Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

Control-M vs Microsoft Configuration Manager comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Control-M
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
120
Ranking in other categories
Process Automation (3rd), Managed File Transfer (MFT) (4th), Workload Automation (1st)
Microsoft Configuration Man...
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
81
Ranking in other categories
Server Monitoring (6th), Configuration Management (3rd), Patch Management (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

Control-M and Microsoft Configuration Manager aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. Control-M is designed for Process Automation and holds a mindshare of 4.4%, up 3.9% compared to last year.
Microsoft Configuration Manager, on the other hand, focuses on Server Monitoring, holds 6.0% mindshare, down 8.6% since last year.
Process Automation
Server Monitoring
 

Featured Reviews

Pedro Fuentes - PeerSpot reviewer
Cost-effective, excellent support, and centralized access and control
They have a department that handles requests for enhancements. I talked to Control-M guys back in October or November when they had a gathering here in Atlanta. We talked about not being able to go back in history in Helix Control-M for more than two weeks. We submitted a request for enhancement. They told us that they are working on it, and they are thinking of expanding that to 30 days. We would like to see it expand to 90 days, but they are working on it. In Control-M, we were able to go back 180 days, but that was on-prem. The storage of that data was on our own servers. We know that storage is money, and we do not expect them to store that much of the data, but at least 30 to 60 days seem proper.
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.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Before Control-M, we didn't have a centralized view and could not view what happened in the past to determine what will happen in the future. The Gantt view that we have in Control-M is like a project view. It is nice because we sometimes have some application maintenance that we need to do. So, in a single console, we can hold the jobs for the next hour or two. We can release that job when it is finished. This is a really nice feature that we didn't have before. It is something really simple, but we didn't previously have a console where we could say, "For the next two hours, what are the jobs that we will run? And, hold these jobs not to run." This is really important."
"We have a team called pro-mon and they monitor all the jobs for us. A single view for them makes it easy for them to monitor things."
"I find Control-M for SAP and Control-M for Informatica good. You can connect to the Linux or Windows servers, and you can run multiple jobs."
"Control-M has enabled true enterprise batch automation, which combined with the other BMC Control products on our mainframe platform, allows us to run a 24/7 site with the lights out."
"The feature we use most in Control-M is related to the file transfer module. It is quite advanced compared to the other tools like Automate, etc. The new version which has come of same MFT has a lot of advanced features which makes it very easy to work with. There is less need for written programs and more GUI-based stuff."
"If a job fails, that development team is notified right away, which improves reliability. Previously, it was on the operators to notify the developers that their job failed, erred, or aborted. Now, it's all automated."
"It is very easy to use. The HA feature is also very good."
"Cross-platform support: A Linux job can be dependent on a Windows job, which can be dependent on many other flavours of hardware/software. Your batch is therefore managed by a single tool, allowing you to monitor your entire flow."
"Software deployment and WSUS are most valuable."
"This solution has made life easy with respect to patching, compliance, and OSD."
"It lets you know what your infrastructure is like and what state you are in."
"The technical support is good."
"The most valuable feature of Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager is patch management."
"Technical support is very helpful and very responsive."
"The solution effectively handles inventory management, deployment, and reporting."
"What's valuable is the basic management of the systems, being able to control who can access the systems."
 

Cons

"The downtime is higher compared to AWS."
"They can improve their interface."
"It is a very strong product, but the reporting could be better."
"In general, it is a very good product, and we are very happy with it. It meets all of our expectations."
"With the current version update, I'm not sure why we needed a separate database upgrade. Why not put it all in one package? Previously, you could do it either via a manual upgrade or an in-place upgrade but it wasn't separate."
"With earlier versions, the support was not accurate or delivered in a timely manner. What would happen is that I would be in production mode and I would have an issue and would want to get someone on a call to see what was happening. But they would always say, “Hey, provide the log first and then we'll review and we'll get back to you." I feel that when a customer asks about a production issue, they should jump onto the call to see what is going on, and then collect the logs."
"The response time could be faster when you need a person to answer your questions. There are situations where availability becomes crucial."
"The stability of Control-M has Not been great. A big thing we've been trying to work on with BMC is observability. Modern applications should be observable and resilient, but we're finding that sometimes Control-M is not very resilient and many times Control-M is not very observable."
"The main room for improvement is the on-screen display. I think it would be good if some improvements were made."
"As far as load balancing across, they don't have that support yet, so that you can actually build multiple primaries and have it load balance across. They don't have any of that functionality yet. That would be a nice feature, to scale that way."
"Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager could improve the integration."
"SCCM should strive to enhance the accuracy of its reporting functions in order to avoid any issues with incorrect or inaccurate data."
"Marketing: Our management doesn't understand that there is a piece of software which helps them automate and manage the entire network, as far as operating systems on computers."
"This solution needs to be supported on all Operating systems."
"It needs to be able to load faster during deployment."
"On some hardware, we'd like an easier way to get peripherals attached."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing is moderate, not too low or too high compared to other solutions."
"We have a five-year contract with task-based licensing."
"The annual licensing within BMC Control-M is on a per task basis. Three- and five-year contracts are also offered. The customer usually buys a bundle of tasks, e.g., 5,000 tasks, then my team configures Control-M for their usage."
"The cost is basically $100 a job, give or take."
"The pricing of Control-M is reasonable."
"In our environment, pricing depends on the total number of maximum jobs that can run, which is fine. Therefore, if the number of jobs increases, then the licensing fees will increase."
"You must accept that BMC licensing can be very confusing. No one can easily understand how they calculate things, whether it is user-based, job-based, or server-based. The calculation is quite tough. How BMC calculates licensing is not easily available anywhere."
"It is a little bit expensive."
"The price model is different for every client."
"The license price could be reduced for Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager They should make the price more affordable for smaller companies, most companies would be able to use the solution if it was priced better. There are more people on this cloud because you don't have to have either a server room or an on-premise server. You can have one IT person handle this without any local infrastructure."
"Pricing is negotiable with Microsoft, depending upon which of their packages you choose."
"Overall, I think it's fine. It's pretty much in-line because there are ways to offset it with the Office 365 licensing."
"We have a support license from Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager and the overall price of the solution is reasonable."
"There is not a license needed to use the solution."
"I rate the price of Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager an eight out of ten."
"Presently, I am using a free trial version."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Process Automation solutions are best for your needs.
842,767 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
28%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Insurance Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

How does Control-M compare with AutoSys Workload Automation?
Control-M acts as a single, centralized interface for monitoring and managing all batch processes, which is helpful because nothing gets left unattended since it is all visible in one place, and th...
What do you like most about Control-M?
First of all, the shift from manual to automation has been valuable. We have a tool that can automate.
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 ...
 

Also Known As

Control M
Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager, System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM )
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

CARFAX, Tampa General Hospital, Navistar, Amadeus, Raymond James, Railinc
Bank Alfalah Ltd., Wªrth Handelsges.m.b.H, Dimension Data, Japan Business Systems, St. Lucie County Public Schools, MISC Berhad
Find out what your peers are saying about Camunda, Pega, BMC and others in Process Automation. Updated: March 2025.
842,767 professionals have used our research since 2012.