IDERA ER/Studio Reviews, Competitors and Pricing

it_user92238

Director at a tech services company with 51-200 employees

Mar 5, 2014

Great product however their delivery & licensing mechanisms are abysmal

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.

it_user341061

Business Intelligence Analyst DBA at a government with 1,001-5,000 employees

Nov 16, 2015

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I think ER/Studio Data Architect is priced high, but it comes with user-friendly features.

What is most valuable?

Being able to to perform reverse engineering is valuable to us.

How has it helped my organization?

I used the tool for data modeling, so I cannot say much.

What needs improvement?

It did everything that I needed, and I didn't think about enhancements while using the product.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've used it for six months.

What was my experience with deployment of the solution?

No issues encountered.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

No issues encountered.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

No issues encountered.

How are customer service and technical support?

Customer Service:

9/10.

Technical Support:

9/10.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

I did use different solutions that were available with the companies I worked for. I evaluated a couple of modeling tools, as I personally wanted to purchase a product.

How was the initial setup?

Initial set-up is straightforward.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

I think ER/Studio Data Architect is priced high, but it comes with user-friendly features.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

I personally compared it with SAP PowerDesigner when I started using ER/Studio Data Architect, and I think they both are equally good tools.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.

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it_user91548

Infrastructure Expert at a tech services company with 1,001-5,000 employees

Aug 26, 2015

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It's our primary means of publishing data models, but it needs to use more modern standard dialogs.

Valuable Features

Flexible and complete compare/merge facility
Exposure of its automation object model which allows custom programming outside of the product

Improvements to My Organization

It has been our primary means of publishing data models for years. It also houses our product data dictionary, and generates all the DDLs for database modifications.

Room for Improvement

Easier licensing
It would be nice if we could use more modern standard dialogs, such as file selection

Use of Solution

I've used it for 10 years.

Deployment Issues

It is not easy to deploy in VDI, but that is a VDI problem.

Customer Service and Technical Support

Good, although they don’t always contact you with a solution to problems if they think it’s your problem.

Initial Setup

Setup was not complex for an ordinary desktop installation. Server installation, however, is a good deal more complex. Their portal solution is more complex still.

Implementation Team

It was done in-house.

Pricing, Setup Cost and Licensing

It is expensive! Licensing requires a subscription to their support site.

Other Advice

It is a very robust, industrial strength data modeling product, intended Ideally for very large development projects where a good ROI can be obtained.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.

it_user91548

Infrastructure Expert at a tech services company with 1,001-5,000 employees

Feb 23, 2014

Huge advantage is that it gives you full access to its automation model.

What has proven to be a HUGE advantage of ER/Studio that was not really evaluated at the time we chose it is that it gives you full access to its automation model. This allows it to be controlled through code (VBA) in programs like MS Access. One reason this is helpful is that we work with huge models of around 1500 entities, 1500 tables, and 25,000 attributes and columns. We often find ourselves needing to make mass updates, and this is easily done with code in a tiny fraction of the time needed to do it manually. Another use is we can extract metadata in code and load it directly to an Oracle database (using MS Access) to publish for developers on the other side of the planet.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.

it_user275646

Senior Consultant with 51-200 employees

Jul 26, 2015

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You can compare your models against the database, but the repository can be slow with big data sets.

What is most valuable?

Ease of use
It looks good enough
Ability to create HTML reports
Ability to compare the model against the database

What needs improvement?

Repository causes continuous problems, as it's slow and sometimes crashes.
Integration with Active Directory does not function perfectly.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've used it for five years.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

If you use repository, it can get slow with big data models.

How are customer service and technical support?

I have received answers to issues within a week from a report.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

Nope, and I hear that this is the best data modelling tool for data warehouse scenarios.

How was the initial setup?

It's straightforward without the repository.

What about the implementation team?

I did everything, from the installation to using it.

Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: We are partners with Embarcadero.

Database9ac8

Database Administrator at a healthcare company with 1,001-5,000 employees

Aug 9, 2018

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Our developers can now see the relationships

Pros and Cons

"The reverse engineering is the most important feature."

"When building the relationships there should be a little more flexibility."

What is our primary use case?

Data modeling.

How has it helped my organization?

The developers can see the relationships now.

What is most valuable?

The reverse engineering is the most important feature. The relationships are also important.

What needs improvement?

When building the relationships there should be a little more flexibility.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

I have not encountered any issues with stability.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

I have not encountered any issues with scalability.

How are customer service and technical support?

Tech support is pretty good. They resolve issues right away, I usually don't have to wait too long.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

I used a little bit of SQL Server. It has a data modeling tool. I also used some ERwin before that, a couple years ago.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup was pretty easy.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

I feel the product's pricing is a good value.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

I looked at ERwin.

Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor.

DBA8d65

DBA at a consultancy with 501-1,000 employees

Sep 16, 2018

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Enables us to audit production, to make sure it matches what we have designed

Pros and Cons

"The most valuable features are... those that enable me to represent the database to the development community and the business users."

"It would be helpful if they could create a generic JSON database type, as a target database, rather than a specific one like Mongo."

What is our primary use case?

We use it for data modeling. It is the way we communicate requirements, both for gathering and presenting them. We also use it for putting together our metadata and publishing it.

How has it helped my organization?

There are a lot of different ways we use the tool. One of the ways is that we do auditing of what's been billed to production to make sure it matches what we have designed. And it has also improved things in that we have design requirements for the DBA.

Because of all the various things we use it for, it has a high value within the organization.

What is most valuable?

The most valuable features are the various features for different databases, but mainly those that enable me to represent the database to the development community and the business users.

What needs improvement?

It would be helpful if they could create a generic JSON database type, as a target database, rather than a specific one like Mongo.

Also, Business Objects doesn't seem to be very stable at the moment, so we've stopped using that.

For how long have I used the solution?

More than five years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

We did not encounter stability issues in the past but lately, since they're undergoing the rewrite of their internal system, there is some stuff creeping in. We've had some stability issues in the last six months.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

We haven't had any scalability issues.

How are customer service and technical support?

Tech support hasn't been as good lately as it was in the past. It is down to "average."

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

Prior to using ER/Studio, there was ERwin in-house, but their tech support was horrible, their product was not very good. This was back in the early 2000s, so we switched over because ER/Studio was more flexible. It was able to reverse-engineer a database in under a minute, versus ERwin, which was taking over an hour. That performance was a big issue. Also, early on, and other than in the last six months, Idera's tech support was excellent.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

I don't know enough about what the pricing is for other choices out there. I've only really worked on this one tool.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We looked at PowerDesigner, Oracle's native designer, and ERwin. We only did those three, four including ER/Studio. And this tool was, by far, at the time, the better one. Since that time, and now that we have more people in-house, ERwin, evidently, now has more features. I can't confirm or deny that, I don't know because I have never used ERwin. But, at the time, back in 2004, there was a big difference.

What other advice do I have?

I really like ER/Studio personally, so for me, it's a nine out of 10. I like it because it doesn't let you make stupid mistakes - and it's easy to make a stupid mistake. The tool can save you a lot of trouble. The only other tool I used before this was Oracle Designer, back in the 90s. This is way better than that. I haven't used anything else, so I'm a loyal customer.