Spiceworks - Do you use it?

[Dos_Box]

A quick poll here seeing as Spiceworks are a sponsor and want to get some feedback.
Are you currently using Spiceworks? Have you used it in the past and have you ever heard of Spiceworks? As a company giving such a funky suite away for free they need this kind of reporting, so let's be nice eh?
Oh, and any feedback you have would be welcome too.

[mbird]

I have and it was really useful for audits - i did feel it was a tad too slow (although apparently it has got much faster).
I will have a play wit it in September, when its all died down...

[sonic1485]

Love it! We have used it to solve so many problems and it keeps getting better with every update!

[Soulfish]

I've used it in the past and found it a little slow. Then we started using OCS-NG/GLPI together. However with the move over the last year to a fully virtualised environment I'm looking at trying the latest version of spiceworks again and given it a whirl

[Dos_Box]

Thanks guys, keep 'em coming.

[Domino]

I used to use it - got annoyed with how slow and unwieldy it was.

Have since made the switch to LanSweeper - which has a free and a premium version (main difference being AD integration). Free hardware inventory and software inventory for windows networks

We were so impressed with the free one we bought the premium. $300 for unlimited clients too..

Logs much more than spiceworks per machine, easier to create custom reports, built in reporting already much better - can't recommend it enough.

[john]

Use Spiceworks and its brilliant, a really good product, it has got faster over the recent releases so if your basing your not using it on a release from say 6 months ago, its well worth re-visiting. My annoyance is the Adverts I know it keeps it free but I often find that they can cause it to slow down and not the actual Spiceworks program.

Another annoyance is duplicate PCs Despite many discussions on the Spiceworks forum where I've tried things, removed them etc they still duplicate at times for us so it looks like I've got about 400 PCs instead of around 200 (thus making it say I need more MS Licences as I use the Licence Gadget).

I do love the new HP Warranty Tracking Gadget though that is great and will be much better when I get all my home-brew PCs swapped for big name HP PCs

Keep up the good work guys its really good

[mattx]

Installed it at the start of the year and it's great keeping track of tickets. I don't really use it for the auditing aspect as that can be a little touch and go - although the reporting element [ detecting down access points etc ] is great and has saved me a heap of work.
For something that's free it's fantastic.
I wrote a screen capture [ just in case of error messages etc ] script to work along side it but it would be great if something like that could be built in and the image automatically attached to the created ticket.
I still get the odd staff member not using it and trying to by-pass it but they are now starting to understand my motto - ' If it's not on the system, it won't get done '

[teejay]

Just started using it a couple of weeks ago for the inventory stuff. Seemed to work pretty well, but haven't had time to play with it properly. One of those projects on the list for if I get time over summer.

[AngryTechnician]

I tried it for inventory management but didn't keep it. A few reasons:

• Found the adverts too obtrusive for something I would be using every day. Paying for the non-ad version was not an option due to budget.
• Integrated AD authentication via Kerberos/NTLM was a must for staff, and Spiceworks can't do that. This was a deal-breaker.
• Preferred something based on SQL Server so I could integrate it with other intranet and database functionality I have on SQL Server (for example, my printer cartridge stock control system).

In the end, I went with the free version of Lansweeper, which met my particular requirements, and wrote my own helpdesk software for the staff to use.

[sparkeh]

Yep used it for years and its my most important piece of software.
Use it for hardware and software auditing along with licence compliance, network monitoring with alerts to head off potential problems (disk space, unauthorised software, av out of date etc), helpdesk + support portal, automatic warranty tracking for our Dell and HP equipment (manual for other brands), networking mapping and some stuff I probably forgot.

The speed issue was dealt with a long time ago for me and have no more issues there and the adverts don't bug me at all.
The network map is still a bit of a mystery to me and can't seem to get it to display correctly but then it is a beta feature so things are still being worked on.

In short I can't sing its praises high enough.

[Dos_Box]

Thanks everyone so far. Good feedback.

[nephilim]

Used to use it but it was FAR too slow for what it did. Ended up giving up on it to be honest as it would take 4 days to inventory my network when I could go round with a pen and paper and do it faster.

[tmcd35]

I've tried using it for inventory management and for the most part it's a good starting point. Quering installed software gets some useful licensing answers but shows up too meny drivers and patches to be really useful. We use it primarily as our helpdesk. It has the right level of simplicity/complexity to do the job we require, and I love the fact we can easily attach jobs to hardware to build up a bit of a case history.

Some of the recent features are a real boon - like remote task manager, so I can see and stop/start tasks on remote PC's.

It's turned off at the momement as I'm wondering if it's network scanning is causing problems/slowdowns across our LAN. I need to get in and have a look at the scan settings but haven't had the time - a job for the holidays I think.

[Hecate]

I looked at it but found it too slow and resource hungry