple things as opposed to sending me a link that refers to 400 pages of a manual; it doesn't help. Saying “select the criteria” is meaningless if I don’t have the basic knowledge of what the criteria means or why I’m selecting it.

It is very stable.

The product is very scalable as well.

We have used technical support. It's hit or miss. Sometimes you get people who are really good and sometimes you don't. However, you can usually escalate quite quickly.

Our company was partially using CiscoWorks before this product.

I would definitely recommend this product to others.

The most important criteria whilst selecting a vendor is reliability.