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Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance vs DX Spectrum comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 29, 2026

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

Cisco Provider Connectivity...
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
45th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
24
Ranking in other categories
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (45th)
DX Spectrum
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
30th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
118
Ranking in other categories
Network Management Applications (11th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (29th), Network Troubleshooting (8th), DX NetOps (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2026, in the Network Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance is 0.7%, down from 0.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of DX Spectrum is 1.3%, up from 0.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Monitoring Software Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
DX Spectrum1.3%
Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance0.7%
Other98.0%
Network Monitoring Software
 

Featured Reviews

Pifu Lin - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior System Engineer at DYNASAFE TECHNOLOGIES PTE. LTD.
Addresses connectivity issues with real-time monitoring while offering good local support
I had prepared for COC and the client. I work as a vendor for a client using Flow Mount for network performance monitoring. I focus on resolving client-side issues related to Packy Performance and quality use. This involves addressing network device issues, specifically Cisco network devices One…
PinchasAlbalya - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Engineer at a educational organization with 1,001-5,000 employees
Monitoring has become centralized and management now sees real‑time health of key network assets
The time investment required is significant, not because of difficulty but because of the need for free time to invest in it. We need to get the knowledge. We know there are many options, but we took an external vendor to install and make the customization. If we want to make others changes without paying for customization, we need to learn it deeply by ourselves. The tutorials are very complicated. They could work on that area. The tutorial part could be more simplified. I know there are many explanations, and you can get help or documents in one click on the current page in the product, but it is not very clear. If you want to do something new that you did not see from the vendor in the installation, it is not very simple. The documents are good for people that know how to operate the product well, but for new users, it is not simple.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"One valuable feature we have is real-time monitoring for connection issues."
"It is not that expensive of a solution and produces tremendous value."
"It is very stable, has reduced downtime and migration time, and with Skylight we never forget anything."
"What I like most about Accedian Skylight is that it's a UI application, so using it is easy. I also like that the support for Accedian Skylight is helpful."
"APM analysis is much faster than traditional root cause analysis of application problems."
"Ease of use; can literally diagnose an issue in about four clicks."
"Network control when experiencing problems indicating "the network is slow"."
"I like this product because it is easy to use and it allows us to have a realistic vision of what is going on at the heart of our network."
"The response detection of an incident was very low, that is, I could work more efficiently and effectively in my incident management."
"Spectrum is our correlation engine and an integration point of external monitoring tools."
"With CA Spectrum, we are now able to monitor more proactively network assets, reduce the total downtime of these and prevent money from being lost for device stoppages."
"The most valuable feature is the auto-discovery, which is nice because you don't have to do anything to add a new component."
"It's a good tool. It's simple to do the configuration."
"All networks (or network equipment) are monitored through CA Spectrum."
"It is a very stable solution."
"It provides us complete visibility into both company networks with one tool, which we didn't have."
 

Cons

"Combination with Avaya switches pose some problems."
"I would like to see some improvements in parts of their synthetic transactions, which includes all the latency, jitter, and throughput. I would like to see some Layer 7 analytics in there. I want to be able to do a DNS request, HTTP GET request, or even SIP call point-to-point or via registration."
"Human resource costs can be high when dealing with connection issues."
"Because of the policies in Vietnam, we cannot connect the system to the Accedian cloud. It would be good if Accedian could provide a local cloud. In the next release, I would like them to focus on improving and adding more reporting features. This will help the operations teams."
"I would like to see some improvements in parts of their synthetic transactions, which includes all the latency, jitter, and throughput."
"This solution is expensive compared to some others."
"Embed a warning system to a mailbox when it exceeds the threshold for use of bandwidth over a given period of time."
"If you want a new version, you go to the website. The hardest part is finding the link, where is that .bin file? Sometimes it's pretty hidden in a document... it's hidden in the release notes or in another file somewhere. And it's usually not on the first page either."
"Technical support for this product is not so good. It needs improvement."
"CA Spectrum is expensive."
"CABI was a major issue for us, but the newly added Jaspersoft is a better-suited reporting toolset, so this has already been addressed."
"From the users perspective the looks and feel of dashboards of Spectrum would be easier to use and for understanding as APM will be in 10.5 version which we saw in CA World."
"No good technical support from CA."
"Customer Service: It's poor. Technical Support: It's poor."
"The CA Technologies sales team destroyed their relationship with our business units."
"Technical support for this product is not so good. It's also not as good as it used to be."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's not for free, clearly. But on the other hand, it offers very interesting functionality. We pay around €100,000."
"We understand there's a significant cost difference, but have yet to investigate fully."
"The price is competitive overall, depending on the type of customer."
"The pricing of Accedian Skylight is really good. The sensors are low cost. Their model to analytics for sensors is by license, endpoint, or session. With the probes for their analytics, if they get deployed virtually, they are free. The licensing is only based on flows. So, you can effectively deploy probes everywhere in your network. Then, if you want to look at a specific type of traffic, you can enter into it with a very low cost license. You can just use things like spam ports, mirrors, TAPs, and aggregators to optimize what sort of traffic you send to these analysis tools. Then, if you want to start looking at more, you can up your licensed as you go. You are not getting forced into expensive appliances or subscription models."
"The pricing is cheaper than other competing products, which is better for our budgets."
"The solution was previously well-regarded, but after being acquired by Accedian, the prices have significantly increased. This has made it challenging to sell the product due to its high cost. It is an expensive solution."
"It provides value and the cost is not huge."
"Pricing is a little bit expensive."
"DX Spectrum's pricing is neither expensive nor cheap."
"Spectrum is expensive."
"Currently, a perpetual license but some services are moving to a subscription"
"DX Spectrum's pricing depends on the license number. It is affordable."
"It is expensive compared to other tools in the market."
"The product, support, and maintenance are all expensive, which is another reason that we are switching to another solution."
"The solution's pricing could be better."
"Since the acquisition by Broadcom, we have not had such a good experience with licensing and pricing. Since they were bought by Broadcom, every sales contract is getting complicated. It's very complicated, and it's much more expensive than before. It's not a good pricing strategy from Broadcom."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Construction Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
6%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Construction Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business14
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise9
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business25
Midsize Enterprise19
Large Enterprise90
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Accedian Skylight?
Human resource costs can be high when dealing with connection issues. I require more tools to file and resolve these issues efficiently.
What is your primary use case for Accedian Skylight?
I had prepared for COC and the client. I work as a vendor for a client using Flow Mount for network performance monitoring. I focus on resolving client-side issues related to Packy Performance and ...
What needs improvement with DX Spectrum?
The time investment required is significant, not because of difficulty but because of the need for free time to invest in it. We need to get the knowledge. We know there are many options, but we to...
What is your primary use case for DX Spectrum?
The university purchased DX Spectrum, called ICE. DX Spectrum NAC is working for us only on Cisco 9200 switches. It is not working on any other switch like C1000 or HG or any 2960X. Even other Cisc...
 

Also Known As

Accedian Skylight, Accedian SkyLIGHT PVX, SkyLIGHT PVX, SecurActive, Performance Vision
CA Spectrum
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

T-Systems, Thomson Reuters, Bordeaux Metropole, CGI, Citadelle Regional Hospital Center, Lorraine Institute of Oncology, Luxembourg Institute of Health, Groupe BPCE, Group S, Splitpoint, Horus-Net, Audatex, Indexis, Province de Liège, EASI, Spie Batignolles, Faymonville
National Informatics Centre India, Banese, Olympus, AlphaServe Technologies, Sicredi
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance vs. DX Spectrum and other solutions. Updated: March 2026.
885,376 professionals have used our research since 2012.