We performed a comparison between Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform and BigFix based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison results: Based on the parameters we compared, Red Hat Ansible comes out ahead of BigFix. While both services provide valuable endpoint protection, BigFix’s ability to integrate with certain applications and its dashboard leave room for improvement.
"The ability to wipe data from and reset devices is one of the most important and valuable features. If a device is reported stolen, we can freeze it or wipe the data from it, preventing data leakage."
"We have found the solution is capable of scaling."
"The ability to (somewhat) manage full Windows 10 computers including EXE-based or MSI-based application deployments using Azure Active Directory as Identity."
"Agile and easy to deploy MDM solution that covers the maximum number of policies. Stable, scalable, and with knowledgeable technical support."
"Its direct integration with all the other products that we have from Microsoft is valuable. We're using the E5 license, and we have a whole wealth of different products available. It just makes it easier to have everything from one provider."
"We are a remote company, and the product helps us manage the global endpoints. It helps us natively manage the endpoints in the cloud from anywhere."
"Intune's most valuable features are the device, compliance, and configuration policies."
"I haven't used other mobile device management solutions, but compared to SCCM, we eliminate a lot of on-premises infrastructure and maintenance by using Intune."
"BigFix has drastically reduced the maintenance window period to patch and reboot servers."
"The use of fast query has been extremely valuable providing insight in real time of the endpoints."
"Patch management, because it very much improved the patch compliance and has the capability to manage Windows and non-Windows clients."
"It is for multiple use cases. A lot of people are looking at it just for security, and that's really endpoint security. The endpoint management part of it in terms of being able to constantly do patching for Windows, Unix, macOS, Cloud, Raspberry, VMware, and all Linux flavors is important, and they are very good at that. They have support for virtually every OS on the market."
"The most valuable point is when you deploy an application, you have to make sure that the application has been deployed to all computers and that is working perfectly. This solution works well at deployments."
"We found the implementation partner to be very supportive in terms of explaining and training the in-house resources and deploying the solution."
"It is pretty secure, and it gives extensive vulnerability features as compared to other applications. It supports multiple languages, and the security checks are pretty high as compared to other tools in the market."
"Prior to BigFix we used Altiris, which was distributed. We had to manage multiple servers, and duplicate the tasks that we did on each server. BigFix tremendously reduced the amount of work that we had to do on each server in a centralized manner. We could minimize the work that we had to do, and we had a lot more control over the tasks and what machines they ran on."
"It is quick to production. It has an API in the back which allows for integrations."
"Since it is in YAML, if I have to explain it to somebody else, they can easily understand it."
"The initial setup is straightforward."
"When you have an enterprise-level number of network devices, the ability to quickly push out security updates to thousands of devices is the biggest thing"
"We can manage all the configuration consistency between all our servers."
"There are no agents by default, so adding a new server is a matter of a couple lines of configuration (on a new server and the configuration master)."
"The biggest thing I liked about Ansible is the check mode so that we can verify, after we've pushed, that the config there is actually what we intended."
"I like Ansible's ease of use. If you have Linux skills, you can create a reusable template for the dependencies and other configurations. I can store the templates in a repository and share them with my customers or other developers. It's a popular solution, so there is a large user base that can share templates."
"There is room for improvement, particularly in terms of compatibility, extending beyond the well-known major brands."
"They should make it easier to order it, however, that's generally true for everything from Microsoft."
"There are a lot of small use cases where we realized that some technical solution was missing in Microsoft in comparison to other products. For example, it lacks something similar to sensing or location-based rules and configurations."
"Having a dedicated configuration server that assists in modifying the configuration service, and creating personalized structures, interfaces, and web services could enhance usability."
"The most important thing is reporting. They should improve their reporting. They should give a free hand to users. In SCCM, I can create my own reports. For example, in SCCM, I can create an inventory report for my PC or for all PCs, but in Intune, we don't have an option to create any report. Microsoft claims that Intune is a successor of SCCM, but SCCM is more powerful than Intune. So, they should develop Intune more and make it equivalent to SCCM. Then, their product will be great in the market."
"The synchronization could be improved."
"The configuration and pricing can be improved."
"I'd like some more reporting so that I don't have to delve into PowerShell and I can pull more of the local device information such as memory, apps installed, etc. It would be nice to be able to see the apps that are present there but might not be managed. For example, if they installed 7Zip, it could report that back via an installed program or feature to see what was currently installed."
"The new EDR (Endpoint Detection and Response) feature, Detect, is new and still needs a few updates."
"To make it a ten they should improve the licensing. Second, if they could have one environment for everything it would be nice. For you to install compliance you need to install the server, and then you add the modules. For you to install inventory you install the server and then you add the modules. It's not easy to do. When I was doing it before I learned it, it was not straight forward."
"BigFix should improve its compatibility with other platforms, such as Linux."
"The deployment has room for improvement and can be more streamlined."
"The stability is generally pretty good. The one thing that we came across is the battle between load on endpoints and load on our servers and relays versus how quickly, effectively and reliably actions can be taken. I'd like to not have to take an action on a system while I'm working with someone and then have to say whether something will happen between five seconds or thirty minutes from that point."
"I would like to see API connectivity, built-in API connectors to the standard toolsets, whether it's for your ServiceNow or your Qualys. More API connectivity to make it easier to integrate to other tools."
"I'd like to see better API integration with BigFix. We have some tremendous API capability inside of CyFIR and the ability to take textual search results, for example, and bring that back into the BigFix dashboard. This would be of extreme interest to us and our customers."
"Maybe the online help could be improved. It'd be nice if you would have a lot more phrases and keywords that you could search for and find answers with the help."
"The solution should add a nice self-service portal."
"We would like support for the post-integration of this product before cloud frameworks because right now their approach is to avoid using on-premises activities and move everything to the cloud."
"It needs better documentation."
"On the Dashboard, when you view a template run, it shows all the output. There is a search filter, but it would be nice to able to select one server in that run and then see all that output from just that one server, instead of having to do the search on that one server and find the results."
"At this time, I do not have anything to improve. What we struggle with is the knowledge base, but that is more about us having to go and find it and learn the platform on our own rather than an actual Ansible issue."
"Because Ansible is establishing SSH sessions to perform tasks, there is a limit on scalability."
"Documentation could be improved. Many times, if I'm looking for something, I have to Google it in a lot of places, then figure out what the best approach will be. There are some best practices documents, but they don't give you the information."
"It is a little slow on the network side because every time you call a module, it's initiating an SSH or an API call to a network device, and it just slows things down."
More Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform Pricing and Cost Advice →
BigFix is ranked 5th in Configuration Management with 91 reviews while Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform is ranked 1st in Configuration Management with 62 reviews. BigFix is rated 8.6, while Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform is rated 8.6. The top reviewer of BigFix writes "Very stable and easy to deploy with excellent patch compliance". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform writes "Makes it easy to build playbooks and saves time and resources". BigFix is most compared with Microsoft Configuration Manager, Microsoft Windows Server Update Services, Tanium, ManageEngine Patch Manager Plus and Red Hat Satellite, whereas Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform is most compared with Red Hat Satellite, Microsoft Configuration Manager, VMware Aria Automation, Microsoft Azure DevOps and Control-M. See our BigFix vs. Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform report.
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