ManageEngine Endpoint Central Reviews

I use only the asset-management part. 

The asset management is a good feature. It's not the best. However, it's a good feature to use.

It is stable and reliable. 

We can scale the product.

The OS deployment could be better.

Technical support from our local partner is not the greatest.

I'm still exploring the solution. There is yet more to uncover.

Typically, if anything was missing, I would put in a feature request. However, I have not done that yet.

I only started using the solution a few months ago.

It is a very stable solution. There are no bugs or glitches, and it doesn't crash or freeze.

It is very easy to expand. You just need to add extra licenses that are required, along with the computer resources. If I add enough computer resources along with the licenses, it's very easy to scale.

We have around 2,000 endpoints on the solution.

How ManageEngine works is they have partner support. In my region, they have only one partner. If my understanding is right, they only have one partner for the full GCC, and the partner I'm with is not great. If you ask me to rate them, it'll be a zero.

The service from the OEM itself, ManageEngine itself, is good. It's just the partner that is not helpful.

I've also worked with VMware. 

We use the asset management from LANDesk Ivanti, although we can't compare all the features as we use it for other processes. 

We had assistance with the setup and only require three admins for maintenance tasks. 

I received professional support for the initial setup.

I don't directly deal with pricing. 

We're customers and end-users. 

I'd rate the solution seven out of ten. It's still new to me, and I'm still exploring its capabilities. 

We are using it for managing desktops and configurations and compliance.

We are using its latest version. We are all up to date with whatever we're doing. It is deployed on-premises.

It helps with compliance. We're moving into a regulated space, and we need to be compliant and have full control over every device. So, the primary purpose of implementing it was compliance.

Identification of gaps and filling the gaps with updates are most valuable. We are able to identify known updates or missing updates and then update.

Each of their products is an independent product, and they don't have anything to do with each other. It is a suite of packages. They all run independently, and they all are a little different because they were acquired differently. They could standardize their portfolio.

We found the team that supports us to be very difficult to understand because of their accent.

I have been using this solution for a year or so.

It is reasonably stable. I had a couple of issues related to corruption, and I worked with their support, but on the whole, it is reasonably stable.

I'm sure it is scalable. It is currently being used by three users. We are using it daily, and we don't have any plans to increase its usage. It is not for any real negative reason. I just don't have a need. I bought it for what I needed it for, and it is doing what it does.

I had some pretty significant problems, and they were very complicated. I've had a number of conversations with them, but the simple truth of the matter is that there were communication problems with their team because of the accent. We found the team that supports us to be very difficult to understand. They had a heavy Indian accent, and it was very difficult to communicate with them.

Neutral

We didn’t use any other solution previously.

It was of medium complexity. You have to get an agent out for every single machine by hand, or you need to push it somehow. It took a couple of weeks.

We implemented it in-house. In terms of maintenance, it requires a fair amount of maintenance. It takes some time. You have to touch it every week and make sure it is working and pushing the code. You have to make sure you're identifying the gaps and the packages to be deployed. You need to build those packages, deploy them, and monitor which ones didn't fire. It is not an install-and-forget package. It is an install-and-use package.

We have seen an ROI. I would rate it a solid four out of five in terms of ROI. The work that one person was doing by hand for each computer in the company is now being done by it in mass. Its value is large because I could free up that person's time to do other work.

The initial purchase was around $6,000 or $7,000. We most probably are not on an annual subscription. We bought it, and then we pay for the maintenance. I'm not 100% sure how that's working out.

We evaluated a couple, but I can't remember what we looked at.

If I re-implement it today, I'd strongly consider a cloud-based infrastructure instead of on-premise.

It is solid. It is a legacy technology, and it has been around forever. It does what it does. It is complicated, but it works. It is not brilliant, but it is highly functional.

I would rate it a seven out of ten.

We carried out a POC on Desktop Central before implementing and it's been in production for two months. Our use case is for patching third-party applications and Windows applications. We use the solution extensively so that aside from the monthly scanning we use it to work on Microsoft vulnerabilities.

We are customers of Desktop Central and I'm an IT Manager. 

Previously, our monthly maintenance would have taken about eight hours, and two or three people continuously on a laptop. Our maintenance is now carried out by this solution and once it's done there just needs to be a check for errors. It's time-saving and resource-saving which is pretty good!

The patch management is really wonderful, it's effortless and just a matter of building a few configurations and creating a few templates which can be reused. The UI is quite good and user-friendly. 

There are a few basic things that haven't been configured in the tool. We're dealing with 600, 700 servers. The way the solution has been configured means you can only see 500 systems at a time. The company has acknowledged that this is an issue but they haven't worked on it yet. It's a little strange given the amount of time the product has been on the market. 

We're working on migrating to Azure. It involves a new patch that was not picked up by Desktop Central. I think it's a problem for them because Azure is everywhere right now and they don't seem to be up to date with the new patches. More needs to be included because everything Microsoft is launching now is more related to Azure.

I've been using this solution for six months. 

Performance is good and stable. If it's working on 600 servers at a time, there is a 90-minute window that it uses to communicate with its agent, and that's divided between all the servers. It can hamper performance at times when compared to other tools where you just click and everything is communicated without any wait time. The IT Ops team uses Desktop Central which, in our company, is two or three people. 

We haven't yet scaled but I believe it will be quite easy. 

We were using batchpatch earlier.

All the ManageEngine products are pretty straightforward when it comes to implementation. There are a few configurations you have to do on a network level for the codes, but it's not complicated. I carried out the deployment with one other person. We contacted the vendor a few times for some assistance but that was it. The POC took about a month and the actual deployment took a week to 10 days including configuring everything on the network level.

In terms of maintenance, the server and installed agent need to be updated on all servers. You do have to check it on your test environment to make sure everything is compatible with a virtual environment, otherwise it could crash your VM. 

The solution is relatively cheap because we purchased the full package. For now, we're only using patch management, but it offers many other things such as software deployment, the ability to create configuration packages and install new software. There are no additional costs to the licensing fee. 

We only recently started using Desktop Central, so we're comparing the results with another solution use, BatchPatch. The Desktop Central UI is very good and easy to use. BatchPatch is a cheaper product so it's more complicated and the UI is not as good. What BatchPatch does have that's lacking in Desktop Central is the granular representation of progress and what's happening on the backend. BatchPatch gives you a clear picture of what's happening step by step and progress per server; it gives you specific errors so you can check and troubleshoot. Desktop Central lacks that visibility. If you're carrying out maintenance of 600 servers, you need to have that visibility, so that if something's not right, you can look into it instead of having to wait eight hours.

If you're new to the solution, check your requirements because the solution is not suitable for every situation. We're using it for a data center, so we configured it differently. If, for example, you're dealing with local laptops on office premises and you're looking to do patch management, a product like Ivanti might be more useful. For us, Desktop Central is pretty good because we are working on servers, and the vulnerability checks we do on the security base are pretty high, so the patch management option of Desktop Central is pretty good. 

There is room for improvement, so I rate the solution eight out of 10. 

We use the product for endpoint security.

They provide good services.

The product's remote access manager needs improvement. The wake-up takes longer time, sometimes more than five minutes. It could respond immediately.

I have been using ManageEngine Endpoint Central for one or two months. At present, I use the latest version.

I rate the platform's stability a seven out of ten.

We have approximately 2000 ManageEngine Endpoint Central users in our organization. I rate the scalability a nine out of ten.

The initial setup process is good. It requires a technical team of seven to ten engineers for deployment and takes an hour or two to complete. Later, we need to maintain the product as well.

The product is not expensive. I rate its pricing a seven out of ten.

I rate ManageEngine Endpoint Central a seven out of ten. We encounter issues related to the quality of services.

We are using ManageEngine Endpoint Central for patch and asset management.

The most valuable feature of ManageEngine Endpoint Central is the central management console. Additionally, inventory tracking is helpful for knowing where our assets are.

We are looking for a complete solution for patch management with central management and the cloud which ManageEngine Endpoint Central does not provide.

I have been using ManageEngine Endpoint Central for approximately five years.

We have not had many issues with the stability.

Our approximately 15 IT staff that are using ManageEngine Endpoint Central in my company.

The application support is effective. We can communicate with the agents by email, telephone, or online chat.

I rate the support of ManageEngine Endpoint Central an eight out of ten.

Positive

The initial setup of ManageEngine Endpoint Central is simple. However, it is client-based, you have to identify the endpoint that needs to have the installation.

There is a freeware version of the solution available as long as you do not breach the number of licenses and users that are dictated.

The price of the solution is reasonable.

I would recommend people use the solution. It's designed to be user-friendly and easy to set up, and one of its key strengths is that many IT professionals are choosing it because it has a free version.

I rate ManageEngine Endpoint Central an eight out of ten.

Endpoint Central is for managing everything, including desktops, laptops, workstation servers, implementing software, and OS deployment. Mobile Device Manager is also included in some editions. There is software deployment, document sharing, remote control, and patching. The Endpoint solution is a complete solution for patching, management reports, Mobile Device Manager, OS patch, OS deployment, and complete endpoint management.

We are a partner of ManageEngine, and we install their solutions for our customers.

From the point of my customers, there is a need for fewer people in the company to manage things. We do not need four or five workers on Endpoint Central. 

Our customers are very satisfied as it simplified their endpoint management, their patching solutions, and is an all-in-the-one web interface control.

They recently included a feature for endpoint security for hard endpoints and offer cord blocking, for example. Also, the fact that you can manage from the same platform, desktops, laptops, mobile devices, et cetera, is great. It simplifies management. The software deployment for remote patching is helpful.

I don't know if it's ManageEngine fault or not. However, most of their agents that are being used for scanning endpoints and implementing software, and getting interaction from the ManageEngine platform are usually blocked by default by Windows Defender or other security products. Users may run into conflicts with other antivirus or firewall solutions. It requires manual intervention so that users do not receive false positives. You need to manually tell some systems, "this agent is not malware, don't block it."

It might be helpful if they offered a simpler way to use the OS deployment function. It's a bit complicated for most of the customers. You have to take some time and create a customized image. Maybe if they had a repository where you can store a Windows image and auto-deploy it, with not so many parameters on how to deploy it, or where to deploy it would be easier. It's overcomplicated for what it is used for.

I've used the solution for almost a decade since it was Desktop Central. Desktop Central's name was changed last year to Endpoint Central.

The stability is great. I'd rate it ten out of ten. I've never had it crash before. 

It may be slow upload to the web interface sometimes, however, in terms of crashing, only the computer or virtual machine would crash.

The solution scales very well. I'd rate it ten out of ten. We can go to almost 60,000 endpoints, and I'm not sure if you would need more. In Romania, we don't have overly large companies

We've worked with support in the past. We have a partnership with them, so we are in contact often. If maybe a customer wants another feature or wants something else done differently, we're in contact with support to help facilitate that.

We have not used a different solution. We only deployed this kind of environment for managing endpoints. Endpoint Central, we consider a good price for the features we get and it scales very well, so we only recommend Endpoint Central, or different editions maybe. It's great for the customer. 

The implementation is pretty simple. I'd rate it nine out of ten for ease of deployment. The only issue is the firewalls and antiviruses need to be manually told what it is. You simply need to install the console and the agents, and everything mostly goes like clockwork. 

Most clients require on-premises installations as they are big entities and have their own hardware and prefer to have everything on-prem. 

How long it takes to deploy everything is very subjective. For example, maybe if a customer just wants an installation. Getting the agent working can take maybe between a couple of hours to maybe a day or two. If you want customizations of policies, software uploads, et cetera, that depends on human intervention and coordination, and that can take four months. However, installing the solution is straightforward. It only takes a couple of hours to one day.

Usually, it only takes two people to handle an implementation. We just need one person that installs and one that checks on an endpoint to see if the agent started working. If it started working, then we replicate the process at scale for the entire organization.

We can install the solution for our customers and do not need the assistance of third parties during implementation.

We have definitely witnessed an ROI.

ManageEngine solutions are very affordable compared to other endpoint management options, like Ivanti or Microsoft. I was looking at VMware Workspace ONE. We compared to features and price and found this product to be one of the most affordable. In a straight race, ManageEngine will win in terms of pricing.

There may be extra costs on occasion. For example, if you purchase Endpoint Central Unified Edition, most of what you only need to pay for is a trial over the server or an add-on so that you have a passive machine that will wake up if the main machine dies. You might also have an endpoint security add-on. If you buy a standard, you have to pay for the add-on. If you want mobile development, you pay for mobile development. Therefore, the cost depends on the edition you're purchasing.

I have looked into VM Workspace ONE in order to compare features with this product.

We're an ManageEngine partner. 

I'm likely using version 13. It would be the version they released last year that we are working with. 

It's the best product. It's a solution that has all the features you will ever need to manage all the endpoints in your company. It has everything you will imagine, and it's simple to manage, it's simple to install, and once you install it, it will work on its own, and you can reduce the manpower required. You may have needed ten administrators before, yet, with this, now you only will use two due to the automated remote control software pushing and patching. All can be done on a single console remotely. You reduce the workload and free up people.

I'd rate the solution ten out of ten based on its many features and its low learning curve. You can become a good admin within a month or two just by using it and checking the menus. 

We primarily use the solution for managing patches and centralizing updates for applications. We can also blacklist and whitelist applications on our users' laptops.

Besides the office and operating systems, there are lots of other products that need to be taken care of, which are beyond your control. I have 250 endpoints here, sitting here and 100 roaming users, so for me, each and every application in the current scenario is very difficult, wherein the digital signatures are happening, the tokens are happening, which ask for the updates of Java, which ask for the update of a browser. It is very difficult for me to do the update of every PC individually. However, when handled in a centralized location, I get the control I need so that I can see which endpoint needs to be updated, which endpoint has been updated, et cetera. This is very helpful for me, very good.

The solution is very easy to use.

Everything is easily centralized and managed under this one product.

When we do the patching, I can select the applications which are applicable to my network. We will get multiple templates and tons and tons of applications, however, you can select and download and it'll start patching. It'll consume lots of bandwidth and disk space. What you can do, is that, whichever applications are applicable for you, you can select those applications and it will start patching only those applications. It will reduce the bandwidth, it'll reduce the disk space, and tracking will be much easier.

In terms of the warranty, you need to install the agent on the laptop, or desktop and once the agent is installed, when the communication happens, it fetches the entire detail of the hardware, software, and everything. The beautiful thing with that is it gives you the warranty information also, whether the product is out of warranty or not. I can set an alert for devices where the warranty is going to expire. I'll get an alert that it is going to expire in one year, a month, six months, whatever the term I defined.

Since I'm able to see whatever the applications are installed on the user's PC on the endpoint. Sometimes most of the roaming users who are out of my network tend to install applications that are not applicable as per company policy. You can define which applications are allowed. There was a couple of cases where my users had installed a YouTube Downloader, and while downloading and installing that filter, by default or by accident, they installed some of the adware also. That won't happen under this solution.

Desktop Central gives me an option wherein I can prohibit any software. When I blacklist software, the user will get an alert saying "This is prohibited software." Then they call IT and I'll get a notification. For me, I'm very much in control of my network now. I have the power of whitelisting or blacklisting.

For users that work from home and are not in the office, sometimes minor things happen, such as email not working properly, et cetera. Desktop Central will give me remote control of a user's machine and I can troubleshoot or find out what the issue might be. If something needs to be installed, I can do it remotely as well. I don't need to buy TeamViewer or AnyDesk or other software. 

There are so many features available to us. They've added a lot over time. Initially, the asset management was there, however, there were no warranty features. The remote control was there, however, there were various limitations. They've just gotten better and more robust over time. 

For the most part, all of my needs are met with this product.

I would like to see them come out with a SaaS version of the product in the future. There are dependencies with on-prem. For example, since it's on my data center, my bandwidth, it is totally dependent on my network. On the cloud, I don't have to worry about anything. 

One feature we're testing is when we have a laptop with just a DOS OS and we need to do a full installation, including installing the underlying OS. I'd like to have the option where we could create a template to allow the system to install the OS with the typical software. It's a feature we're testing now to see if this is possible. We don't use it yet. However, I'd like it if we could just run one script, one command, and then get an alert when the process is done so that I can go in and configure emails or whatever else I need so that it is ready for the end-user.

I've been working with the solution for around three years. 

The stability is very good. We have been using it for the last three to four years and there is not a single downtime where the product has failed. In terms of service updates, service backups, and whatever the features are coming, we have faced a 99.9% success ratio.

In the initial stage, at that time, we had a hybrid environment internally, where we had Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 10, and some of the servers which had Windows 2003 OS. There were compatibility issues, however, we've since migrated and upgraded the systems and there is no longer an issue.

The solution is scalable.

We are using the solution quite extensively and have about 250 users.

Technical support has been good and we've been satisfied with their level of service. They have a good inbuilt chat option if you need to reach them. They have a technical team right within the solution that you can talk to in real-time. They can provide workarounds or escalate issues quite easily.

We used to have a Windows SUS server for patch management. There were other products that needed to be taken care of - for example, Adobe, the WinRAR, and multiple other software, which needed to be patched, and in which the assets needed to be managed. There are things such as warranties that need to be managed, and their tracking needs to be done, we were looking for an application wherein we would get everything on a centralized product, which is why we chose this solution.

The initial setup was straightforward. At the time, when we were in the phase of testing for the product, we did whatever testing to fulfill our requirements. That way, when we went into production, there were not any hiccups.

Deployment took around ten to 15 days, due to the number of endpoints that needed to be done, and the number of products that needed to be whitelisted. Also, everything needed to be configured. Around four to five people were involved in that project.

In terms of maintenance, if there is any product update, or if the application will have any service package coming, then I need to take downtime, to go through everything and do testing of the service pack to see whether it will hamper any current writing process or not. Once I do it in the test environment, then I have to put it in production.

That said, once we move to SaaS, this process will be obsolete in the cloud.

I have two dedicated resources for maintenance. That includes me. The other person looks at the patch management and the warranties. I look at server maintenance and deal with whatever resources are required for servers. 

We were able to set it up ourselves in-house. 

At the time we signed onto this product, it was a bit more expensive than SolarWinds, however, I'm not sure if that's since changed. 

We looked at SolarWinds, however, we went for the Desktop Central. We evaluated it and we found Desktop Central was quite user-friendly in terms of patch management and in terms of asset management. Right from the user inception, until the exit, everything is tracked under Desktop Central, whatever the asset allocated to the user, whatever the warranty, whatever the application, the install, everything is tracked under the Desktop Central.

Kaseya was also evaluated which was on the cloud. However, it was costlier and there were manageability issues. SolarWinds was a bit very complex in terms of handling. Technical support was also different as they only have an email option.

I'm a customer and an end-user.

Currently, we are using on-prem. I am waiting for SaaS, however, I really don't have the SaaS version. It'll be very good if they offer a SaaS version; my manageability will become very much easier.

If you're looking for third-party patch management, asset management, and/or remote control support, then this is the best app. For remote control, it doesn't require much bandwidth. Often, people sitting in a remote location are using their 3G data cards or mobile data, mobile phone, and they still got connected with the seamless connectivity. There has been no issue.

I'd rate the solution at an eight out of ten.

I am certified for two of the modules of ManageEngine. I am a certified associate for AD Manager Plus (Active Directory Management) and I also have the certification for Desktop Central. Desktop Central is a management module used to manage devices and services from one location.  

To manage a large number of users and devices and push upgrades and patches, we need a solution that allows us to do that in an efficient way. We can do this with Microsoft Active Directory. That would be our primary use case for this solution. There are other things that we do with it.   

If we want to track an incident more closely to do some root-cause analysis, Desktop Central can help us with this.  

If I have a large group or area of a company that extends into EMEA (Europe, the Middle East, and Africa) and APAC (Asia-Pacific) and maybe LATAM (Latin America) that is on Windows 7 and I want to upgrade multiple devices to Windows 10, I can plan for these upgrades and do them simultaneously. Desktop Central has certain use cases within IT, Ops, and DevSecOps (security as a part of software development and IT operations) roles. Using these you can build a DevSecOps pipeline using Desktop Central.  

In the case of a well-formed pipeline, the Ops is given the liberty to do the releases rather than having to get IT involved at multiple locations. With minimal help, the Ops can do the releases, they just have to define the release and the release goes out smoothly without any IT intervention. The automation process can be built out this way to give technical control to non-technical users. We built our own platform for doing that from scratch Java based. But the technology matured and there are more options available from vendors to solve these issues. We chose to deploy Desktop Centeral as our dedicated solution.  

It has greatly simplified updating and patching within our systems.  

From my hands-on experience, the features I have found the most valuable in Desktop Central is the way it is tightly coupled with the rest of the modules and the entire gamut of ManageEngine. So if I want to collect data about who the users are on the system, I can pull that from the Active Directory. The AD Workbench is a dashboard that gives all the data about the users enterprise-wide.  

Desktop Central has got a dedicated mobile device management module. ManageEngine has got the complete gamut of offerings. It has got asset management, service management, and asset classification. It can do any kind of patch management. It is best at the general management of assets and reporting.  

For example, we can use it for virtually anything having to do with security on endpoints. Say we have maybe 4,000-plus devices that we have to monitor and upgrade the OSS (Operations Support Systems) and apply patching. This can all be handled with Desktop Central from a central location. That is what makes it a very good option.  

Desktop Central manages pushing upgrades to endpoints and how to securely manage those endpoints. That is how it is most useful.  

The product has several places where there is room for improvement.  

Although it is on the cloud, sometimes the performance is slower than it should be. One of the reasons could be that it is tightly integrated and tight coupled with the rest of the modules and all of them have to be in sync. This syncing takes time and resources. When I go to our Desktop Central console, sometimes it runs slowly. So performance is one place where it could have room for improvement.  

In terms of patching, which is a major benefit of the package, patch management can work even better as well. The vulnerabilities are obvious. Every day we get reports on a lot of new vulnerabilities. It is clear that ManageEngine is doing the patching and the package is easily deployed once they are developed and available. The incident management, the root cause, the planning of the resolution, the service management — all these things are known and available. The team at ManageEngine is good at that. But they do not provide reports to user admins on the development and delivery which is information they already have and admins could use. Once the patch is added to the repository the defense against vulnerabilities improves. But the information about developments and vulnerabilities would be good to have and could be shared more candidly.  

I have been working with Desktop Central since February 2020, so that is about 2 years now.  

The product is constantly being upgraded by the vendor for any known issues with some features or some bugs. That kind of stability issue will always be temporary.  

There can be minor bugs that linger because they are not affecting operational issues, but even these can be escalated for fixing. We can get it fixed through the support and the product team for that. We talk directly to the product team if we feel something is important. It can happen over the phone, or it can happen by email. The entire product team has got different account managers for each of their customers. We can go directly to the team professionals that we need and get a bug fix and get it applied.  

Although Desktop Central is performing well, it sometimes experiences lag because of the resources available. The CPU and memory available might be temporarily low. Desktop Central needs a lot of resources to perform its services and syncing.  

Overall we have not had any serious, lingering issues with stability.  

We have not had any issues overall with any type of scalability. Right now we might have more than 12,000, 15,000-plus users spread across the geography. We can add more.  

All the service management gets taken care of by Desktop Central, which monitors everything. So if you need to expand services you configure this in Desktop Central. There are business KPIs (Key Performance Indicators), so it is KPI driven. How many incidents we are expecting, how much we can scale and all these system variables can be driven by business KPIs.  

Quest Office has a product called Foglight that has been used for quite a long time to order business KPIs. There are two different types of KPIs: the business KPIs, and then the functional or technical KPIs. So those are all integrated with Desktop Central from Foglight.  

We have incident management through Alacrity which is made by a different segment of BMC Software which has also got the product called Remedy. Alacrity is something similar.  

Within Desktop Central there is a production management function that is at the core of the application. When we configure Alacrity to care for incident management or Foglight to manage KPIs, this becomes integrated with the Desktop Central modules.  

We can tightly integrate other applications to the Desktop Central solution and expand out what it oversees and interacts with.  

If the workload increases, we can scale services easily on the cloud or make other plans for enhancing our architecture.  

I am quite satisfied with the customer support. They have bigger support teams available and the routing to the proper people and resources is quite good. They have support out of different cities, so they 'follow the sun' from the perspective of support and the availability is quite good all the time.  

Neutral

VMware was our solution at first. It was a PaaS (Platform as a Service) offering with built-in security and a part of vCloud Air. Workspace ONE was on the top of that. It was the first real desktop virtualization. Like Citrix, it gives you VDI (Virtual Desktop Infrastructure). With that, VMs can easily be managed through Workspace ONE and integrated VDIs.  

If I already have VMware and vSphere as my core backbone for the virtualization strategy in the organization, I might also look at automation for deploying updates. If I have a containerized application that is not automated, I can build in the automation using the DevSecOps pipeline or I can look for another solution. If you want to do the DevSecOps pipeline in the VMware workspace, you can do that with vRealize automation.  

VMware, compared to Desktop Central, is far more expensive. Desktop Central has got a license and pricing advantage similar to your windows update and Windows WUSP (Windows Update Services: Client-Server Protocol). That is your Windows update platform. With Desktop Central, you pay something similar to that. It is only a few dollars per license per user.  

Switching to Desktop Central was a matter of having an opportunity to make a switch, keeping aware of the developments in the technology and on the market, and moving to a product that was cheaper and had the capabilities that we needed to carry out the task.   

Our process and roll out for doing the setups are pretty easy. We have managed to gain familiarity with the product and created a pretty smooth process for the installations.  

I have installed a lot of modules by myself, like EDI Manager, and I even installed Desktop Central. We run tests until we are satisfied that these two modules are installed correctly and this usually does not take much time.  

We do not necessarily handle the setup and deployment totally by ourselves. We stay connected to the managing and support team. There are different product teams within the managing team. There is one for EDI (Electronic Data Interchange) Manager, there is one for Desktop Central, there is another one for the service management. There are many different parts at the support team level. Most of the installations do not require assistance but we can consult support when required. They will help us cope with any sticking point and we can move on from there.

Desktop Central can be less expensive than other solutions like VMware for managing DevSecOps. You have to pay per asset with Desktop Central and the final cost depends on how many assets you have across the organization. Per asset, the license cost will be less than using a more expensive license for VMware and vRealize. I think per desktop it might be somewhere around $50 or $100 each using ManageEngine.  

This is the only product I have in mind for this type of solution currently, although we have not evaluated Sophos yet. After that, there is only Citrix and VM Workspace ONE. Citrix is the oldest vendor we have had since Citrix MetaFrame Presentations Server days. At that time they were using screen sharing on desktops, RDPs (Remote Desktop Protocol), and still using all those older technologies. So that is too old as a solution. Desktop Central is doing much better things and has advanced well beyond that solution.  

My advice to people looking into this solution is that if you want to improve on the patching processes as a part of a DevSecOps pipeline, Desktop Central can help you do that. It will help you make that workflow easier and it is a better option than other solutions. So this works out to be a better because everything is built-in. You do not have to integrate with any other company's portal or any other incident management or tracking.  

If you plan for a patch, there are different tools to use, different notifications to set for the patch, and they can be administered within Desktop Central itself. So the admin can approve it and once the notification changes, the patch can be released to the endpoints. That works pretty fast. That built-in workflow makes it more productive and easier to use.  

On a scale from one to ten, where one is the worst and ten is the best, I would rate Desktop Central higher than the VMware and Citrix Workspaces. The workflows are much better and easier, and the different roles for IT and Ops are well defined. So I would rate somewhere around seven.  

It is a seven because it still has got some room for improvement, but I think seven is good.