CA IDMS vs Quest Foglight for Databases comparison

Broadcom and Quest Software are both solutions in the Database Development and Management category. Broadcom is ranked #29, while Quest Software is ranked #2 with an average rating of 8.2. Broadcom holds a 1.1% mindshare in DDM, compared to Quest Software’s 8.0% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Broadcom users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 93% of Quest Software users who would recommend it.

CA IDMS

Read 5 CA IDMS reviews

105 Views
79 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Quest Foglight for Databases

Read 14 Quest Foglight for Databases reviews

1,947 Views
722 Comparison Views

93% willing to recommend

CA IDMS

Quest Foglight for Databases

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 23, 2025

CA IDMS and Quest Foglight for Databases are competing in the database management and monitoring space. Quest Foglight appears to have the upper hand due to its advanced real-time performance monitoring capabilities and comprehensive solution for database issues.

Features: CA IDMS provides efficient database management, strong integration with legacy systems, and high-level data processing. Quest Foglight for Databases offers real-time performance monitoring, in-depth database diagnostics, and comprehensive alert systems, making it ideal for organizations needing advanced analytics and visualization tools.

Room for Improvement: CA IDMS could improve its modern monitoring capabilities, user interface, and support for newer database trends. Quest Foglight can enhance its UI simplicity, extend support to more diverse database types, and reduce resource usage for performance monitoring tasks by optimizing real-time data gathering.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: CA IDMS caters mainly to large-scale legacy environments with traditional deployment models that often require more resources. Quest Foglight, on the other hand, is designed for modern architectures with a streamlined and flexible deployment process complemented by superior, responsive customer support.

Pricing and ROI: CA IDMS may require a high initial investment, with returns tied to legacy system efficiency. Quest Foglight offers more favorable pricing with faster ROI, as its monitoring tools help reduce downtime and ensure optimal database performance. The initial cost is often offset by long-term savings through enhanced operational efficiency.

To learn more, read our detailed CA IDMS vs. Quest Foglight for Databases Report (Updated: June 2025).

Buyer's Guide

CA IDMS vs. Quest Foglight for Databases

June 2025

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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

CA IDMS

Ranking in Database Development and Management

29th

Average Rating

9.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Quest Foglight for Databases

Ranking in Database Development and Management

2nd

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Database Development and Management category, the mindshare of CA IDMS is 1.1%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Quest Foglight for Databases is 8.0%, up from 7.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Database Development and Management

Featured Reviews

Alfredo Silva

ALiBS Solutions at ALiBS Solutions

Helps us to manage user profiles very quickly and in an assertive way

I would rate this solution 9 out of 10. I would advise that they should evaluate other possibilities because this is a very quickly changing environment and there are other possible providers that have good solutions. I would do some kind of test. I would test other possible solutions too and compare them.

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Stuart Dairiki

Senior IT Manager at a wholesaler/distributor with 1,001-5,000 employees

Empowers efficient database monitoring and performance troubleshooting with powerful workload analysis

I find it extremely helpful to use Foglight to triage any database issues, specifically performance issues using what Foglight calls PI investigator. It is a very powerful workload analysis tool that helps me understand where bottlenecks are. It allows me to see performance issues as end users report them. It can save time and effort when doing root cause analysis. It enables me to obtain information quicker and easier compared to manually compiling it. Foglight provides us with a near-real-time activity database. It's not 100% real-time. It has less than a minute latency. It allows us to see performance issues as end-users report them. We started seeing benefits pretty much immediately. We use Foglight to display intensive databases. However, it's not something we monitor regularly. It's only something we kind of dig into as we troubleshoot and triage issues. It does help us determine potential IT help issues. When we use Foglight, we find it helps drill down holistically into potential bottlenecks. It helps us to see what is going on in the database. Foglight allows us to monitor multiple database platforms. We use, for example, Oracle, SQL Server, Postgres, Amazon Redshift, and SAP HANA. It gives us insight into our entire landscape of production workloads in near real-time. The solution saves costs when performing root cause analysis. It can save time and effort when doing root cause analysis. It allows us to obtain information quicker and easier than by manually compiling information.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It is a really stable platform. It has been around for many years. We trust it implicitly. "

"The most useful feature is the governance feature, because it can show us and help us to manage user profiles very quickly and using it in assertive way."

"Technical support is very good. They are very knowledgeable, very quick to respond, and very nice people, too."

"The ability to monitor multiple database platforms streamlines our database operations. The single pane of glass is what we were really after when we picked Foglight. We knew we wanted something that could monitor cross-platform because it does save a lot of time to use the same tool. The one thing that I like with Foglight is that we don't have to install anything locally, like agents, directly on the database servers. That was also a big seller because it simplifies things."

"Its reporting capabilities are immense."

"Foglight is also able to help the DBAs proactively fix problems before they become an issue. It provides them with real-time activity screens that help in this regard. The DBAs are able to go to these screens and look at what's happening in real time, and that buys them time. It helps them see problems ahead of time and find solutions to them."

"The PI module allows [my colleague] to identify which new indexes or modified indexes are going to make the biggest impact."

"The most valuable feature is the in-depth capability SQL Performance Investigator provides. It allows you to drill down to the smallest detail that occurs on our platform. It does a highly detailed and atomic follow-up of what one wants to look for in relation to time and our different instances."

"The alarms alert proactively if there are any potential or ongoing issues with the databases that we support. That means we can take preventive or corrective action before the issue becomes a big issue. And the SQL PI features enable us to drill down into performance issues in our databases so that we can improve performance, which is important."

"One of the hardest things to do in database management is to evaluate performance deviation across time. The adaptive baseline that Quest is using is by far the most helpful. That doesn't necessarily mean I use it on a daily basis, but it is something that I have not been able to find in any other tool, at the same level."

"The platform is very stable."

More Quest Foglight for Databases pros

Cons

"I would like to see it made simpler to operate and maintain."

"Right now, it's not easy to start using this solution. You have to take long course and train people. It's not an easy path."

"It would be amazing if they could enable the 'Performance Investigator' functionality across all database platforms."

"I get a lot of alerts that, while important, are not critical. Then I have to dig in and figure out how to turn alerts off, but not the logging. I want to be able to go back, once we get the other big issues out of the way, and start fine-tuning some of those other areas, but I don't necessarily want to receive an email for all of them."

"When we decided to go with Foglight, a lot of people stopped using the diagnostics part because it was very intimidating... They still won't use it because they feel it's too intimidating. They will open something up and not know what to do. It's not very user-friendly. You have to click on a lot of stuff to find the information."

"Foglight does have a component that allows you to look at things in real time, but it's not as friendly or as efficient in terms of responsiveness as Quest Spotlight is. Foglight might be lacking in this department."

"The version that I'm using is not the latest version, so there might have been some improvement, but the OS monitoring is a bit lacking, and the high-availability option is a bit complicated to set up and it doesn't work all the time."

"I would like the rule development code to be made available so we don't always have to be referred to professional services for custom solutions. For example, if we want to exclude certain databases from a particular rule, we shouldn't have to go to support and to professional services for that solution. If the code and syntax were available, we have resources that could quickly turn something like that around."

"When holding data for two years for 20 SQL Servers, the reporting becomes sluggish and unresponsive."

"It would be amazing if they could enable the "Performance Investigator" functionality across all database platforms."

More Quest Foglight for Databases cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Do not hold back on asking questions about the maintenance and continued support of the product."

"Pricing is very reasonable. We were able to construct a pretty easy contract with Quest, who were very easy to work with and very amenable to what we are trying to do. It worked out well for us."

"The price of Foglight could be a little more competitive in Chile, and it should be lowered for long-time customers— at least by 20 percent. Sometimes the price is a limitation. We have seven instances and nearly 5 million users. If Quest Foglight could reduce its prices for the clients that have been with it for a long time, we would be able to have more instances."

"The price is worth it, if you have the time to go through the information."

"This is like the "Cadillac" of performance monitoring software. It's not cheap... I am currently with a company that I was able to convince that the product is worth the cost."

"It is cost-effective. With our EA, it is really based on the scale of our database environment. We found the Quest team to be reasonable and flexible when it comes to pricing and scaling of licenses."

"Compared to the other tools on the market, Foglight is okay in terms of pricing and licensing."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

23%

Government

12%

Computer Software Company

University

Financial Services Firm

13%

Computer Software Company

13%

Government

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

Questions from the Community

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Quest Foglight for Databases?

The pricing is palatable. We've already done one renewal and we are in our second contract. We're happy thus far.

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What needs improvement with Quest Foglight for Databases?

It would be amazing if they could enable the "Performance Investigator" functionality across all database platforms. I've been talking to their product development team about enhancements that I wo...

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What is your primary use case for Quest Foglight for Databases?

I primarily use the solution for database monitoring, specifically for Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server, Postgres, SAP HANA, and AWS Redshift.

See all answers

Comparisons

IBM IMS vs CA IDMS

Compared 79% of the time

CA Datacom vs CA IDMS

Compared 21% of the time

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Compared 36% of the time

SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer vs Quest Foglight for Databases

Compared 28% of the time

Oracle Enterprise Manager vs Quest Foglight for Databases

Compared 8% of the time

Redgate SQL Toolbelt Essentials vs Quest Foglight for Databases

Compared 7% of the time

SQL Sentry vs Quest Foglight for Databases

Compared 7% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Database Development and Management

May 2025

Download CA IDMS product report

Buyer's Guide

Quest Foglight for Databases

May 2025

Download Quest Foglight for Databases product report

Also Known As

IDMS

No data available

Overview

CA IDMS is a reliable, high-performance, web-enabled Database Management system (DBMS) for IBM z Systems that provides business value for hundreds of enterprises and government organizations. CA IDMS provides high-performance database management and transaction processing performance for existing and new workloads, helping you consolidate business functions on a central data repository, as needed.

Broadcom

Foglight identifies and resolves performance issues across your applications, databases and virtual environments. The Foglight family of products easily integrates with your existing tools, so you can monitor and analyze data from almost any source across your infrastructure and view it through a single interface with our customizable, unified monitoring platform

Quest Software

Sample Customers

Blue Hill Data Services Inc.

CommitDBA

Buyer's Guide

CA IDMS vs. Quest Foglight for Databases

June 2025

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