SpiceWorks

J

jen4950

[H]F Junkie
Joined
Apr 25, 2001
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Does anyone have any experience with SpiceWorks?

I'm considering implementing it at work per my consultant's recommendation- looking for some feedback or competing products.
 
Yes I've tried it several times over a few years....hoping that newer releases would get better, but I always find it very slow, sluggish, incomplete in its scans and reporting. Plus it comes with adware...affiliate links that get in your face to purchase IT products.

A little over a year ago I came across LANSweeper.
www.lansweeper.com
A tad more involved to setup than Spiceworks...you'll need to have IIS installed, plus .NET Frame, and you'll need to deploy a script. However...easy instructions to do so.

...and it works great. Incredibly detailed reporting....it's unbelievable how much info you can get from it.
Works well
No adware..even in the free version. There are some additional advanced features that you can opt to pay for...but it doesn't nag you.

Lansweeper blows the doors off of Spiceworks.
 
We use it where I work for a basic help desk ticketing system. Since I've got to spend money on more important things I just need something that's free and generally works, and Spiceworks fits the bill.

I will agree with YeOlde however that it is somewhat slow, the ads suck, and if you're looking to do inventory with it- it is inaccurate.
 
I use Spiceworks daily and have been for the past four years (since beta) and don't know if I could work without it.

That said, there really isn't anything not useful about Spiceworks. It's a small download, small footprint, agent-less, easy to use, well developed, and much more. The ads are not really that obtrusive, only using a small portion of the window on the sides, where the meat of the app is unobscured in the center. Even still, the ads are relevant and useful sometimes, and you get used to them and are able to ignore them after a while.
It is constantly being developed and improved, and most features implemented are user-driven. Doesn't do something you need/want? Look for a plug-in or submit a feature request. As far as the speed, the performance is not bad at all and always being improved. The latest beta is clocking in at a 30% and greater performance improvement.

Speaking about the community; that is the keystone of the whole works. The information contained in the community and its members is invaluable. Questions will get a response within minutes and the IT pros answering will always stick with the issue until a solution is found. And it's not only for Spiceworks issues, ANY IT related (and some non-IT) topic is welcome and encouraged. With over 1,000,000 users (20% SMB Worldwide) someone is there who can help.

The second-greatest thing about Spiceworks is the helpdesk. A fully-functional, automated ticketing system. There are some features which are not available but in development for it, like being a tiered system, queues, etc. but many have found easy workarounds for now that they'd be happy to share (or may have already in the how-to's). For me though, I'm a one-man operation so not having multiple levels of support here isn't a problem.

No challenges to implement it. Just download it, install, and go. It does a good job of walking you through the initial steps to get it going, plus there are many tutorials and help videos available to get things started. Again, the community is always there to help. Really the biggest hurdle is configuring all your devices to send the data to Spiceworks, and that isn't a huge deal either. A lot of it can be done through scripting. But still, all that is done once and you're set.

It's true there are some things to configure and it will sometimes have difficulty identifying or modifying a device, but with a little digging and some help from the community the issue can usually be solved pretty quickly. Speaking of problems, if there are any major ones that you can’t get solved, the support staff is like no other. An example.

There are definitely things that the program won't do (yet) but as I mentioned, it's constantly being developed and new features are added regularly. It's up to version 4.7 now (in only 4 years) and version 5.0 is in beta now and slated for release late this year. For what it can't do now (e.g. monitor event logs for real-time events) a third-party program (e.g. Splunk, Nagios) can fill in the gap and be tied in with Spiceworks to raise an alert.

I could really go on and on about Spiceworks, but it's more something to dive in to and use.

If you want to check it out again, you can download it here.

FYI - I don't work for Spiceworks, I'm just an average user who lives by Spiceworks every day.
 
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I'm going to play with it again when 5.0 is out.

http://view.news.spiceworks.com/?j=...c1573&jb=ffcf14&ju=fe321671726d077e771472&r=0

* Config Management automatically backs up the configuration of your network devices and lets you compare and restore (via TFTP) when changes occur
* A More Detailed Network Map has broader SNMP device support and collects deeper end-point device (i.e. desktop & networking) details
* Microsoft Hyper-V Support means you can manage more virtualized machines in your inventory
* People View associates your users with their assets and lets you perform basic support and troubleshooting tasks like password reset & unlock
* Purchase Tracking lets you track, calculate & report on costs as well as purchases for your environment and users

...and so much more (oh, and did we mention it's w-aaa-y faster?)!
Click to expand...
 
I wouldn't say a spammer, not sure where you get that idea from. I'm just a user who is dedicated to the product and benefits everyday from it.

But this thread is about Spiceworks the product and not my participation in the forums or trying to spread its use across SMBs.

I did copy much of my post from TechSoup but only because it describes the software the best and touts it's benefits to small IT shops.
 
Does anyone know of a product that is able to determine software usage? Like how many of these dickbag teachers are using this 30k dollar program they begged us to buy?
 
benhar said:
I wouldn't say a spammer, not sure where you get that idea from. I'm just a user who is dedicated to the product and benefits everyday from it.
Click to expand...

God what is with the shills all over this forum lately? You do realize we're not idiots and can tell you've been a forum member for a day right?

Back on topic: Lansweeper is tons better than SpiceWorks. I've used SpiceWorks several times for places to do basic inventory and help desk type junk. It's slow and the inventory half works.
 
Captain Colonoscopy said:
God what is with the shills all over this forum lately? You do realize we're not idiots and can tell you've been a forum member for a day right?

Back on topic: Lansweeper is tons better than SpiceWorks. I've used SpiceWorks several times for places to do basic inventory and help desk type junk. It's slow and the inventory half works.
Click to expand...

I appologize for trying to contribute to the forum and answer a question that was asked. I didn't assume you were an idiot at first. I don't worry about your opinion of Spiceworks anyway, arrogant elitists like you wouldn't be welcome in the community anyway.

Back on topic: I would follow your consultants advice and give Spiceworks a try. You have nothing to lose since it's totally free!
 
Ok, I could have gotten past the slowness of spiceworks ( and have several times in the past ), but the astroturfing makes me want to go uninstall it everywhere I've put it in place.

Lansweeper, stonecat? I think I'll go take a look.
 
XOR != OR said:
Lansweeper, stonecat? I think I'll go take a look.
Click to expand...

Give it a shot...takes about an hour to setup, come back the next day and reap it's detailed reporting...it excels in workstation inventory...WICKED detailed reports of each workstation, all software, users, when it joined the network, detailed hardware specs (make/model/etc)
 
benhar said:
arrogant elitists like you wouldn't be welcome in the community anyway.
Click to expand...

Really? You've been here for a day? Go collect your pay check from Spiceworks and spam up their boards with your "love" of spice works..

Back on Topic. I will also side with these guys who have tried spiceworks. It does help desk pretty decently, but the lan scanning really blows. only about half of the 200+ pcs I had at the clients ever showed up. We finally just shut off the network scanning because it sucked.

I will give benhar one thing.. It is free, but keep in mind you pay for what you get....
 
calvinj said:
I will give benhar one thing.. It is free, but keep in mind you pay for what you get....
Click to expand...

THat's my concern. I don't really mind paying for something if it adds value.

We use SCCM for imaging, anyone have any experience with SCOM? From what I gather it's more for datacenter management, but might fit the bill.
 
So being ever bored here at work i installed SpiceWorks. Interesting stuff. Seems a little clunky but the install was nice and easy, and this early in the morning easy = good choice.
 
jen4950 said:
THat's my concern. I don't really mind paying for something if it adds value.

We use SCCM for imaging, anyone have any experience with SCOM? From what I gather it's more for datacenter management, but might fit the bill.
Click to expand...

I think your right SCOM is more for DC management. I'm sure you could use it to get everything at a PC level, but I would imagine at a nice cost.

If your looking for something cost effective maybe consider something like TrackIT!. I've heard some good things about it.
 
I get to use spiceworks where I work. It was in place before my arrival.
It is slow, painfully slow. I would not mind if it was accurate. It is not.
Benhar is right, most of the people here in this forum would not be welcomed in the spiceworks forum. The spiceworks forum members expect you to take what they give you and like it, even if it does not work or is nothing but a link to some other product which they want you to pay an arm and a leg for.
You get what you pay for, it is free. Can be useful but not 100% accurate and quite slow. Not a bad program for free. Try it out, then remove if neccesary.
 
Snufykat said:
Not a bad program for free. Try it out, then remove if neccesary.
Click to expand...

Sometimes the "you get what you pay for..../...it's free" doesn't work.
Examples...
www.lansweeper.com if you want a great network inventory program that works (it kicks the snot out of Spiceworks in this area) , that's ad free, and does things well.
www.untangle.com or www.astaro.com or heck..lets list many of the other *nix distros out there
 
I'm sorry, but after already having a shill in the thread, having another 4 day account in the thread defending him reaks of astroturfing.

One of my projects this morning is to remove spiceworks from the various places I have it installed ( i do contract work, many smb sites ), and get them set up on something else. Primarily due to this thread. I was already uneasy with the ads in the product, but after seeing this kind of scummy behavior I have lost faith in the company behind spiceworks.
 
B-C said:
Defending partially....

Also not knocking, you guys also have a great community as well!

I think its reasonable to state that SW is a decent product...for Free... LS for 299 is a pretty darn different animal for sure! But that price starts creeping up as well for consultants and multi-site business'...
Click to expand...

Lansweeper does have a free version, FYI.
 
B-C said:
LANSweeper.. haven't tried but there are some compelling reasons to... speed and simplicity... (still not running on linux that is the downfall of both)
Click to expand...

But Spiceworks is the slow pokey sluggish product, LANSweeper runs circles around it..I've run them both..quite a few times.

And LANSweeper is also FREE....it's additional add-ons which you can pay for, if you wish to have those additional features. But at least, unlike Spiceworks, LANSweeper doesn't nag you to death to upgrade and support itself and it's adware sponsers.
 
XOR != OR said:
I'm sorry, but after already having a shill in the thread, having another 4 day account in the thread defending him reaks of astroturfing.
Click to expand...

Yup...I'd like to see the status of the IP address of those accounts...bet it's the same. ;)
 
nope not the same IP....

Removed (again by myself)
 
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calvinj said:
I think your right SCOM is more for DC management. I'm sure you could use it to get everything at a PC level, but I would imagine at a nice cost.

If your looking for something cost effective maybe consider something like TrackIT!. I've heard some good things about it.
Click to expand...

SCOM is not a good fit for small/mid-sized businesses, which is why I suggested SCE earlier in this thread ;)
 
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