Microsoft SCCM vs. HP
Configuration Management
System (CMS)
HP Software Market & Industry Intelligence
August 2015
HP Internal Use Only, Do not Share with Partner’s or Customers.
© Copyright 2015 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
Disclaimer and How to use this information
This information is for internal HP audiences only.
The deck is meant to provide more insight into the competition we face on a relative
basis.
Please refer to the notes section in every slide for more details
For suggestions or comments on how useful the enclosed information is to you or
how it could be more valuable, please contact: poulami.mukherjee@hp.com
© Copyright 2015 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
Know Your Competition!
"The most meaningful way to differentiate your company from your competitors, the best way to
put distance between you and the crowd is to do an outstanding job with information. How you
gather, manage and use information will determine whether you win or lose." – Bill Gates
© Copyright 2015 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
Microsoft SCCM: Overview
•
Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager 2012 (SCCM 2012) is a Windows product that enables administrators to
manage the deployment and security of devices and applications across an enterprise. SCCM is part of the Microsoft
System Center 2012 systems management suite
•
Microsoft also continues to enable a robust and growing ecosystem of certified third-party modules and snap-ins, which
integrate with the Configuration Manager console, allowing Microsoft to present a more complete set of capabilities in
competitive situations
•
The complexity of the CM infrastructure is reduced in the 2012 version through the introduction of role-based access
controls and other capabilities that reduce the amount of traffic required to travel the network.
•
Several key features of System Center Configuration Manager 2012 help administrators address the bring-your-owndevice (BYOD) trend in the enterprise, including user-centric management
•
CM moved to a more context-aware model. The tool now delivers applications to users, and will present different
applications and use different delivery models based on user context
•
Microsoft also plans to release a major new version of Configuration Manager in the fourth quarter of 2015
•
Microsoft’s solution builds on market-leading client management by combining System Center 2012 R2 Configuration
Manager with Microsoft Intune to provide organizations with a comprehensive, cross-platform, and user-centric way to
deploy applications and manage users’ devices whether they are corporate-connected or cloud-based
© Copyright 2015 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
Microsoft SCCM : Key Capabilities
Feature
Capability
Benefits
Application Delivery
Configuration Manager takes a usercentric approach to application
delivery that allows administrators to
create one application that can be
delivered to all of a user’s devices. It
evaluates device and network
capabilities and optimizes delivery,
whether through a local installation,
streaming through App-V, or via a
presentation server
Through integration with Citrix
XenApp, CM gives users access to any
business applications on a wide array
of mobile platforms. CM allows users
to securely self-provision
applications from anywhere with an
easy-to-use web catalog
Mobile Device Management
Integration with Microsoft Intune
provides a single administrative
console for managing policies and
comprehensive asset and compliance
reporting across PCs as well as
mobile devices, including Windows,
Windows Phone, iOS, and Android
Provides a single administrative
console for policies, as well as
comprehensive asset and compliance
reporting
© Copyright 2015 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
Microsoft SCCM : Key Capabilities
Feature
Capability
Benefits
Virtual Desktop Management
Configuration Manager reduces the
complexity and cost of implementing
virtual environments by providing a
single, unified tool to manage all your
client desktops, thin clients, mobile
devices, and virtual desktops
With the significant improvements in
CM 2012 around user-centric virtual
application and VDI scenarios, IT has
the tools they need to empower user
productivity with Desktop
Virtualization, while maintaining
corporate control and compliance
Endpoint Protection
Configuration Manager serves as the
infrastructure for System Center
2012 R2 Endpoint Protection. It
delivers a single solution for malware
protection, identification, and
remediation of vulnerabilities, while
giving visibility into non-compliant
systems
Can configure antimalware policies
and Windows Firewall settings to
selected groups of computers, by
using custom antimalware policies
and client settings. Can also use
Configuration Manager software
updates to download the latest
antimalware definition files to keep
client computers up-to-date
© Copyright 2015 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
Microsoft SCCM : Key Capabilities
Feature
Capability
Benefits
Compliance & Settings Management
Creates a baseline for “desired
configuration state”, then ensure that
all user devices comply with that
baseline through either auto
remediation or alerts. CM also
integrates with Microsoft System
Center Service Manager to
automatically create incidents on
baseline drift
Improves functionality by setting and
enforcing configurations, triggering
console alerts, providing richer
reporting, and utilizing pre-built
industry standard baseline templates.
IT also gains visibility into at-risk
devices through jailbreak and root
detection for iOS and Android
Software Update Management
IT administrators can deliver updates
of Microsoft products, third-party
applications, hardware drivers, and
system BIOS to a variety of devices,
including desktops, laptops, servers,
and mobile devices
Maintains operational efficiency,
overcomes security issues, and
maintains the stability of the network
infrastructure. Provides state-based
updates to simplify updates to
individuals or collections within
groups
© Copyright 2015 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
Microsoft SCCM : Key Capabilities
Feature
Capability
Benefits
Power Management
Works with the power management
capabilities built into the Windows 7
operating system to enable
administrators to optimize power
settings at a granular level
Monitor machine and user activity to
minimize unintended user
interruption. Apply a power
management policy to enforce
different settings for peak and nonpeak user activity periods. Check
compliance and remediate noncompliance. Analyzes power
consumption and saves energy costs
Operating System Deployment
Provides support for PXE-initiated,
multi-cast network-based
installations, stand-alone
media, and pre-staged media
deployment
Helps eliminate the inefficient and
errors associated with manually
installing applications
© Copyright 2015 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
Microsoft SCCM : Key Capabilities
Feature
Capability
Benefits
Client Health & Monitoring
Offers an in-console view of client
health, threshold-based console
alerts, hardware/software
inventory and status, and
remediation
Provides alerting and remediation
capabilities should health statistics
fall below established thresholds
Asset Intelligence
Can have continuous visibility into
hardware and software assets and
usage. Asset Intelligence translates
inventory data into information
Provides rich reports that help
administrators with software
purchasing decisions, upgrade plans,
and license reporting
Inventory
Configuration Manager can inventory
hardware and software in an
organization to help give a view into
what resources the organization has
With the R2 release, users can enable
custom hardware inventory more
easily and extend the inventory
schema
© Copyright 2015 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
HP UDI vs Microsoft SCCM
© Copyright 2015 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
HP UDI Vs. Microsoft SCCM
Capability
Microsoft SCCM
HP UDI
Yes
Yes
Limited
Yes
Yes
Yes
Limited
Yes
File-based (very accurate) software inventory (all
.exe & .dll)
No
Yes
Non-Windows client/agents automated deployment
No
Yes
Identification of Software/Application Suites
No
Yes
Limited
Yes
No
Yes
Limited
Yes
Unrecognized software teaching by tool vendor
No
Yes
Agentless discovery support
No
Yes
Storage discovery support
No
Yes
Networking discovery support
No
Yes
Windows-based Hardware/OS Inventory
UNIX/Linux/Mac OS Hardware/OS Inventory
Windows Software Inventory
Non-Windows Software Inventory
Software usage tracking on Windows
Software usage tracking on non-Windows (Unix,
Linux, OSX)
Non-Microsoft hypervisor Inventory
(Xen, Citrix, Solaris, LDOM, IBM, HP, etc.)
© Copyright 2015 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
HP UDI Vs. Microsoft SCCM
Capability
Microsoft SCCM
HP UDI
Includes mature CMDB
No
Yes
Linux/UNIX/Mac inventory can work without root
access
No
Yes
Pre/post scan scripting capabilities
No
Yes
Express teaching tool for software and other
inventory mgmt. tools
No
Yes
Advanced UI with topology maps and HTML5 based
end-user interface (non-technical)
No
Yes
Reconciliation Engine to reconcile data coming from
multiple sources
No
Yes
Topology Query Language (TQL) based reporting,
views, enrichment, etc.
No
Yes
Multi-tenant support for access to discovered data
No
Yes
Option to upgrade to powerful Application Discovery
& Dependency Mapping
No
Yes (UD)
Oracle LMS Audit discovery (tool verified by Oracle)
No
Yes (With UD)
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Why HP?
© Copyright 2015 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
Microsoft SCCM 2012 –Key Disadvantages (1/3)
•
Microsoft SCCM It doesn't natively get the editions of SQLServer ( 'express', 'standard', 'Enterprise')
•
Microsoft SCCM doesn't get the inventory of VMWare or Centrix hosts ( though it does work for Hyper-v)
•
Microsoft SCCM is not very good at Third Party Application Patching. You can integrate System Center Updates
Publisher (SCUP) tool, as it’s free for Configuration Manager customers, with SCCM. However, loads of manual work
is needed and more packaging efforts needs to be put in to deploy third party application updates through SCUP
and SCCM
•
While System Center 2012 offers many architectural improvements and gains in automation for common activities
such as patching, several areas such as touch less provisioning and scale-out still require third-party add-ons
•
The product does not yet manage hosted virtual desktops or Macs effectively
•
Software Metering is not supported and so can be turned off
•
The software inventory capabilities of the UNIX and Linux client are derived from hardware inventory collection and
are limited to the list of installed programs present on the UNIX or Linux systems – very similar to the Add/Remove
programs view in Windows hardware inventory. There is no ability to inventory specific files or file types on a UNIX
or Linux system
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Microsoft SCCM 2012 –Key Disadvantages (2/3)
•
Configuration Manager 2012 is a significant improvement, but it will still require substantial infrastructure for
larger deployments and still falls short in critical areas of automation, requiring augmentation with third-party
tools
•
Customers report that some of the new capabilities are less useful than they would like. For example, the new selfservice portal requires roughly 22 steps to publish an application from selecting the package to staging it for selfservice deployment, leading some of the interviewees to conclude they don’t want to leverage it
•
For Configuration Manager 2012, Microsoft is adding important and long-awaited new capabilities, including a Web
gateway that can reside in a DMZ, and it is also adding Azure based distribution points to the model. Forrester
believes add-ons like 1E’s Nomad or Adaptiva’s OneSite products will still be necessary in some larger shops with
network constraints or to simplify use cases like remote PXE. Firms express concern that Microsoft’s Background
Intelligent Transfer Service (BITS) doesn’t poll to understand WAN load for dynamic throttling — something they
view as critical in constrained network environments to deliver large payloads efficiently. Firms also like 1E’s more
sophisticated PXE boot capabilities for easier remote provisioning
•
Non-Microsoft application patching is inadequate
© Copyright 2015 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
Microsoft SCCM 2012 –Key Disadvantages (3/3)
•
Automated policy compliance is better but still limited
•
Software license compliance is unreliable and incomplete in functionality
•
Self-service automation and user centricity are welcome, but fall short of needs
•
Building collections based on organizational details or data that resides in other systems of record is not a native
feature and will require either clever custom development or third-party add-ons
•
‘Touchless’, automated OS deployments and upgrades require third-party tools
•
System Center Configuration Manager 2012 is equipped to manage Microsoft Hyper-V, App-V, and (Microsoft) VDI
out-of-the-box. Citrix and Microsoft continue their collaboration with updates to XenDesktop 5.6 and the XenApp
Connector for Configuration Manager 2012, but the capabilities are simplistic, in Forrester’s view. Virtual desktops
are not new, and Microsoft’s apparent delay in embracing customer-preferred client virtualization platforms (also
including VMware) with more comprehensive management support undermines its efforts to be a trusted
enterprise management tool provider.
•
Some items migrate easily while many will require reconstruction
© Copyright 2015 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
The HP Advantage! (1/3)
•
HP UCMDB and Universal Discovery (UD) is based on a unique architecture that integrates near real time service
discovery with embedded CMDB providing strong integration, reconciliation & synchronization capabilities. HP
Universal Discovery provides automatic mapping and binding together of Business Service and Application
dependencies in real-time along with detailed inventory data with the Industry’s most extensive support for
software, servers, virtualized infrastructure, clusters, networks, storage, middleware such as application servers
and messaging servers, web servers, database load balancers, public and private cloud, mainframes, AS/400, etc.
•
Support for non-Windows PCs is weak in Microsoft SCCM. Configuration Manager lacks patch content for most nonMicrosoft desktop applications. Organizations must patch most non-Microsoft applications through traditional
software distribution or third-party patch management tools
•
In Microsoft SCCM, remote control is frequently supplemented by third-party products, as it lacks advanced
security and auditing capabilities offered by third-party remote control tools
•
In Microsoft SCCM, The accuracy of installed software title quantities and license information displayed in Asset
Intelligence reports, can vary from the actual amounts currently in use because of the complex dependencies
involved in inventorying software license information for software titles in use in enterprise environments
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The HP Advantage! (2/3)
According to the recent Critical Capabilities for Configuration Management Database by Gartner HP UCMDB and HP
UD (Universal Discovery) received Excellent to outstanding scores in all the critical capabilities criteria’s that were
measured in the report such as: Service Modeling and Mapping, Integration/Federation, Reconciliation,
Synchronization and Reporting. The HP products also received Excellent to outstanding scores on all the use cases
that were covered by the report: Service Support Analyst, IT Change Manager, Subject Matter Expert, IT Asset
Manager and CMDB Manager
•
Other vendors embed CMDBs within ITSSM suites, but HP offers a different approach by integrating its CMDB with
its SDM tool (Universal Discovery and Configuration Management) as part of its Configuration System product
portfolio. The inclusion of the CMDB within the tool's dependency discovery capabilities ensures transparency in
service modeling, which leverages data from discovery directly to the CMDB
•
For customers who have purchased UD, HP Live Network delivers access to downloadable content packs,
integration packages, and documentation. This allows clients to discover new types of applications and resources
without having to wait for the next product release. Although HP's Universal CMDB (UCMDB) is not an auditing tool,
it can track comprehensive configuration item and attribute changes, and it can override or prohibit updates
according to policy terms
•
UCMDB offers comprehensive reporting for configuration items and attributes, as well as for scenarios such as
changes, snapshot comparisons, or referral to "gold master" reports or trusted sources. Policy and impact analysis
reporting is also available. HP's Configuration Manager handles free auditing of base configurations and additional
fee-based capabilities for more-robust configuration item analysis. Ask Microsoft about their capabilities
© Copyright 2015 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
•
The HP Advantage! (3/3)
•
•
•
•
•
•
HP UCMDB is a market leading, mature enterprise product in the Service/Application Discovery and Dependency
Mapping market for over a decade with thousands of Global 2000/Enterprise customers
Although HP's Universal CMDB (UCMDB) is not an auditing tool, it can track comprehensive configuration item and
attribute changes, and it can override or prohibit updates according to policy terms
UCMDB offers comprehensive reporting for configuration items and attributes, as well as for scenarios such as
changes, snapshot comparisons, or referral to "gold master" reports or trusted sources
Policy and impact analysis reporting is also available. HP's Configuration Manager handles free auditing of base
configurations and additional fee-based capabilities for more-robust configuration item analysis
HP UCMDB/UD is a foundation for ITOM processes such as Change Config & Release Management, Service Asset and
Configuration Management, Closed-Loop Incident Prevention, Software License Optimization, Data Center
Transformation and Optimization. It supports out-of-the-box integrations and federations with Service
Management, Asset Management, Operations Management, Performance Monitoring, Security and Cloud
Provisioning tools
HP has also dramatically extended the reach of the UCMDB through its “Run-time Service Model” (RtSM) and its
integrated support for its Operations Management Center (OMC) and Business Service Manager (BSM) 9.1. Through
the RtSM and these integrations, dynamic changes to configuration due to virtualized and cloud environments, as
well as performance-related KPIs, can be reconciled across the broader system without having to port data into a
single physical data store
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Thank you
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