Hands off my assets: 6 asset management packages tested

MAXIMO Asset Tracker

 Asset management
The installation of MAXIMO only took a few minutes and we can't see too many people having problems installing it. The installer recognised that our server didn't have the latest Microsoft Data Access Components installed and installed it for us. It also installed SQL Server then the main components of the application.

After all this we were ready to deploy the client agents to all our PCs. There are a few ways you can do this, using a login script, via e-mail, or automatically over the network. We decided to deploy the client agents automatically over the network then we were ready to discover and interrogate our assets.

The user interface can become a little cluttered once a large number of assets are discovered, but generally it was quite easy to carry out simple tasks. Some of the key features of MAXIMO were:

  • Inventory of your hardware
  • Inventory of your software including where it is installed
  • Identifies all configuration changes made to a PC
  • Tracks software usage
  • Shares the data with other applications (exporting data)
  • Optional Web-based access

Reporting can be done from the Control Center. You can either run one of the built-in reports by simply generating a query or you

can build custom designed reports. You can also export data for use in other applications.

MAXIMO doesn't interrogate hardware as well as some of the other packages. It identified the obvious hardware, but it didn't drill down as deep in some areas. It didn't list important information like the driver versions used by the respective hardware, which I'm sure any administrator would love to have on hand at all times.

As with software monitoring, MAXIMO can categorise audited data by usage and can also list where the application resides on a PC. Furthermore it can display the disk space usage by file type. From here you can, for example, list all the installations of an application and compare it to the number of licences purchased against the usage.

It's a little messy how it does all this, but you can still efficiently manage all your licences, reclaiming licences or reallocating licences depending on what is happening.

Product MAXIMO Asset Tracker
Price Standard Edition $7850 for 250 nodes
Vendor MRO Software
Phone 02 9463 7734
Web www.mro.com.au
 
Interoperability
Good hardware and software support.
Futureproofing ½
This product has limited expansion potential, but MRO Software has other packages for larger deployments.
ROI
Pricey; works out to over $30 per node.
Service ½
Annual support and maintenance is charged at 20 percent of list price.
Rating

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Talkback 4 comments

  1. Geez you guys, do you think you could have included appropriate candidates for this topic? Where is Marimba, Landesk, Paradigm, Tivoli? The fact that these were not included make this inaccurate! Anonymous -- 15/04/04

    Geez you guys, do you think you could have included appropriate candidates for this topic? Where is Marimba, Landesk, Paradigm, Tivoli?
    The fact that these were not included make this inaccurate!

  2. Guess Mike in previous comment does not see the difference in IT asset management and device management. Bigger issue in the items listed is these are all legacy software solutions. Difficult to integrate, upgrade headaches and very intrusive to your en Anonymous -- 18/08/04

    Guess Mike in previous comment does not see the difference in IT asset management and device management. Bigger issue in the items listed is these are all legacy software solutions. Difficult to integrate, upgrade headaches and very intrusive to your environment. Look at products that will grow and support you in the future and link easily to enterprise systems. Look at incontroltechnology.com

  3. other options Stuart McDonell -- 10/11/05

    Some others to think about include Centennial and Opsware. This doesn't end the list by any means. BMC-Marimba and Tivoli do ITAM also. The Opsware solution ATE (originating in Tangram) was the leader for desktop inventory. It supports all major platforms and allows Lifecycle management. Ask vendors to do a proof of concept, some won't. A proven track record of integrating to similar systems to your own is also important. Regards.

  4. Sofware Asset Management Review Petar -- 15/03/07

    We have 2 software packages BAM (Biomedical Asset Management) and NAMES (naval asset management ).
    We would like to be reviewed. How can we have you review our software?

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