Microsoft System Center vs Pandora FMS comparison

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Microsoft System Center

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 18, 2024

Microsoft System Center and Pandora FMS compete in the IT management and monitoring category. Based on their functionality and user feedback, Microsoft System Center has an upper hand for Windows-centric organizations, while Pandora FMS offers superior cross-platform flexibility.

Features: Microsoft System Center integrates seamlessly with other Microsoft products, boasts powerful automation capabilities, and a low learning curve for Windows administrators. It includes operations management, antivirus administration, and intricate alarm systems. Pandora FMS is noted for its simplicity and flexibility, supporting agent and agentless monitoring, geolocation, and intuitive interfaces. It provides comprehensive network monitoring, including TCP/IP services and efficient alarm notifications.

Room for Improvement: Microsoft System Center users face issues with non-Microsoft product integration, cumbersome installation, and platform performance. There is also a need for smoother third-party integration. Pandora FMS requires enhancements in resource efficiency, documentation, and dashboard customization. Improved analytics and simplified configuration processes are also desired. Microsoft System Center lacks in cloud-monitoring, while Pandora FMS needs better mainframe integration and real-time monitoring.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Microsoft System Center supports primarily on-premises deployment, with mixed reviews on technical support, citing response delays and lack of engagement. Pandora FMS offers diverse deployment options, including on-premises, hybrid, and public cloud. It receives better initial support feedback, usually requiring less technical support post-implementation compared to System Center.

Pricing and ROI: Microsoft System Center is considered expensive due to licensing and support costs but offers significant ROI within the Windows ecosystem by reducing third-party dependency. Pandora FMS presents a cost-effective solution with competitive pricing, offering an open-source version and a straightforward single-payment license that includes updates and support, providing excellent value for budget-conscious businesses.

To learn more, read our detailed Microsoft System Center vs. Pandora FMS Report (Updated: September 2025).

Microsoft System Center vs. Pandora FMS

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Helped 869,566 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

19th

Average Rating

7.8

Reviews Sentiment

6.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Application Infrastructure (13th)

Pandora FMS

Ranking in Cloud Monitoring Software

40th

Average Rating

9.2

Reviews Sentiment

7.6

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Network Monitoring Software (74th), Server Monitoring (23rd), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (54th), Log Management (57th)

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Cloud Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of Microsoft System Center is 0.4%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Pandora FMS is 0.9%, up from 0.6% 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	0.4%
Pandora FMS	0.9%
Other	98.7%

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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Gabriel Glusgold

Asociado/ at Infraestructura Informática

Personalized metrics; simplicity of data

My primary use case for Pandora is monitoring This solution has helped us improve our organization by allowing us to create a lot of metrics on several platforms, including Windows, Linux, and Unix. We then use these Pandora metrics to create an interface. We then pass the interface off to the…

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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

"The installation process is easy."

"The tool has many valuable features, including license tracking, software deployment, and installation deployment. However, we primarily use it for Windows updates and deployment for Windows servers and desktops. It's a complex product but very well-managed. If you use all the features, they will be valuable to your organization. It allows you to deploy desktops, manage patches, and track various features."

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

"We like Microsoft System Center's Operations Manager. That is primarily why we use it."

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

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

"I like the automated features of it that let you schedule those updates and the ability of the product to focus on the specific updates, specific platforms, and products that we're interested in keeping up to date."

"The availability performance matrix and the reporting capabilities are the solution's most valuable features."

More Microsoft System Center pros

"It allows me to quickly see the status of all of my printers, switches, computers, and virtual machines to determine if any system has fallen."

"The most valuable features are auto-discovery and automatic detection of the network topology and network monitoring."

"The network monitoring and configuration within this solution is very good."

"Thanks to this software and to the work of the support team, we have everything under control."

"Pandora's architecture is interesting. It's open so you can easily extend and enhance it. It's simpler to customize Pandora compared to other solutions. It's also scalable enough to support large environments."

"The monitoring system within this solution is very good. It is easy to use and navigate, and makes issue alarms easily viewable."

"Thanks to its flexibility, I have been able to adapt the tool to our servers and find out quickly how their console works."

"I like this solution a lot because it has a very large Hispanic community and the platform looks very friendly."

More Pandora FMS pros

Cons

"For me, the tool's UI seems to be too old."

"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."

"Could be more user friendly."

"The solution’s pricing could be improved."

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

"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."

"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."

"They should have some customized solutions or internal development, then maybe it could be easier to use different solutions or some self-developed solution."

More Microsoft System Center cons

"Improvements are needed for server and network discovery, including service-based discovery."

"Pandora could deliver better analytics out of the box. You can work around these limitations with the help of other tools like Grafana. The shortcomings are mostly on the graphical side. The built-in report generators are a bit limited in some areas."

"I find that this software is resource heavy, and demands a lot of processing capacity."

"The product lacks APIs for integration with other systems."

"An update to the Android app would be appreciated."

"Their support is good, but it is just online communication. It would be great to be able to just call someone and talk to them instead of always writing. It works well for me because I am a decent communicator in email, but some people might find it difficult to describe in a written fashion and communicate with them that way. There is a learning curve to the interface, but once you get used to it, it is actually very powerful. They have a lot of options, but people struggle with the interface. They've improved it though, and it is getting better. They need to keep improving the learning curve to help buy-in. I'm the guy that manages it, so I'm comfortable with it. They can refine the upgrade agents to be easier. They can also do more refinement in end-user usability because not everyone is strong technically, and people who aren't strong technically might be averse to the product, even though it has come a long way. It has a complete GUI and everything."

"I sincerely believe that Pandora needs new ideas for functionality closer to advanced device security monitoring."

"Third-party integration should be improved for some commonly used products."

More Pandora FMS cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"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."

"We maximized our license investment."

"Microsoft System Center is quite expensive."

"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."

"Microsoft System Center's licensing is costly."

"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."

"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."

"Only one payment and it includes support, updates, new versions, and access to the complete library of plugins except for SAP and z/OS."

"Growing the solution or migrating to the Enterprise version is easy, and various plans are available."

"My rule of thumb would be that if you need more than thirty agents, and you lack an automation tool such as Chef or Puppet, you will save a lot of time and money going to the Enterprise edition."

"The open-source version offers 100% functionality and the hardware requirements for a solution like this one are very modest."

"You get the license and it includes updates, new versions, and access to the complete library of modules."

"Pandora FMS is easy to implement and the pricing of licenses is competitive."

"You have to pay for the number of agents and models that you are monitoring. I would rate the cost at three with one being the most expensive and five being the cheapest."

"The Open Source Community Edition is great to just explore the software, or use it on medium-sized infrastructures."

More Pandora FMS pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

No data available

Government

13%

Comms Service Provider

12%

Computer Software Company

Media 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
Small Business	11
Midsize Enterprise	4
Large Enterprise	3

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

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Compared 16% of the time

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Compared 20% of the time

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Compared 15% of the time

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Compared 11% of the time

Checkmk vs Pandora FMS

Compared 9% of the time

SolarWinds NPM vs Pandora FMS

Compared 7% of the time

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Product Reports

Microsoft System Center

Download Microsoft System Center product report

Download Pandora FMS product report

Also Known As

MS System Center

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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

Pandora FMS is a monitoring as a service (MaaS) solution that is ideal for companies with at least 100 or more devices. Instead of multiple, difficult-to-integrate monitoring systems, Pandora FMS is an all-in-one solution that is easy to use. The software is able to untangle complicated technology infrastructures to easily identify the root cause of issues in order to find the most efficient solution. It does so by analyzing everything in your system, from databases and applications to services and desktops, as well as communications.

Pandora FMS Features

Pandora FMS has many valuable key features. Some of the most useful ones include:

Application Monitoring (APM)
IoT monitoring
Log collection
Inventory
Issue management / ITSM
Mainframe monitoring
Network monitoring
Remote control
Synthetic monitoring
Service oriented monitoring
Server monitoring
User experience monitoring
Virtualization & cloud

Pandora FMS Benefits

There are many benefits to implementing Pandora FMS. Some of the biggest advantages the solution offers include:

Comprehensive overview: Pandora FMS provides a comprehensive overview of your system to make troubleshooting easy. It also provides all the tools to monitor and analyze an extensive range of data, from traffic to connectivity.

Easy forecasting: With Pandora FMS, you can use your network diagram for forecasting solutions, which gives you the necessary info you need to perform maintenance.

Proactive solutions: Issues are proactively addressed. Pandora FMS provides alerts 24/7 so you can deal with problems before they grow even bigger. This also helps your organization eliminate any down time.

Solve future problems: Another benefit of implementing Pandora FMS is that it enables you to optimize your services to ensure that future issues are minimized. In addition, they offer around-the-clock monitoring and automated solutions. As a result, the solution enables you to operate your organization with maximum efficiency all the time, saving you money and time.

Personalized service maps: Pandora FMS allows you to create detailed, personalized service maps that can help you identify any shortcomings in your system and address them as soon as possible.

SLA and availability reports: With Pandora FMS, you receive critical alerts when SLA levels aren’t met, which also helps you understand when your applications and systems are not meeting your business goals.

Reviews from Real Users

Below are some reviews and helpful feedback written by PeerSpot users currently using the Pandora FMS solution.

PeerSpot user Marc C., Systems Analyst at a university, says, "It is easy to create your own custom modules if you just know a little bit of scripting. If you have unique requirements, you can just make your own modules. You can even grab checks from other vendors. There are open-source checks for various things such as SMTP, etc. It is really flexible. It is reliable. It does the job, and it alerts. It is also surprisingly feature-rich. It is very mature for a not-so-known product."

Another reviewer, Alexandre J., comments, “What I value most about Pandora FMS is the simplicity of working with it. The speed of locating problems and to be able to solve them quickly, so that it affects our client's network infrastructure as little as possible, is very valuable.

Thanks to Pandora FMS we have everything unified in the same point and it is highly efficient.”

Sample Customers

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

Rakuten, Prosegur, Repsol, Teléfonica, Allianz, Ottawa Hospital, Hughes

Microsoft System Center vs. Pandora FMS