Microsoft System Center vs NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights comparison

Microsoft and NetApp are both solutions in the Cloud Monitoring Software category. Microsoft is ranked #28 with an average rating of 8.5, while NetApp is ranked #41. Microsoft holds a 0.7% mindshare in CMS, compared to NetApp’s 1.2% mindshare. Additionally, 85% of Microsoft users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of NetApp users who would recommend it.

Microsoft System Center

Read 20 Microsoft System Center reviews

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525 Comparison Views

85% willing to recommend

NetApp Data Infrastructure ...

Read 13 NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights reviews

1,801 Views
828 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Microsoft System Center

NetApp Data Infrastructure ...

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 2, 2025

Microsoft System Center and NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights compete in the IT management and data analytics category. NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights appears to have an edge in environments needing multi-platform data visualization and security analytics due to broader visibility.

Features: Microsoft System Center offers comprehensive integration with other Microsoft products, extensive automation features, and management packs that support both Microsoft and other hypervisors. It is also noted for its ease of configuration and advanced performance monitoring capabilities that benefit IT operations. NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights excels in data visualization, providing detailed analysis in multi-vendor environments, and its advanced analytics features deliver real-time security alerts across various platforms.

Room for Improvement: Microsoft System Center struggles with integration when dealing with non-Microsoft products and involves a complicated installation process with extensive prerequisites. Users report a need for enhanced reporting features and more detailed documentation. NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights could improve its report creation process and simplify its pricing model. Users also find the console complex and seek better initial technical support.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Microsoft System Center is mainly deployed on-premises, facing challenges in technical support, particularly in non-Microsoft environments, with average customer service feedback. NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights supports both on-premises and cloud deployments, with users praising initial support while noting complexity in customer service engagements. NetApp’s flexible deployment options present a significant advantage.

Pricing and ROI: Microsoft System Center is considered costly, with high licensing fees impacting affordability but delivering significant ROI through process automation. NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights, although complex in licensing, is deemed cost-effective, particularly for NetApp products, offering flexible payment options and cost savings via efficient resource management. The pricing model of NetApp could be simpler, while Microsoft's high costs remain a barrier for some users despite robust ROI.

To learn more, read our detailed Microsoft System Center vs. NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights Report (Updated: December 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft System Center vs. NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights

December 2025

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Helped 881,114 peers since 2012

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

Microsoft System Center

Ranking in Cloud Monitoring Software

28th

Average Rating

7.8

Reviews Sentiment

6.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Application Infrastructure (14th)

NetApp Data Infrastructure ...

Ranking in Cloud Monitoring Software

41st

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.3

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Cloud Migration (14th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (50th)

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Cloud Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of Microsoft System Center is 0.7%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights is 1.2%, up from 0.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Cloud Monitoring Software Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Microsoft System Center	0.7%
NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights	1.2%
Other	98.1%

Cloud Monitoring Software

Featured Reviews

Carl Palapal

Sr. Sys. Server & Storage Egineer / Tech .Consultant at CANAR OFFICE SYSTEMS

Provides comprehensive system management with effective deployment and integration capabilities

The advantages of Microsoft System Center are significant, and I have seen other products as well. As far as advantages are concerned, they have PXE deployment, which is good for deploying operating systems, such as Windows client systems including Windows 10 and Windows 11. Since it is a Microsoft product, all the patches are proprietary, making it easier to deploy. In Microsoft System Center, all the features are integrated already, whereas in ManageEngine, you have to license each feature individually to access those features. The automated features of Virtual Machine Manager are very useful; it automates as long as the policy that I have created is in line with the objective, especially the templates when I'm going to deploy. Regarding endpoint management, Microsoft System Center is very helpful; it has integrated endpoint protection deployment, allowing me to handle endpoint configuration, system deployment, and patch deployment, making it an all-in-one stop shop for managing and configuring end clients. The impact of using Microsoft System Center is significant; it gives me a whole picture of my environment, making it easy to get inventory details regarding applications and hardware, providing full visibility of my setup within the organization.

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Punit Waghela

Technical Specialist at Softcell Technologies Limited

Reduces troubleshooting time and improves operational efficiency through a single console

NetApp technology, specifically NetApp Cloud Insights, has significantly impacted the way my customers do business. One customer had multiple components, such as a VMware environment, Cisco switches, NetApp storage, and backup tools. Previously, the customer had to monitor all these tools individually each morning by logging into every console to check for errors or performance issues. It used to take them about 1 or 2 hours, but after we installed NetApp Cloud Insights, the time spent was reduced to just 5 minutes with a single console where they could monitor everything. The customer can integrate their VMware servers, Cisco switches, and storage with NetApp Cloud Insights to quickly identify any problems and resolve issues efficiently, demonstrating a reduction in complexity and monitoring time. The values that NetApp Cloud Insights delivers to my customers are evident in real examples, such as an application team running their application on a single VM connected through a switch and storage. When they experience a performance issue, the VMware team needs to identify the source of the slowness, whether it's from the server, switch, or storage, which requires a time-consuming investigation of each component. Without NetApp Cloud Insights, this process is slow and stressful for both the application team and the VMware team, but with the tool, a single click allows the customer to pinpoint the issue directly, improving response times to performance problems immensely. The evolving cybersecurity landscape and the proliferation of AI highly influence my customers' technology decisions, as having NetApp storage in their environment allows them to detect ransomware attacks effectively. NetApp guarantees data recovery in case of such attacks, and here, NetApp Cloud Insights plays a crucial role; it can identify where a ransomware attack originates, allowing the IT team to respond rapidly, such as disconnecting affected devices to mitigate the damage, especially crucial when multiple users are involved.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The product's initial setup phase was easy."

"The installation process is easy."

"System Center helps to create the basis for ITIL alignment."

"Step-by-step documentation that clarifies the implementation procedure."

"The features that I have found most valuable are the ease of configuration and the easy discovery of the environment."

"The solution is easily available. That's its most valuable aspect."

"The impact of using Microsoft System Center is significant; it gives me a whole picture of my environment, making it easy to get inventory details regarding applications and hardware, providing full visibility of my setup within the organization."

"Good for managing and administering the infrastructure."

More Microsoft System Center pros

"Among the most valuable features are the queries and reporting that allow us to look at the utilization of resources, at how well the storage is performing, and to report on which resources are being used by which business units. We can track usage across the entire environment, across applications, business units, cost centers, etc."

"Its ability to quickly inventory our resources, figure out interdependencies across them, and assemble a topology of your environment is brilliant. There is a price associated with it. Whenever you target a NetApp environment, it is included in the price but whenever you want to add different vendors, like VMware and Cisco, the price greatly spikes. Inventorization helps us a lot to visualize the environment."

"All our production clusters are in Cloud Insight. It provides a single pane of glass, giving us visibility into the environment, which allows us to understand if any issues are going on across any of our clusters."

"Cloud Secure is definitely the most valuable feature and being able to see file level activity. It gives real-time alerting on possible ransomware attacks and provides file security review. It helps us to see if something abnormal is happening on the system before it's too late."

"NetApp Cloud Insights helps with login monitoring and troubleshooting. Previously, if we had performance concerns or needed to interface with other groups and their products, a task that should require only one or two people turned into a six-person job."

"Cloud Insights' best features are visibility and the connector to move the workloads."

"NetApp Cloud Insights helps reduce the time spent on problem resolution by up to 50% for my customers, making their operations significantly more efficient and productive, which is a perfect outcome."

"The solution is 98 percent stable."

More NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights pros

Cons

"The multi-tenancy support needs to be improved. We need to have the ability to manage several different environments from one central point of administration."

"The solution’s pricing could be improved."

"Microsoft System Center should be easier to manage. However, it is complex to deploy, so people hesitate to use it. Though it has many features, such as licensing, asset tracking, and software deployment, we mainly use it for Windows updates. It protects many screens and integrates with databases, but it's complex compared to other solutions. Many now use cloud-based products or other tools like Automox to deploy updates and manage vulnerabilities."

"Most of the documentation is online, however, there are some gaps there. The product documentation still refers back to the 2012 Server. We're pretty much in 2022. There's a ten-year gap there."

"The disadvantage of Microsoft System Center is related to the many integrated services; if one service is failing, then all features will be affected."

"Implementation and integration in the case of multi-tenant environments needs improvement."

"Something super important that we need is this integration via Intune Configuration Manager."

"We have some bugs but it's stable. It doesn't break every day. It works. Like other applications, it has a lot of bugs but they're manageable."

More Microsoft System Center cons

"The first level of NetApp's technical support could be improved."

"The support is not very quick."

"The visualization needs some improvement because there are occasional delays while the system queries information."

"Cloud Insights could offer more detail when we drill down into the Azure environment."

"There is room for improving the creating and managing or modifying of reports. That is still a difficult task to do and requires knowledge beyond the storage itself. I would love to see reporting improved so that we can create reports by dragging and dropping pieces into a report form and publish a report that way."

"In a perfect world we would have something built, right out-of-the-box, that can identify what we call "noise," and reduce the amount of data. You're presented with so much data when you first start the data collectors. For example, it brings back a lot of change rates that happen just because of standard computing, like profile changes and that sort of thing. Being able to identify things like that and categorize them and strip it down—and it probably can do that, I just haven't gotten there yet—would be very beneficial."

"Even though I work with NetApp, it still takes time for me to navigate and find components, so new customers might require considerable hands-on experience to efficiently use the console, indicating that it could be more user-friendly."

"In my opinion, one area where NetApp Cloud Insights could be improved for the next release is the console, which I find a bit complex."

More NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I rate the product price as five to six on a scale of one to ten, where one means it is cheap and ten means it is expensive."

"We maximized our license investment."

"I know that sometimes there is some reduction in the prices of Microsoft System Center because of the costs of Microsoft SQL Server, which can be advantageous."

"Microsoft System Center's licensing is costly."

"Microsoft System Center is quite expensive."

"It's rolled into our enterprise subscription. The entire subscription is around $25,000 a year, however, that covers all the products that we use."

"On a scale from one to ten, where one is cheap and ten is expensive, I rate the solution's pricing a six out of ten."

"The licensing is complex. The calculation depends on what you're ingesting. A terabyte of one product is not a terabyte of another product. Virtual machines don't equate so easily. It's all about the end-use managed units and having an easy place to reference how far those units go."

"We are billed based on management units, so we can purchase units based on six months, twelve months, twenty-four months, or thirty-six months upfront or pay as you go depending on our requirements."

"The licensing model could be improved. We love that you can use it for free for looking at NetApp products. You only need licenses to look at non-NetApp products, but as soon as you do that, you start utilizing licenses that actually would have been free in the public. So, there is a bit of an anomaly in the licensing model."

"Be aware of the capacity licensing and understand how that works, because it is based on capacity. Getting an understanding of that is the biggest thing."

"The solution is expensive."

"The solution's pricing is based on the device you purchase and includes support services."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Comms Service Provider

11%

Transportation Company

10%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Insurance Company

Manufacturing Company

27%

Computer Software Company

15%

Financial Services Firm

Consumer Goods Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	7
Midsize Enterprise	4
Large Enterprise	10

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Midsize Enterprise	5
Large Enterprise	8

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Microsoft System Center?

The product's initial setup phase was easy.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft System Center?

Microsoft System Center's licensing is costly.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Microsoft System Center?

The disadvantage of Microsoft System Center is related to the many integrated services; if one service is failing, then all features will be affected. For example, with site configuration, when one...

See all answers

What needs improvement with NetApp Cloud Insights?

In my opinion, one area where NetApp Cloud Insights could be improved for the next release is the console, which I find a bit complex. Even though I work with NetApp, it still takes time for me to ...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for NetApp Cloud Insights?

It is a monitoring and analysis tool. In our environment, we have different technologies such as VMware, Nutanix, or maybe a backup tool. Instead of monitoring them through different consoles, with...

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering NetApp Cloud Insights?

NetApp Cloud Insights delivers significant efficiencies in addressing performance issues as experienced by an application team running on a single VM. The VMware team must methodically check each c...

See all answers

Comparisons

VMware Aria Operations for Applications vs Microsoft System Center

Compared 19% of the time

Veeam Data Platform vs Microsoft System Center

Compared 13% of the time

IBM BPM vs Microsoft System Center

Compared 13% of the time

JBoss Enterprise Application Platform vs Microsoft System Center

Compared 12% of the time

LogicMonitor vs Microsoft System Center

Compared 9% of the time

More Microsoft System Center Competitors

Dell CloudIQ vs NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights

Compared 13% of the time

Datadog vs NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights

Compared 10% of the time

Grafana Enterprise Stack vs NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights

Compared 9% of the time

HPE OneView vs NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights

Compared 8% of the time

Instana Infrastructure Monitoring vs NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights

Compared 5% of the time

More NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft System Center

January 2026

Download Microsoft System Center product report

Buyer's Guide

NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights

January 2026

NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights report

Download NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights product report

Also Known As

MS System Center

Cloud Insights

Overview

System Center helps customers realize the benefits of the Microsoft Cloud Platform by delivering unified management. Experience fast time-to-value with out-of-the-box monitoring, provisioning, configuration, automation, protection and self-service.

Microsoft

NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights delivers comprehensive capabilities like visibility, usage optimization, and real-time alerting to manage and report resource utilization efficiently.

NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights focuses on strengthening data security and enhancing performance monitoring. Its sophisticated analytics tools offer clarity on complex resource interdependencies, reducing troubleshooting times. With advanced dashboards and data visualization, users can efficiently monitor performance metrics and optimize infrastructure management. While it boasts numerous features, improvements are needed in reporting, affordability, and simplifying the interface.

What are the key features of NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights?

Visibility and Optimization: Tracks resource utilization to optimize operations.
Real-time Alerting: Provides immediate alerts for performance issues.
Advanced Analytics: Uncovers multi-tiered insights for better decision-making.
Snapshot Capabilities: Enhances security by providing recovery points.
Comprehensive Dashboards: Visualizes complex data for performance monitoring.

What benefits and ROI should users expect?

Improved Efficiency: Streamlines performance monitoring and troubleshooting.
Increased Security: Identifies vulnerabilities like ransomware threats.
Resource Optimization: Forecasts capacity needs to prevent bottlenecks.
Seamless Integration: Unifies technologies like VMware and Nutanix for cohesive management.

Organizations implementing NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights across industries can expect improved analysis capabilities and security measures. From finance to healthcare, entities rely on its ability to integrate diverse environments like virtualization or storage management, enhancing predictability and efficiency in their operations.

NetApp

Sample Customers

Kassen_rztliche Vereinigung Nordrhein, Magyar Telekom Nyrt., Adeka, QualCare, Aeriandi, UniCredit Bank d.d., Mostar, Allianz Australia Ltd., Grupo Familia

Information Not Available

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft System Center vs. NetApp Data Infrastructure Insights

December 2025

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