KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) Reviews

We are a small university of 10,000 students with 1,000 faculty and staff. We have to manage about 3500 computers spread over 3 sites.

There are 2,000 computers available for students. The rest are for staff, including 700 laptops.

Student computers are completely redeployed during the summer break, unlike staff computers which are redeployed during their replacement (every 5 years).

We use KACE SMA mainly to deploy software and security updates. We also use KACE to manage our assets and create monitoring reports.

We were using an end-of-life solution with limited software deployment management capabilities, as well as WSUS to deploy security updates. The asset management was done in an in-house tool that was also end of life.

With KACE, we were able to have a simplification of the software deployment management with more granularity and flexibility.

The use of replicas allowed us to relieve inter-site links during massive computer deployments or security updates.

The ability to create reports is also a plus that allows us to track the life of our computers.

On a single page I can have access to the hardware information, the status of the warranty, the associated support tickets, the installed software, the software waiting to be installed, the last user connected, the accounting information, the date of purchase, et cetera. It gives us the ability to create our own indicators by using customized inventory rules.

We can also create our own indicators thanks to personalized inventory fields and thus bring up very targeted information, including the state of Windows activation, the number and model of connected screens, the power supply scheme used, the presence of a file, et cetera.

What could be improved is the possibility to use replicas in a secure way outside our network in order to maintain the machines that never connect to our corporate network.

The helpdesk could also improve, although it has evolved a lot on the last versions. It does not meet the moment for our needs.

What could be interesting when deploying larger software or software to many machines on a remote site would be to be able to do it P2P in order to accelerate the local deployment and not to load too much of the inter-site links.

I've used the solution for ten years.

When you have a large number of computers, the price starts to become apparent. 

The use case is for organization server patching, and we also use the asset management in a smaller capacity.

For what I use it for, the solution provides a single pane of glass with everything I need for endpoint management of all devices. For the most part, it lowers the amount of time required for manual intervention. It gives me more time to work on other projects instead of consistently worrying about patching. Per week or per month, it's saving me a good five hours.

One of the most valuable features is that it natively patches third-party applications and not just a core operating system.

It's relatively easy to use and most of it is pretty intuitive. They've made things a little more involved now with the agent token that needs to be used. That means installing it from a server, from the share, is not quite as simple as it used to be, but once you know how to do it, and that it's something that has to occur, it's really not a problem.

It enables IT asset management, compliance, software asset management, mobile device management, and patch management, although we don't utilize the MDM. That's mainly due to our security requirements. But the IT asset tracking is a big segment.

And the software asset management has been a big help, even when it comes to license true-ups. I can use it to find out how many Tivoli we have, and boom, there's the number. Even if it's reporting a number that might be a little higher than what it actually is, because it's looking for one component, it gives you a good first first-hand look. As a result, we know there's something out there and this confirms we've got five of them. And you can actually click on the information about the software and it shows, for example, that these five servers are where it's being reported. If you really want, you can log in to them and validate. We have used that quite a bit.

Another segment that has really helped out is where you go in and actually use the distributions. We might have a situation where we need something installed on all 237 servers by tomorrow. I'll just go in and do a managed installation and have KACE push it out. So far, that's been pretty successful. I wish it had a little bit more ability to allow me to put something in there without saying, "Okay, we're already aware of this software. What file do you want to use?" It would be nice if it let me type it in and prompted me, when needed, saying, "We've already found that. Do you want to use this one? Yes or no?" But it hasn't kept me from accomplishing what I intended. Overall, the distribution is a pretty nice feature.

My biggest complaint is that almost every time they send out a new version, it fixes something and breaks another. Something that wasn't working in the last version now works, but something else stops; or they'll remove some dashboard that I really found to be nice and replace it with something totally different that I could care less about.

Another example of this would be that there is a set of agents where the communication between the agents and KACE is very consistent, and the patch numbers are very good. And then there will be a new agent which they say fixes this, this, and this. But then, all of a sudden, my patch numbers go down and the communication isn't as good, or they're timing-out more.

An additional instance of this is that it used to be, when you were patching, you would see how many succeeded and how many failed. You would also see which patches had failed and had reached the maximum number of attempts. Connected with that, there used to be a "reset tries" feature and that was nice because you could actually reset the attempts and KACE would try those patches the next time. Now, although "reset tries," is still there, it's grayed out. It doesn't function.

It affects usability because every time you upgrade, you don't really know what you may be getting yourself into. I wish they'd be a little more consistent and make sure it's only getting better, rather than their saying, "We had 15 known issues in the last version. In this new version, we're offering these new things, but we've still got 15 known issues."

The installs are generally very easy. You just say, "Okay, go ahead, upgrade," and they seem to run fairly smoothly with no problems. It's just that after you've done them, you have to see what is working and what's not working.

I have been using Quest KACE Systems Management for five years.

On the whole, the stability is good. Once it's up and running, it just pretty much runs. There aren't really system crashes or anything of that nature. It's a solid system that really does not encounter failures of the system itself.

Scalability is available. I have not experimented much with some of the options. For example, you can have a system at this site and have another site that doesn't have an entire KACE, but just a file share where KACE can put patches as well. Instead of servers at that site going all the way to your primary site, they just pull the patches from that local repository. Theoretically, that helps. So it can be scalable if you so choose.

In our environment we manage 237 servers. 

Their technical support is good. They're very prompt. Quest has been very quick in responding to any support cases or questions. And most of the time, the answer is very straightforward and easily executed or easily understood.

Positive

We did use something that KACE replaced, but I don't even remember what it was.

SCCM is what we use for workstations, but not for server patching. We do have WSUS (Windows Server Update Services) running as a backup in case we want to use Windows Update. We do have other options available, but for servers, KACE is the primary patching system.

I was involved in the initial setup and I found it to be relatively easy. It was pretty intuitive and straightforward.

Bringing it online to the point that I could log in took 45 minutes to an hour, and that included making sure I had DNS records so that the URL was resolving, and putting in the IPS and gateways, et cetera. All of a sudden, boom, it was up and running. 

After that, it was a matter of making sure that patches are actually downloading properly, and that the agent installs are checking in and everything is working properly. So getting it all tuned and set the way we wanted took two or three months, but the initial "it's technically functioning" was just two or three days.

We have realized a return on our investment with the solution. We are more stringent than the NSA as far as security goes. We run weekly security scans on our systems and we're consistently bringing in third-party organizations to do red-team tests where they'll try to hack in and do a lot of things to test us. Since Quest KACE Systems Management patches not just the operating system, but can also patch third-party things like Java and Wireshark if an update is detected, overall it handles everything that's detected. If possible, it will attempt to patch it.

The cost of KACE has been relatively low compared to other systems. Even if those systems have the same cost, they do not do as much of the third-party patching that KACE natively does. With a cost of less than $4,500 a year, it's been very good.

The pricing model is fair and fine. I wouldn't change anything about that.

We looked at SCCM and Qualys.

One of the reasons we went with KACE was cost. 

Another was that it patches third-party applications natively. Certain systems tend to need native operating system patching only. You can download something like a Java update and then "package it" for installation. But with KACE you can say, "If you find it and it's critical, recommended, not superseded, and it's detected on our system, download it and patch it." It's nice that it's doing third-party apps and not just the operating system.

If you're considering KACE for a large environment, come up with smart labels and patching schedules that are going to fit the number of systems that you have. The scheduling really comes into play, especially now with Windows having bundled patches. As a result, you're downloading a 1 or 1.2-gigabyte file to update the server, versus between three and seven 2 or 3 or 5 megabyte files. When there were multiple files, even if two of them didn't get uploaded, the other three did. If this one large file times out, it just does not patch. So scheduling the time to stage those and deploy on a different day is really important.

I wish we had the ability to use the mobile asset tracking and bar coding. Those are things that have been a real void in our organization. At least we are utilizing KACE for the servers and we manually input barcodes or serial numbers. Having the option to use a KACE app to input that information is nice and would save a lot of time. 

We Primarily use KACE as a diverse deployment and management solution. 

Our environment includes multiple locations, so having a single point of deployment for automation/patches/software/scripts and response management is ideal. 

We work in the banking industry, so having this single point and not having to worry about security is enormous. We have to go through multiple government security audits a year and our auditors are always blown away with our KACE environment. We need KACE to keep our organization going.

Previously, we were working with upwards of 200 different applications and tools, the amount of compatibility issues and clutter was unbelievable. One update on one application could ruin a whole environment at times. Thank goodness we found KACE to consolidate our environment and really cut down on resources! 

They've saved us so much time and money it's unreal. They have so much flexibility in what you want to configure or script. In some of my deployments, I've built entire applications on KACE to work with, while in others I have small built-in batch files. The only thing that limits KACE is your imagination.

The ability to build scripts right on the deployment center itself, as well as building groups that take those scripts/task chains has been absolutely invaluable and one of the most important parts of my whole environment. Without it, we would need to hire at least six to seven more employees to do what I'm able to do myself with those tools. 

On top of this, they have multiple forums that are super active. I've gone to tech support, ITninja, and even Reddit. One time, I asked a question on the KACE subReddit on how to improve a function and a KACE team member responded in five minutes. That's honestly unheard of for a company like this.

The GUI needs some work. I love all that it can do, however, it can be just be so cluttered at times. I wish we could see them spend some time improving the interface.

Sometimes when I run certain functions or need to do a one-off massive deployment, it lacks in "mobility". It can be a pain, having to go back a page and re-type in all the same information in the "run now" tab when I have a whole bunch of one-off situations. It's not like I can't do what I need to do, however, I seem to just spend more time than I'd like having to type in the same information over and over.

I've used the solution for the past five years.

In all the years we've had this product we've never had a stability issue.

The solution can scale. The product can be a help desk ticket system, all the way up to the entirety of your virtual machine environment - making updates and changes at a click of a button.

They take their role in support extremely seriously. We don't have to reach out too often due to the lack of problems, however, when we do, they respond within an hour or two at the very longest.

Positive

We did not use another solution. Once we got KACE, I just don't understand how we held on for so long without it.

We had a vendor assist us so that we never had a single hiccup during the entire setup.

The vendor was, without a doubt, an expert. We assisted and learned everything they could teach us.

We had ROI about a year into this and have saved so much ever since.

If your team is small like ours, I highly recommend working with an install vendor. For us, it wasn't as much a technically challenging thing to implement as much as what the vendor showed us during setup and installation that was just so helpful. With their help, we were able to hit the ground running and had much less of a learning curve.

Other options were discussed however, it was so long ago I can't recall what they were.

I would say start by looking at all of the services/products that KACE offers - don't feel overwhelmed as they will integrate very well with each other.

It is a virtual device. We use it for our everyday systems management and software deployment. It is implemented on all of our devices as an inventory and asset management tracking system. Our help desk system is utilized through it, and we do software distribution and deployments from it. We do all of those things on a daily basis.

We just updated to the beta version 12 on our test prep unit. We're on 11.1 on our active production device.

It has been very helpful in terms of management. The speed at which we're able to address help tickets is invaluable. We are able to maintain a history of problems and reference that information. That's been a huge piece.

Software distribution was what we initially purchased the product for, and it immediately paid for itself in time saved. We were looking to implement a new version of Office at the time, and we were anticipating a 6 to 12 weeks process to do the upgrade on all of our machines. With the device, we were able to complete that process in under a week. We saved a huge amount of time. At the time, I was the only tech who would have been doing the job. So, it would have been six weeks or so of my time. It has saved my hourly wage at the time for six weeks. We now have three people. Our roles are all the same. We're all IT technicians.

It has increased IT productivity. It has improved the speed for addressing end-user needs, distributing and updating software, and dealing with software vulnerabilities through patching. We could do these things much faster through the product.

It provides patch management, IT asset management, software asset management, and compliance. It also provides mobile device management, but we don't use it. The combination of all these things is really important for us. The patch management would be top of the list of those items. Asset management would be second, and software asset management would be third on that list. Compliance would be the last one.

It is really good for updating and configuring everything the way we need it to be in our environment. On a scale of one to ten, it is about an eight or a nine.

Its System Deployment Appliance (SDA) is wonderful for automating deployments. It is very quick and fairly easy to move forward with deployments. It makes deployments much smoother and quicker.

Pretty much all of the features are valuable. The inventory is very helpful to be able to keep track of our devices. The deployments make it easy to deploy new software packages or upgrade packages. The help desk is also a great tool for tracking problems and problem tickets.

It is very easy to set up and very easy to use on a daily basis. There is a lot of stuff to learn in terms of how do you do something and the things that it can do. It is just a matter of taking the time to learn all the functionalities and all of the nuances of how to use it, but it is pretty intuitive to use.

There isn't a lot they need to improve with the solution itself at this point. It is pretty close to providing a single pane of glass for everything that we need for endpoint management specifically on all devices. There is very little that it doesn't provide for us, and for those, we have to go to other methods. There are some of the patching solutions that it doesn't take care of for us. So, we have to do those manually on the devices, and that's really the biggest thing. It doesn't do patching really well for non-Microsoft applications. The major application updates, particularly Windows updates, don't function nearly as well, but, for the vast majority of things, it does just fine. If they could improve in this aspect, that'd be great, but I don't know if they're going to be able to do that.

The end-user training could also be better. I did talk to them the other day at a seminar about the training availability for end-users.

I believe we've been using KACE since 2003.

It is very stable.

It is very scalable. We've grown, and we've probably doubled our end-point devices since we started using this system. 

In terms of end-users, we've got about 1,200 system users in the city who use the help desk. There are 10 or 12 of us in IT that utilize the inventory, asset management, and software distribution side of things for IT management of those end-devices. It is being used very well, and we don't have any plans to increase its usage.

Their support has been really good. We don't need support very often because the system is so stable. It is usually a matter of not knowing how to do something when we end up getting support, but that has been pretty rare.

We did not have anything.

It was really straightforward. It took half a day. Our implementation strategy was to just get it up and running.

We did it with KACE directly.

It paid for itself within the first month we had it. So, the return on investment was incredible.

Their pricing is per end-point device. There is an initial cost for the license for the server, which is pretty low, and then there is a per end-point device license, which is also fairly low. So, the pricing is still reasonable. 

We compared it to Microsoft's SCCM. At the time, that was the only one we compared it to. The SCCM product in our mind was really intended for a large complex environment with thousands or tens of thousands of computers and multiple servers. At the time, we were several hundred computers. So, we were looking for something that was really built around that environment and for use of a smaller entity. Quest KACE was built around that, and it just worked out really well for us. It was a whole lot cheaper, as well.

I would advise just looking at the size of the environment in the end in terms of where you're going to end up. You have to make sense of the environment.

I would also advise others to take the time to learn about the system. There is a lot that it can do. We've had it going on 20 years. There is still stuff that we don't really know how to use or don't utilize to the capacity that we could. That's just because we have never taken the time or had the time to learn all of the pieces and parts and how to do different things within it. My recommendation would be to learn as much as you possibly can out of the box. Learn as much as you can and as quickly as you can to be able to utilize it because you'll never regret it.

From what I have seen, it is hands down a 10 out of 10.

We have several use cases for KACE and a lot of them are related to the helpdesk. For example, they provide assistance with modifying the helpdesk, client distribution, and maybe a tad bit in scripting on how to use it.

I've used the KACE tickets a lot.

This solution provides us with compliance management. We used it for security updates including Windows security, Dell, and other products. Another feature that we use is patch management. In fact, we patch other products all the time using KACE. I have Windows and Dell updates running bi-weekly, whereas other products are done weekly. Microsoft servers are an example of something that we regularly patch.

The combination of the features is important, although I'm just happy that it all works. It's fairly easy to use once you figure it out.

The system helps a lot when it comes to updating and configuring everything the way we need it to be in our environment. In particular, their support engineers are really good, although the system usually configures and updates mostly on its own. 

Price to using KACE, we were using emails. Now that we have a ticketing system, everything is monitored and everything is saved. For example, with the service desk portion, it's a lot easier to track because of the OSV files. They take up a lot of storage and as such, they get stored in archives. This means that it's hard to find those emails, so it's difficult to see what people said. Something we would look for is how we resolved an issue by following steps X, Y, and Z. This information is all available in the description of the ticket and by using KACE, we can find it easily. As far as the service desk operations go, this solution has been A one.

Using this solution saves us lots of time, especially when it comes to performing updates. We only have one on-premises server, and we have somebody that updates it, but prior to using KACE, there were lots of errors that would occur. For example, one update superseded another. Now, it is put on the automated run with a smart ticket and the server is always up to date. I estimate that we're saving at least 40 hours per month, based on the fact that we have 170 computers. It takes a long time to push all of the software updates to every one of them.

When we consider patching and software application updates, our productivity has increased by at least 80%. This has been major for us, especially with COVID and since people started working from home. It's been tougher to manage everybody but with KACE, it's made the job a lot easier. For example, the KACE agent looks at the client and it updates everything automatically.

The system gives us visibility with respect to whether a user is online, or the last time they were online. While online, it also gives us real-time status updates.

The only feature that we aren't using yet is asset management, and that is something that we are working on.

This solution is easy to use. None of it is very difficult, although I had to learn it from the ground up and it wasn't very easy when I first started with it. However, progressively, as I put in tickets and began using the service desk, the Quest help, and the technical support, they showed me how it works. Usually, after they showed me one time, I was able to understand what I needed to do. Eventually, it was really easy to use.

The inventory is really good, where it automatically updates catalogs. When I check on things, it's right there, and it even has zero-day patches. When you fine-tune it and set up the automation, it makes life much easier.

The patch management security is also A one.

It would be nice if the asset management capability was a little more intuitive.

The software asset management functionality is an area that needs to be improved. It could be more automated because when connections need to be made, such as when I connected Adobe and my malware remover, the process was pretty much manual.  For example, I have to tell it which and how many licenses we have, and I have to keep updating it. KACE has what they call Smart Labels and they are supposed to automatically detect things, but it seems that they don't detect anything. I put all of the information in, and it still won't do it. It makes you wonder why you're putting the information into the system in the first place.

I have not been able to connect to Active Directory, which is a ticket that I've had open for several months. It looks like the problem may be on our side. I've been working with the firewall team, which is a third-party vendor, and even their developers can't figure it out. Each vendor is pointing fingers at the other. I just want it to work.

I have been using Quest KACE Systems Management for approximately two years.

I like the stability a lot. It doesn't crash. We've had a few hiccups but it's definitely not worse than some of our vendors. The downtime is near 0%. Some of our vendors have a lot of downtime.

Scalability-wise, this product is great.

When we first implemented KACE, we had approximately 80 computers that we needed to install it on. We now have 170 computers.

We will continue to use this solution going forward. Every time we stage a computer, we make sure that we put KACE on it. Once we do that, we pretty much don't have to worry anymore. We're setting up more PCs and we're going to be hitting the 200 mark, probably at the end of the year. We have been hiring a lot of people and I expect it will continue.

There are three people who use KACE but I am the primary one. I'm the only person that makes changes and monitors the system regularly.

The technical support is pretty good but we still have cases pending. There is one case that we have had open for several months and I'm not the happiest about that, but for everything else, the assistance has been pretty spot on. It's hard to complain about the support.

Sometimes, I figure it out myself after opening a ticket but usually, they can get the job done. They are much more responsive than most vendors. I don't know if they have SLAs but if they do, then I would say that they're meeting them. They usually contact me either the day of, if it's early enough, or the next day, which is nice.

If I speak with any one of them, it doesn't matter. I've worked with multiple support engineers from KACE and they all seem to know what they're doing.

Usually, I have to contact them for the higher-level stuff. For example, I didn't know about how security certificates worked because I had never used one before.

The vendor has Premier support available, although we do not use it right now. We haven't looked into it yet but because we're growing and don't have enough IT people, Premier support might be ideal. For example, I have read that they help with VBS scripting, and I don't know it, so that would help me to learn it a little bit faster. Also, they save certain things for Premiere support. I had asked the service desk if I can change the category of a service ticket and they told me that I could, but it was a custom option. For that kind of thing, you need to have Premium support. I plan to call the vendor and get a quote for the service. That said, for everything that's not custom, they help a lot.

Overall, they're very proficient and they're very knowledgeable about the product.

We were using Datto RMM before, and KACE is much easier to use. I wasn't the most familiar with the old solution but with KACE, I can do things beyond monitoring. For example, I can do distributions or use security updates. With Datto, I basically used it to see what PC people were on.

Before I was hired, an IT company used to manage our infrastructure and they were the ones using Datto. We moved away from the IT company, which is why we switched.

We have not used any of the freeware products that are available or tried SCCM to achieve the same functionality.

It was definitely complex but that is because I'd never seen anything like it before. It wouldn't be a fair assessment to say that it was the most difficult thing, but it was a lot of information and I'd never used smart labels before. I was very confused at the beginning.

But, after I put in tickets, they did take the time to go back over it with me. After they showed me maybe once or twice, I understood what a smart label does. From that point on, it was very easy to create smart labels and automate the system.

It takes perhaps five minutes to install KACE on one computer. The longest part is pulling it down from the server. Once it's copied to the local machine, it only takes a minute or 90 seconds to install.

We completed the deployment in-house.

The pricing is great. It's billed annually and it's very reasonable.

My manager was already very familiar with this solution, which is why it was chosen. We didn't evaluate other options.

I have seen other monitoring tools that you use with a PC, where they are part of the assets. With this one, you have to run a custom script and you have to do a lot of custom stuff. When you do custom work, you have to pay more money, obviously. It means that there is an extra cost but other than that, it's pretty good.

KACE provides capabilities for mobile device management, although we don't use the feature. We also don't really use the monitoring system at this point.

My advice for anybody who is looking to implement KACE is that it's fairly easy to use and once you learn it, it's a very simple product. It's not simple in function, but the ease of use is there and you can very quickly learn what you need to do to get things done.

Also, if you know a little bit more about VBS, you get stuff done a lot quicker. 

Overall, it's a great product, I'm really happy with it, and I feel like it gets the job done.

I would rate this solution a nine out of ten.

The primary use of this product is for our user support (help desk).

Kace has helped us integrate all of our IT needs from inventory to imaging. Having this appliance to do everything automatically and push out software is a plus. Summer tasks are so much easier with imaging across the network that requires almost zero technicians intervention.

Managing 3,000+ computers across our campus from one single solution has made our life (and work) so easy. We are able to respond to the needs of our users always and can look into the history of the devices or the KB created to self-serve our users.

Our computer Inventory became more accurate, and computers were rolled out faster. Our techs adapted quickly to the new service desk, and the users can now check the status of their ticket by login into the user portal. 

As we plan computer rotations, having an accurate inventory is a key to identifying computers that are end-of-life or out of warranty. KACE can provide all of the necessary information by simply running customized reports that in turn can be provided to individuals or departments, either on-demand or on an automatic schedule.

Asset management, inventory, reporting, and service desk features work together and they are very valued in our daily operations.

When a user creates a ticket, users are in a continuous loop of communication via the service desk, user portal, or email. We are now able to set tier levels and involve other areas within IT, networking, sysadmin, VOIP, or managerial for approvals.

The service desk can be configured and customized to better serve our environment. If necessary, additional queues can be added.

There is always room for improvement. An example will be the implementation of granulated permission to run Scripts. We often find it unnecessary (and dangerous) that all technicians can see/run all the scripts created by our institution. Ideally, a Manager could assign some scripts to certain levels of support. 

However, the system does most of what we need at this moment.                                          

KACE has a website, "Use Your Voice," where users can make suggestions to improve the product or add new features. This offers a great way to improve the system.                      

KACE recently added Windows Feature Update patching to SMA. That was a considerable improvement to keep end-points secure, as many users were asking for it. 

SMA was implemented in our institution in late 2008.

The stability is great, initially was running on a physical server, and recently migrated to a VM, both environments are very well-built.

Support was always provided a fast and accurate response to our questions, issues, or even helping us implementing new system upgrades

Positive

n/a

The setup was straight foward, and a dedicated support team was on the line while we implemented and set up the system. KACE included a follow-up online training to guide us and have the appliance up and running within the first hour.

We've seen ROI in less than 6 months.

We also looked into TrackIT.

I primarily use this solution to deploy software, to deploy patches, to deploy drivers, and to do software package updates. I'm not using all of the functionality that it has but another thing I do is push out Windows upgrades. Rather than doing them all at once, I push out the feature updates.

It is set up on a VMware virtual machine.

When I first joined the company, the director and the other help desk associates were going to each computer to do updates and patches. At the time, we had 274 computers in the building, and I felt that there had to be a way that it could be automated.

One of the problems is that in order to get the updates completed, we were coming in on Saturday, which meant that they had to pay us overtime to get things done. When I started digging, I realized that you could use the SDA for automatic deployments and things of that nature. I was able to configure it to do what I needed to do.

I set up certain floors to be deployed during the night. The schedule was to complete 30 or 40 computers a night until they were finished. Then, when my director came to ask how the progress was, and I told him that the job was complete, he was shocked. It used to take them between two and three months to do the same thing.

Especially with the pandemic, where one day I have an employee in the office to work but the next day I don't, Quest has been instrumental in completing these tasks. With a couple of mouse clicks, I can get the job done.

The single pane of glass for managing devices is helpful because it allows me to perform updates and control things without having to disturb the doctors or nurses. The update process is transparent to them.

This solution provides us with IT asset management, software asset management, compliance, and patch management. This combination of features is important to us because we are able to perform all of these tasks without interrupting anybody's workflow. The most important thing is that we don't want to interrupt a doctor when they are with a patient and without Quest, if something critical needs to happen then I might have to wait to get into the office. During this time, the system could be vulnerable. Using a system with all of these capabilities and being able to use it after hours is key in IT.

The system makes it easy to update and configure things in our environment. If you get stuck then there are well-thought-out KBs available, and you can also ask people in the community. Personally, it has made my job easier. It's not as hands-on and it's more auditable.

Quest has absolutely saved me time, which I would estimate to be between two and three hours a day, easily. With the automations, things flow the way I need them to flow. When Windows updates come out on Tuesday, rather than deploying them on the weekend, we deploy them to all of the computers every Thursday. Because there is no more work to do on the weekends, it saves the company money, especially in overtime.

The automation helps on both ends. For one, you don't have the labor costs that you have to pay for in overtime. A lot of the things that we used to have to do by hand, I can now automate through the system. Then, at the same time, the work is getting done at the time you set it for. There is no "people factor", where they may not move as fast as expected. It happens, for example, that as people get tired, they get slower. Automation greatly diminishes the time that we spend going from one desk to the next. When I do it with the click of a button, everything is going to be done at that exact moment. 

The most valuable feature is the ability to deploy Windows features during off-hours times, through all of the machines at one time versus trying to systematically do them either by area or by floor. I can set one floor to automatically update on Thursday, the next one on Friday, the next one on Saturday, and so forth until I get everybody done. Doing it this way doesn't negatively impact my productivity, nor does it affect anybody else. Updates can be done in the middle of the night.

Using this system is pretty straightforward. When I first joined the company and started using it, a lot of it for me was reading the knowledge base to find out what it was capable of doing. Originally, the only things that they were using it for were popups and ticketing. When I took over, I started the software deployment, driver deployment, updates, and those types of things.

I still don't use the system to its full potential but I now use at least 90% of it.

The systems deployment appliance (SDA) is one of the main features that I use on a regular basis. A lot of the time, I won't do a feature update using the software deployment function. Instead, I will build an image on the SDA. That way, as I need to deploy it, I can do so at will. It gives me the ability to deploy to 10 machines at a time, which means that I can complete most of the stuff that I need to do over a period of time. It's as easy as can be; I'd say that it's as simple as cutting butter.

I would like to be able to deploy an image to more than 10 computers at a time. When we have to do a rebuild on these machines, although it is rare, I would like to be able to do more than 10 at a time. With the current limit, it slows me down because I have to set up 10, then the next 10, and so forth.

My client started working with Quest KACE Systems Management in 2014 but personally, I began using it in 2016.

I have not had a problem other than just recently when I started having issues with a library and a few of the files being corrupted. But, whenever I've called technical support, they've been generally on the spot for getting things fixed, and getting me back up and running. As such, it hasn't really affected my environment much.

My downtime, the first time they had to fix it, was about a day. The most recent time, I wasn't down but I could tell that they were working. Overall, the issue with corrupted files hasn't affected me.

In an environment like this, where you can't afford to be down, it is critical that you have premium support. It is definitely a factor that should be considered when purchasing other products.

The scalability is fantastic. You can add to it and there are lots of things that you can do but it's overkill for us at the clinic.

There were two of us administering the solution and there are about 274 endpoints. Since the other administrator recently quit, it is only me doing the job at the moment.

The technical support people are awesome. In the beginning, I dealt with a few of them that seemed like they just didn't want to be there, so I just would hang up with those people. Lately, in the last couple of years, I have not had any problems. Everybody I've dealt with has been happy to be on the call and glad to help.

We use Quest premium support and the biggest thing that stands out to me is that it's available 24-7. Sometimes, things will happen outside of the eight to five range and when it does, I need that ability to be able to call them and get someone on the phone. That's the major value for us.

There are other pluses with premium support but given that we have moved it from a physical appliance to a virtual appliance, right now it's just the 24-7 support that is important for us. Having the premier support had added value to our overall investment with Quest. It's worth what you pay for it because they are literally there. In a mission-critical system, such as a clinic, you can't have wait periods of two to four hours before technical support starts working on the problem. When a patient system or a lab system is down, you can't wait around for somebody to figure out if and when they're going to call you.

They did not use a similar solution prior to Quest KACE.

When the person who set up Quest first joined the company, he wanted to modernize things. People were leaving post-it notes or written notes on everyone's desk, and he wanted to implement a system to improve the clinic's way of doing business.

When he implemented the system, he implemented it with Active Directory to make it more fluent so that when something happened, they didn't have to go from one desk to the next desk.

I was not with the company for the initial setup, although I have spoken with people about it. What I have been told is that when the system was first purchased, they paid for support to help walk them through the setup. I have not heard that it was difficult but I do recall that it took some time to get everything configured.

We purchased KACE through a reseller, Netrix.

It was deployed in-house by my former director, with assistance from technical support. At that time, it was Dell technical support.

One person is enough for maintenance because it is not hard at all. Click a button and it's updated. You also have to make sure that your host is updated. It's pretty simple.

If I was on the outside looking in, where I had never dealt with it before, based on everything it does I would think it is quite complicated to operate and keep functional. It's definitely the opposite of that.

Our clinic's ROI is a saving in time and money. Prior to having this solution, we were sometimes in a position where there would be three of us working on it, and we'll all be working overtime. When you take that away, it is a big saving. For example, I have been here for five years and if I were putting in two weekends a month over the entire time, it is a lot of money that has been saved.

In terms of pricing and licensing, my advice is that you need to assess what you need and then look at what they offer. It's easy to get caught up in the things that you want, but don't really need. You really want to assess what's best for your environment and to plan it very well.

Ideally, if there is a project manager available then they should help with the planning because you want your end goal to be in line with what you are trying to do. A reseller will try to sell you everything under the sun, so it's important that you plan well and know what is required in your environment. 

I don't believe that the company evaluated other products. My understanding is that the reseller we used made the recommendation and we went with that.

My advice for anybody who is implementing this solution is to take your time. I suggest doing it on a Saturday but if your production is in an area that can't be down because you have to sync with Active Directory, then choose a time where you won't interfere with anybody's ability to work. It may require rebooting your DC and that is something that can't be done without affecting people in your environment.

For organizations running two DCs, it probably won't affect them at all. However, in our situation, where we use single sign-on, we really want to make sure that any downtime doesn't affect our users.

The biggest lesson that I have learned from using this solution is to read the knowledge base.

We had a transitionary period where I was taking over and my director was leaving. The system needed to be updated but part of the system was not paid for. Once it was updated, I found out that they no longer support physical servers, so we had to move it to a VM. That was a bit cumbersome but the important part that I learned is to keep your licenses current. If they expire because you are behind in paying for them then it puts you in a more difficult position when you renew.

Overall, this is a good solution that saves us time and effort. Other than the limit of having only 10 images deployed at once, I don't see anything else that I want to improve. I control everything through VMware and I'm pretty good at it.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

We primarily use this solution for the help desk, but we also utilize the scripting portion of it to automate things that would otherwise take us a long time to do manually. We're just now trying to start using the asset management portion of it as well, tying users to various equipment.

In addition to these things, we use some of the reporting and some of the file synchronization features.

An example of automation is pushing patches out to users. For example, I just finished creating a bunch of patch schedules.

All of the features that this product offers play an important role in our company.

We have a K1000 and it offers a single pane of glass for endpoint management. It would be nice to have a K2000 because it would then include image updates for hard drives, which our version does not. Otherwise, as far as endpoint management is concerned, it is complete.

We have utilized the IT assets but have been largely unsuccessful in using the modules for licensing and warranty.

When it comes to updating and configuring everything the way we need to have it done in our environment, it takes care of 90% of the work. It would be nice if it had a packager for software when we're dealing with executable files because not everything has a managed installer, unfortunately. It means that we have to trick it into doing what we need to do sometimes. For the most part, it does what we require.

The most valuable feature for us is the helpdesk. Just being in the IT industry in general, we have to have something to track what we're doing day in and day out, whether it be a project or end-user support. It helps us keep all that together in one place. The help desk is what everybody in our department uses it for the most.

The scripting is a very valuable feature, as it saves us time on pushing certain things out to the users, such as software and patches. The patches definitely need some help.

When you get to patch management, it's complicated. I have had to call technical support about it several times. The labels can get kind of confusing as well. I know that there are a lot of them and if I spend more time in it I'd probably understand it better, but anytime I have to create a label for something, I just get lost in a rabbit hole.

We tried the licensing a few times, but we never got it to work properly. It's always really buggy. It is a similar situation with the warranty information; it doesn't always pull that information accurately. It would be helpful to have those pieces addressed because we can't use them. It's been a few years since we touched it, so they may have been addressed by now, but every time we updated, we would go and test it and it just wasn't keeping track correctly.

The KACE Go Mobile App crashes a lot, and it always has. I would love to see that get fixed because it's very convenient when it does work properly, but most of the time it does not. This experience is uniform across multiple devices that we've tried over the years. I've read the reviews on the app store and all of the different messages being sent to the developers about how this needs to be fixed, and nothing ever happens. This is an area that could use some improvement, for sure.

It needs to have better Unix crontab options for patch management. We want to have the ability to use expressions because we would like to do our patches every two weeks. As it is now, with the way it's formatted, it won't allow us to do that. Essentially, we need more customization as far as the schedules are concerned.

We had a report where there were some custom fields in KACE, and we would be able to fill those out and utilize them for reporting. In one of the updates, those fields were removed. They were custom-built and they still exist in KACE, but from what I understood from the release notes and from speaking with a support rep, those fields are no longer available in reporting. Without being able to report them, it defeats the whole purpose of having fields there in the first place.

We are still able to do some customization in the reports, but the custom one, two, three, and four fields in the user details are in the appliance, but we can't find them on a table anywhere inside of the database.

Another thing that we would like is to have at least a limited degree of write permissions for the databases. It would make it a lot easier for reporting or even certain things that can't be exported, to have at least some kind of write control to the databases. I understand, as a company, why they don't want to give that ability to some people because of the can of worms that it opens, but it would just be really helpful to be able to automate some things, rather than have to go in and update the stuff field by field.

For example, the help desk configuration, where you have your categories and subcategories, and you can go in there and assign users. We have more than 100 of those line by line. Anytime we get a new help desk person or we make a change to who the owner is of a certain category, we have to go in there and manually set it, each and every one of them, and it takes hours to do.

Essentially, we would like to have more control over it and assume responsibility for problems should they occur. If we break something then it's our own fault.

Since we upgraded to version 10.0, all of our reports are broken. I haven't yet called in about that to find out what the problem is. At this point, we get a bunch of unknowns and question marks whenever we pull a KACE report off of our report server. It may not be a serious issue.

I have been using Quest KACE Systems Management for almost seven years. At the company, it has been in use since before I started.

The stability is great. We've only had it crash once, and that was because of a power outage. Otherwise, it's been awesome.

It used to be slow at some points, but over the years, through the updates, it's gotten a lot more responsive. There are still a few things here and there that take a little bit longer than I think they should to load, but it's not worth mentioning.

For the most part, this product grows with our needs. Back in the day, when we first got it, it was owned by Dell. All of our equipment is from Dell, including our servers and our laptops and computers, our workstations. It fits together very nicely.

All of our end-users use it, if they need to put in a help desk request. As far as the daily use of it, the ins and outs, I'm the administrator and I make sure that all the updates are done. I check on the patch schedules.

In IT, there are three of us. Aside from me, we have an IT admin that uses it to track his projects, as well as some tickets that get assigned to him for reporting requests.

On top of tracking these items, he uses some of the scripting functionality, when it's server-related. As an example, last week, he used it to handle changes that we had made regarding a print server. We changed our print server over to a new one, and he utilized scripting to remove the old server and add the new one. That's what he mainly uses it for.

Our IT director doesn't really use it for much of anything, other than his project-tracking and being able to look at everybody's queues, like mine and my IT admin's, just to see where we're at during the day in more of a supervisory role.

My experience with technical support goes back a long way and the service has changed over time. Overall, it's been a mix, based on luck of the draw. It depends on who I get on the phone. Some people know exactly what they're talking about, and some people don't, and we have to go through several emails or several phone calls just to try and figure it out.

Whenever you call in and you request a callback and the representatives say, "Okay, yes, we'll have a technician call you within the next couple of hours," it's about a 50/50 shot whether they actually call you back or not. Sometimes, they just send you an email instead of calling you. This can be a problem because I have all my emails filtered, so, if I'm looking for something important, I can get to it quicker. However, if I'm expecting a call from KACE support, I'm not going to be looking for that email. That's been a frustrating experience.

Over the years, it's gotten a little better, but it's still the same thing with the emails and the time it takes for them to get back to you. Or, if they just don't happen to be there the next day and somebody else has to take that ticket, that is another thing that can be frustrating. There is room for improvement there, as well.

We did not use another solution prior to this one.

It was implemented before I arrived but I have been involved in the upgrade process ever since I joined the company. It is straightforward most of the time but there can be some complexity and it can vary. For example, getting the backups done can be complex, as can things be when changing from version to version. However, for the most part, it has been as easy as just pressing a button and doing an update.

I would say that overall, it is 75% straightforward.

The help desk is super simple to use and we saw our return on investment a long time ago, just in man hours alone.

We used to use a spreadsheet to track all of the things that came through IT, and that is cumbersome. It takes 20 times longer to do. You have to make sure that somebody else doesn't have the spreadsheet open. There are only so many ways that you can put in different columns and rows to get all the information you need, especially when you have to do updates. It was really clumsy the way it was done in Excel.

Another example of where it saves us time is with the scripting, whenever we have to do an update to our transportation management system. It is the biggest piece of software that we have, it's the most complex, and there's a lot of moving pieces to it. We used to actually have to go to each individual computer in the company, of which there are 100 or more, and manually update the different pieces. Now, we can do it with the click of a button in scripting, and then just go around to the few people that it may not have hit properly and manually do it there. It saves a lot of time.

We pay annually for technical support.

I looked at Spiceworks at one point just to see what their solution was like. We didn't fully implement it. Rather, I added a couple of computers on it. It was mostly for watching the network and I didn't evaluate it to the point where I could compare it with KACE.

My advice for anybody who is implementing this solution is to be ready for a lot to come at you at once because it does so many things. It's a blessing and a curse at the same time. Also, if you're going to go with a solution from KACE, I would suggest the K2000 rather than the K1000, just because it has more.

We do not plan on changing solutions anytime soon.

I would rate this solution a six out of ten.

We have KACE SMA and KACE SDA. The SMA is to image all of our desktops. There are 3,000 desktops, and we use KACE SMA for Windows imaging and security patching and updates. We're using KACE SDA for our software library, so our client base can go to the software library and install software from there. We're using the support component and the trouble ticket system.

It increases security. We can target any machine or any device that is connected to it and update security if there is a vulnerability that comes out, especially this day of cyber attack. If we're notified by a vendor of vulnerabilities, we can push out an update within minutes. It has really increased the security of the network.

It is easy to use and pretty intuitive. It is pretty much a GUI interface. Its ease of use has affected the time to value because we can get our staff quickly up to speed on all of the components and how to support it best. Because it has a graphical user interface and is easy to use, it really decreases the training time and increases our efficiency in implementing things.

It provides a single pane of glass for everything that we need for endpoint management of all our devices, which has made things more secure. It gives us full visibility into every endpoint device that has the KACE agent on it.

It saves a lot of time. It has probably saved us a good month of person-time a year. It also saved a lot of training and a lot of lost productivity, not only for the technical staff but also for the staff, students, and faculty.

We also use KACE SDA, and it is fantastic for automating our deployments. We can literally push out an image to all 3,000 desktops at the same time and have everything imaged and done within three hours.

All of the features are valuable. We find everything we're using very valuable because they increase security and efficiency.

It is excellent in terms of updating and configuring everything the way we need. For anything more complex, we do professional service engagements, and they're exceptional. For anything less complex, we just need to ask questions. Their support division is extremely good too.

If we have any issues, we've had great success with their professional services team and their support team. Their technical support is excellent. They're very responsive and fast. Within an hour of initiating a support request, we've got somebody on it.

The only pain point I have is with their salespeople. They call too often. They're too aggressive in trying to upsell. We know what we need, and we know if we want to expand. I don't mind quarterly calls from them, but sometimes, it is weekly. They need to get their sales team under control. The main goal of their support people and professional services is to make sure they deliver the service, and they deliver it well, whereas their salespeople are so interested in making a sale that they're wasting my time. 

We did look at MDM, and I was misguided by their salespeople. When I talked to their tactical people, I found out that I hadn't been given the full picture on MDM, and it wouldn't have been what we wanted if we had moved forward with it. I really value their technical services, their professional services, and their support services, but their sales team needs to really up their game and not phone every week.

I have been using this solution for three years.

It is extremely stable. We've never had any downtime. There has never been any unexpected downtime with the KBOX, SDA, or SMA. They just seem to be extremely robust.

We're asking for it to be scalable for up to 10,000 end-user devices. When we purchased it, it was for 3,000 with scalability of up to 10,000. We haven't tried to scale up that much yet, but they say we're sized appropriately for that.

We use Quest's Premier Support for KACE solutions. The biggest value of having Premier Support is the response time. Their response time is phenomenal. We've never created a support ticket that they haven't responded to within an hour and resolved. They're professionals. Their support team is extremely knowledgeable. 

Their Premier Support has added value to our overall investment in the Quest solution. Their responsiveness and their technical skillsets are amazing.

Their Premier Support had an influence in purchasing additional licenses or additional products from Quest. We decided to customize the support desk component because the first implementation of just the standard SMA stuff was so good. We also implemented a Request for Change and a custom Request for Service based on how greatly satisfied we were with the KBOX, their support, and their professional services. If it wasn't for all of those three things, we wouldn't have looked at expanding.

We used Microsoft Deployment Toolkit (MDT). It just wasn't scalable enough for us, and it also wasn't customizable enough for us.

We used SCCM as well. It is much more complex, and it takes a lot of end-user training. That's why we decided to go with KACE.

After using other products, we want to stay with KACE. Earlier, we had a separate Request for Change application and a separate support system. We merged all those into KACE. It saved us a lot of money and a lot of time, and everything is central for our client base. They go to one spot in the self-service user portal, and everything is right there. This consolidation has probably saved us a couple hundred thousand a year. It is hard for us to do money points because anything that's Microsoft, such as MDT, SCCM, we get free through the Department of National Defense Microsoft Enterprise agreement. For us, there are no costs.

It was straightforward, but we did engage professional services.

In terms of the implementation strategy, we wanted the support component configured for all of our different support queues. We were asking for customizations, and it took about two weeks for the professional services person to implement them based on our requirements, but out of the box, everything is easy. We just had a bunch of customizations made.

We engaged professional services.

We have seen a return on investment. It is the fact that my IT staff can come quickly up to speed on the KACE appliance. It doesn't require a lot of in-depth training. It is fast to implement and get people trained on and able to support. It is also fast to get end-users using the self-service portal.

Based on other solutions that we had implemented, its pricing seems to be quite competitive. It is not inexpensive, but it is also not more expensive than any other solution. They have the standard licensing fees and support fees.

We evaluated several other solutions, including support desk solutions, and we settled on KACE just because of their ability to customize what we need. Their professional service is excellent, and so is their support, so we decided to go with KACE.

We found other municipal companies in the area that were using it, and we went and met with them to get their use cases and their experience. If anyone is looking into using it, I would recommend talking to people who have implemented it and seeing if it's going to meet their needs. I highly recommended it as a chosen solution, just for the fact that it's end-to-end. It's extremely robust and reliable, and their professional services and their support teams are stellar.

I would rate Quest KACE Systems Management a 10 out of 10.

We were originally using a physical appliance and now we have migrated to a virtual appliance. We migrated to the virtual appliance three years ago.

Our primary use case is for managed installations and the software that we deploy. Our offices are scattered throughout the state and we have 103 locations that are remote. We use KACE to inventory those items. We use KACE to push updates, third-party products, and third-party software to them.

We gather inventory from them, it lets us know how many machines out there have 16 gigs of memory and who's running low in this space. Any new software that we get that the company purchases, that is how we deploy out to the masses. We do that so that we don't have to travel the state over and over again, we can do all this stuff remotely.

We also have a lot of reports that are being generated from the information that KACE has so that we can take that back to our accounting department. We can provide reports on the location of newly purchased laptops. It shows us if they're still being used and who they are assigned to.

The ease of being able to distribute software to a thousand machines from one location with just a few clicks is the most valuable feature.

KACE is super easy to use. You have to change your mental process on how to think of something and look at it as how KACE has designed it. But once you can figure out what KACE is thinking, then it is really easy to use. We've been using it so long that we don't have to write much new stuff for it. We are able to use the old scripting jobs or deployments that we had. We're able to take those and modify them with new software and then push it out that way. I learn something new every day in it. There's a lot of stuff that I probably don't know that it can do. I'm always playing with and discovering new things.

It's 90% on a single pane.

We use the Systems Deployment Appliance. It's our bread and butter. Every machine that gets imaged here in this building and out through the whole state goes through the SDA. We rely on it completely. There is no manual process of getting a laptop out of a box, plugging it up, turning it on, and waiting for Windows to start. If you were to go to Best Buy and buy a brand new laptop, you would spend the next two to three hours just setting it up. We don't do that. We get a laptop, plug it into the network, connect it to the SDA, and within about three clicks, we're done.

It takes around 30 minutes to configure our laptops. We image machines, image laptops five to 10 of them at a time. It's really great to just line them all up and power them on, hit enter, enter, enter, and then walk away. That part's great.

KACE saves us time. We've been using it for so long now it's become part of our routine. 

It has also increased the team's productivity. We've been able to create standards where we know that no matter what type of laptop it is, we can image it the same way. It has the same setup for every user kind of thing. We know we can guarantee that everybody across the state is running the same version of Microsoft Office or products like that. It has continuity. It's made it to where we are efficient across the board from high-level VP level down to standard user level. Our equipment and the way that our equipment functions is standard. It's across the board.

It makes it to where the six guys that are on our team here can step up and do the same job. We know what to look for. We know the learning curve for it. We all know what it does and how it works. If we hired a new person, they could come in and pick it up very fast and be up and going extremely quickly. We've cut the learning curve down tremendously.

I would like for there to be improvement when it comes to Microsoft and Windows updates. It has the ability to do it but the control of it is not there like I have in the Windows Server Update Services. The way KACE does it is still very granular. You don't really see the process like it is in the Windows Server Update Services. I think that would be one of the biggest things that I would like to see KACE really put some work into and really make that a big enhancement. 

I have been using KACE for seven to eight years. 

It's very stable. The upgrades and patches that they come out with only seem to enhance the product. They're not trying to fix something that's broken. It always seems like when there is a new version, it's always something that is enhancing.

We have one SDA and one SMA and it works for all 1200 of our devices that we have listed. I don't think we would ever need to scale out to anything larger than that.

When it comes to opening a service ticket or a support ticket through KACE with Quest, it's one of those that I don't cringe at. I don't mind it because I know I'm going to get somebody that's going to help me. They go above and beyond to help, unlike other companies like Microsoft or something. It's a pain to open a ticket with them because you feel like you have to sit at your phone and can't move and can't leave waiting for them. It's the complete opposite for Quest. I really like how KACE operates on the support side of things. We use their premium support.

I can open a ticket through the appliance itself or I can sign onto the Quest support website and submit a ticket that way. I know that in a very short amount of time, I'm either going to get contacted that they're working on it or we'll actually have a support technician calling me directly. I get real people. One of the biggest benefits is you get a real person. A real person who is willing and knowledgeable about the problem that you're calling about.

Having this excellent support hasn't influenced us to purchase additional products. But it has been an influence on never, not even considering, picking a different product for SMA or SDA. It's a given that it will be here and it will be here for a long time.

The initial setup was straightforward. When we got the original physical machines, it was taken out of the box, we plugged it into the rack, and got it set up. Within a day or so we had it up and running and had machines in there doing inventory already.

We had professional services assist us with the deployment. I can't remember if they actually came on-site or if we did it remotely. 

Our experience with Quest support has always been great. Any of our interactions with them have always been spot on.

The biggest thing that I've discovered from it, is to give a picture of our entire environment. In one location, I can see how many laptops we have, how many desktops we have, how many people we have assigned, and to what software we have it deployed. I can give versions. I can give so much detail on devices that I don't normally see or I don't normally touch, that are anywhere from five miles down the road to 300 miles down the road. I have the ability to see them, change them, update them, and move them. That's where the biggest bang for it comes in.

From an admin point of view, it would make an administrator's life a lot easier to be able to have that vision across their environments and know what's out there and where you stand in that environment. To know if the machines are up to date or if they falling behind, and different things like that. 

I would rate KACE a solid nine out of ten. Nothing is perfect, I think that there's always room for improvement but it would be a strong nine.