|
Maneki Neko posted:Out of curiosity, anyone spent much time looking at Microsoft Intune as an RMM type tool? The pricing looks high (not sure what the discount breaks look like beyond 250 seats) compared to the other options we looked it, shame you can't just spla the goddamn thing, but Microsoft seems hell bent on screwing over MSPs on their cloud stuff I didn't spend much time, but I did spend *some* time. it's expensive, and a clusterfuck - avoid at all costs was my kneejerk reaction a year or so ago. I also trialed exchange online protection or whatever their forefront replacement is, and it was unholy dumb. I couldn't even cancel my account without jumping through 129301 hoops, and setting up my test domain was unintuitive and clunky as hell.
|
#
?
Apr 29, 2014 06:08
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 24, 2024 06:50 |
|
|
Stugazi posted:Dell's affordable MD3xxx series iSCSI SAN can now mix and match storage pools (SSD and 10k) so we are looking at that as an option. I know this is a day late and a dollar short, but I'd be interested to see the quote comparison - PM me if you're willing to share.
|
|
#
?
Apr 30, 2014 23:29
|
|
|
Richard Noggin posted:I know this is a day late and a dollar short, but I'd be interested to see the quote comparison - PM me if you're willing to share. You'll see the VNXe be about 3-5k more than a MD3xxxx, then support/installation tack on about 10k
|
|
#
?
May 1, 2014 00:37
|
|
|
See that's what I don't believe. Having sold both (we're a Dell and EMC partner), the numbers don't make sense.
|
|
#
?
May 1, 2014 13:07
|
|
|
Richard Noggin posted:See that's what I don't believe. Having sold both (we're a Dell and EMC partner), the numbers don't make sense. What's your partner level and are you selling to state/local gov?
|
|
#
?
May 1, 2014 14:38
|
|
|
Not really sure, and yes - but not under contracts.
|
|
#
?
May 1, 2014 14:45
|
|
|
For fun, I just priced out a md3220i and a VNXe3150. I kept apples and apples wherever possible - 300GB 10K SAS disks (24 for the Dell, 25 for the EMC - both their max). The EMC came out $600 above, yet has a lot more features (block, file and CIFS/SMB vs just block for the md, 8GB RAM in each controller vs 4, the ability to add I/O modules, a much better interface - the list goes on and on).
|
|
#
?
May 1, 2014 15:03
|
|
|
We sold a VNXE and an MD3XXX in the past six months. Both configured with headroom available. Dell was ~$13k and EMC was ~$25k. They weren't apples to apples but pretty close. The Dell had a drive fail on day one. Learned about the Intel NUC computer from the HTPC thread. We definitely don't want to get into box building but for <$500 client cost we can deliver a SSD, i3, 8GB box with low energy and footprint to clients. We are stress testing a box right now with the goal that a fast and inexpensive machine is better than what we get from Dell. Same config from Dell is 1.5-2x the price. Stugazi fucked around with this message at 00:03 on May 2, 2014 |
|
#
?
May 2, 2014 00:00
|
|
|
I've said it before, possibly in this thread - if Dell did an OptiPlex branded version of the current-gen i3 NUC with a 240GB SSD, 8GB RAM and an Intel Wi-Fi / Bluetooth card with an internal PSU (Mac Mini style) I wouldn't be able to hand them money quick enough. All the traditional enterprise PC people seem to want to continue down the path of cases large enough to sit a monitor on, optical drive, poo poo slow hard drive.
|
|
#
?
May 2, 2014 00:08
|
|
|
Richard Noggin posted:For fun, I just priced out a md3220i and a VNXe3150. I kept apples and apples wherever possible - 300GB 10K SAS disks (24 for the Dell, 25 for the EMC - both their max). The EMC came out $600 above, yet has a lot more features (block, file and CIFS/SMB vs just block for the md, 8GB RAM in each controller vs 4, the ability to add I/O modules, a much better interface - the list goes on and on). If you're selling state/local gov most all the storage vendors will meet X quota.
|
|
#
?
May 2, 2014 00:21
|
|
|
Stugazi posted:... . FWIW I have a dozen or so of these deployed and haven't had a single issue, I really like them.
|
|
#
?
May 2, 2014 00:42
|
|
|
NUC chat: How are you handling licensing? Did you go SPLA or they buying retail, vlk etc? The test client we have in mind is a non profit so they can buy windows and office for $20.
|
|
#
?
May 2, 2014 02:44
|
|
|
Stugazi posted:NUC chat: I'm curious about this as well. I'd come across the NUC concept and really liked it, but licensing (and warranty) were the first huge issues that jumped into my head as far as office deployments. I agree about the optiplex sentiment - give me a dell branded $~500 box, and I could sell so many of those it'd make my head spin.
|
|
#
?
May 2, 2014 06:25
|
|
|
You'd just need to be buying OEM licensing for each box. If you are building the boxes and selling them onto your own customers then you should be at the point where you are purchasing from distributors. The VL is only an upgrade, so you need a Pro edition of Windows licensed already. In education I think you can get away with a Home edition.
|
|
#
?
May 2, 2014 21:30
|
|
|
Hooray, so I managed to get a parallel discussion going on about looking at PSA to accompany our RMM search. At a glance, it looks like Autotask, Connectwise and Tigerpaw are all pretty well supported by the various RMM vendors out there. From a personal experience level, are there any clear leaders between those 3? Autotask looks potentially the slickest, but not sure if that's just a larger marketing budget than the other two.  On the RMM side we're looking at n-able, Kaseya and Labtech. I need to talk more to the Continuum people, but is there a lot of value in Continuum if we 100% don't want any kind of managed/outsourced NOC/helpdesk stuff? On yet another side note, are there good MSP forums out there that aren't vendor specific? Maneki Neko fucked around with this message at 23:48 on May 2, 2014 |
|
#
?
May 2, 2014 23:32
|
|
|
Maneki Neko posted:Hooray, so I managed to get a parallel discussion going on about looking at PSA to accompany our RMM search. Look back earlier in the thread for my comments on autotask. We use autotask and n-able, so ask any questions you'd like about those.
|
|
#
?
May 3, 2014 00:08
|
|
|
We are a medium sized msp and we went with n able and connectwise. Autotask is better in some regards but I feel like we have the best combination of tools. Also our sql guy scrapes n able passive scan, symantec cloud reports, and some wmi scripts from the DCs for an internal combined inventory website. Its pretty handy to search for printer shares, warranty expiration, and installed versions of software.
|
|
#
?
May 6, 2014 08:07
|
|
|
We've got our deeper dive sessions with nable, kaseya and labtech over the next week, but I'll be sure to bug folks with any question. Anyone using storagecraft as a backup solution? I noticed that all 3 of those RMMs seem to hook into it, so it's either decent, or really cheap/easy to resell.
|
|
#
?
May 7, 2014 20:39
|
|
|
bimmian posted:Look back earlier in the thread for my comments on autotask. We use autotask and n-able, so ask any questions you'd like about those. lampey posted:We are a medium sized msp and we went with n able and connectwise. Autotask is better in some regards but I feel like we have the best combination of tools. Also our sql guy scrapes n able passive scan, symantec cloud reports, and some wmi scripts from the DCs for an internal combined inventory website. Its pretty handy to search for printer shares, warranty expiration, and installed versions of software. SO out of curiosity, what ended up making you go with n-able? Either we got some real bad sales guys or something, but so far the group consensus has basically been "meh" for n-able, and everyone seems to like Labtech and Kaseya a lot more so far based on what we've seen. Labtech looks janky as hell, but people were impressed with the functionality of the tool a lot more than what we've gotten from n-able so far. Kaseya looks nice, but their sales people still haven't gotten back to me with pricing yet (I'm expecting it to be high).
|
|
#
?
May 14, 2014 05:03
|
|
|
Maneki Neko posted:SO out of curiosity, what ended up making you go with n-able? Either we got some real bad sales guys or something, but so far the group consensus has basically been "meh" for n-able, and everyone seems to like Labtech and Kaseya a lot more so far based on what we've seen. N-able uses the opposite approach of labtech, showing relatively little, but highly relevant detail, focusing heavily on automation. The Automation Manager basically sold it for me, it is a really really powerful tool. While the lack of directly visible data can make some of the little things a bit more cumbersome as you need to run a script or dig in a bit deeper to get some data, I find that pretty rare. Once you get a customer setup and automation policies in place then the vast majority of the time spent in n-able for that customer is either for a) remote connectivity, or b) patch management. With automation manager and self-healing policies, you can be pretty hands-off. One thing to consider with n-able is its' remote connectivity options. It uses NTR Global DirectConnect. It's a 3rd party cloud-based solution, and while it enables some great functionality, it can be problematic at times, though it has gotten much more stable in the last year and I have no complaints at this point. Essentially it creates a private tunnel between your computer and the endpoint, whether that be a pc, server, printer, network device etc. It uses their servers for that relay though, so if they have issues, you have issues. Clicking one button and getting to the web config for a printer, or putty to a network device without external ssh access, directconnect or rdp(also with private tunnel) to a pc/server... it's nice. Recently implemented integration for teamviewer as well. If you haven't had a good demo of automation manager, I would advise you to do so before you make a decision. If you have people on your team that would take advantage of it, it can extremely powerful and do wonders for your efficiency. Also, we got pricing so ridiculous we had to sign an NDA. You can push them pretty hard if you are buying a decent quantity of licenses. To note, we haven't had any pcs or servers - literally zero - have issues with the n-able agent. Considering it is .net, that is pretty good imo. We also host it ourselves. (These are my thoughts on labtech as of over a year ago, I don't know what has changed) Labtech was very unpolished compared to other products, especially n-able. It gives you so much information, way more than you'll ever need or really care to see. OTOH that can also make it look pretty awesome while evaluating, but as you get into the management and automation aspects it becomes quite underwhelming in functionality and frustrating in usability. It looks like it is 10 years old or more, and some of the usability feels that way too. . I can't really speak to keseya, I didn't spend much time on it and I was pretty sold on n-able at that point. It is expensive though.
|
|
#
?
May 14, 2014 13:40
|
|
|
What do you guys do for smaller clients who may not need a server? My company is trying to figure out an initiative to get servers out of smaller (5-10 user) companies who can use mostly hosted applications (Office 365, Quickbooks Online, etc.) We use LabTech, and could try to script as much as possible. I personally hate the idea. Things we're trying to suss out include: -User Management: Local user accounts on each PC sound like a mess. Alternatively, Azure is an option, depending on how well we can integrate it with other services. -Printer Management: I literally have almost no experience with workgroups, but I have to figure printers have some sort of workgroup manageability. If not workgroups, then we have to find a way to map each computer to each printer by creating IP ports. -File Storage: We're a Dropbox for Business reseller, and if we could integrate this with Azure, that'd be awesome -DNS/DHCP: Probably just handed off to the SonicWALLs we deploy -Wireless Authentication: Our standard now is SonicPoints through SonicWALLs authenticating with RADIUS to the DCs. Obviously, that would be gone. -Scanning: Would either need to rely on scan to e-mail for everything (which I loving loathe) or set up scan paths for each user to their PC This all seems very low-end IT and not a way I want to go, but for some reason, we want to keep these clients around. Anyone else have any experience in this regard?
|
|
#
?
May 14, 2014 22:49
|
|
|
Two Server 2012 R2 DCs in Azure in a Virtual Network, connected back to the main site over a VPN. These can do DHCP (via DHCP relay) and DNS. That gives you a 'real' AD that you can use for Office 365, Dropbox, RADIUS etc. Keep a NAS on site for local file storage, scan destinations etc - again this will be AD bound. Print directly to each printer using the printer hostname. Or look to something like Bonjour so it literally adds itself.
|
|
#
?
May 14, 2014 23:29
|
|
|
Caged posted:Two Server 2012 R2 DCs in Azure in a Virtual Network, connected back to the main site over a VPN. These can do DHCP (via DHCP relay) and DNS. That gives you a 'real' AD that you can use for Office 365, Dropbox, RADIUS etc. Keep a NAS on site for local file storage, scan destinations etc - again this will be AD bound. You're saying use the two DCs across all my clients?
|
|
#
?
May 15, 2014 00:02
|
|
|
Jesus Stick posted:You're saying use the two DCs across all my clients? there are a few different ways going about domain's to customers who can't afford it. The real problem is the headache and time used during a customer leaving. Unless you're willing to spend the time and money on the off boarding it isn't always fruitful. how small are we talking?
|
|
#
?
May 15, 2014 00:21
|
|
|
Jesus Stick posted:You're saying use the two DCs across all my clients? No, sorry. That was per-client. If they can't afford the ongoing costs for 2 tiny Azure VMs and the VPN then they are probably beyond help and you'll have to resign yourself to using the email hosting platform as the directory and only buying in services that can hook into it.
|
|
#
?
May 15, 2014 00:43
|
|
|
My 2 cents from a business perspective, I've seen this (along with scope creep) happen to two msps and it really doesn't end well. Breaking from your mold to accommodate clients that aren't a good fit is a slippery slope and is something to avoid if at all possible, unless that is your business model I suppose. Taking into account the relatively small amount of revenue you do generally get from them, the added time and effort to maintain one-off environments adds up and snowballs as you add more. You lose organization and efficiency. That being said, if you can standardize on, for example, the azure + VPN setup Caged outlined above and is a good solution, you could make it into an actual service offering for small clients like that and support it as such. Two standard environments are much more manageable than 1 standard and 10 unique ones. E: As little pricey compared to other options, but worth it imo- get a synology NAS in that type of setup. It has apps that handle all the LAN services you'd need and they are very easy to manage. bimmian fucked around with this message at 03:39 on May 15, 2014 |
|
#
?
May 15, 2014 03:34
|
|
|
Any client under 10 employees (ideally 20) is a waste of your time. Also, for any client, if you are constantly looking to cut costs to match unrealistic expectations step back and evaluate the quality of that revenue. Dump them and get better clients. Might be painful to lose the revenue but focusing on more profitable gigs will make you more money and cause less stress long term. A 5-10 seat client is just as much work as a 20 seat client but a 20 seat client will pay 2-4x more.
|
|
#
?
May 15, 2014 07:24
|
|
|
To add to focusing on revenue, it is a lot easier to standardise when you focus on a niche. Cloud everything is a trend now, it saves money for most smaller businesses to have everything possible hosted offsite. If you can focus on supporting small clients better than your larger competitors by cutting out servers you save youself a lot of time. Also you can get referalls from larger msps. Where I work we don't do ecommerce, getting 5 9s means no quarterly downtime for patches. We don't do software dev, they know just enough to break everything. One thing I wish we did better is lync integration with a hosted phone system and cell phones.
|
|
#
?
May 15, 2014 08:02
|
|
|
bimmian posted:Words This is basically my stance, and the position I was taking in the kickoff meeting for this initiative. If we HAVE to figure out a way to cut IT costs for small clients, my idea is this: HP MicroServer Windows Server Essentials 2012 Between the above, which would go for roughly $2000, and Office 365, Dropbox for Business, we can cut a TON of cost for our clients while still being able to provide domain services. If we can use the DC to integrate all services into using the one account, clients are going to loving love it. I also think that we don't even sell the hardware to the client, but provide it as a service and sell it to the them if they ever want to leave. I agree that if we try to use LabTech to customize server/domain-less environments, it will end up costing us in the long run. If we can get something simple like my solution in, these clients would essentially just be easy revenue because they already have very few tickets and a high effective bill rate.
|
|
#
?
May 15, 2014 19:20
|
|
|
Jesus Stick posted:
Ha I was actually about to suggest this, the micro server or Dells T20's are perfect for this. I doubt a <12 person company is going to swallow a 2000 dollar deal right off the bat, it may be more beneficial to you and your company to do leasing of domain services to companies. E.G. Lease for 12/months, show the value in a domain then present a full implementation cost of XXXX. Say if you do 75 a month+O365 for "hosted services", you're getting a base of 900/yr + time saved on your the company. I assume you have a minimum bill time, but you can also show the company the value in the time reduction it takes with a leased server. Not only that but a central backup location is a life saver.
|
|
#
?
May 15, 2014 19:34
|
|
|
Stugazi posted:Any client under 10 employees (ideally 20) is a waste of your time. Also, for any client, if you are constantly looking to cut costs to match unrealistic expectations step back and evaluate the quality of that revenue. these are very true words. I've dropped several clients this year that have been taking up a disproportionate amount of resources to the amount of revenue they bring in. My basic rule is, hey, if you appreciate what I'm doing for you and it's costing us a bit of effort, no problem. I've had a few companies balk at recommendations like 'you need to replace these aging XP machines that fail every month now, today, right now', and at that point I have pretty much just shown them the door. I did one today by this doctor's office who had been a good client for years - but the main doctor just loved to play "IT Guy" on the weekend, rather than just have poo poo fixed. He declined to sign a managed service agreement - strike one. He had someone else work on his network without letting me know, causing major problems down the line (which he paid for in having me sort them out properly) - strike two. Strike three, he called me up today asking if I could give him any tips on removing a virus from his system - which by the way was super urgent and keeping him from seeing patients - but he didn't want to pay a service charge (which he wouldn't have had to pay anyways, if he had signed a MSP agreement and I was willing to get on remotely) because if I could just "give him tips on how to remove the stuxnet.conficker.A.F.Windows.32.Popup.FakeAV.Trojan.NSA virus from the safe mode desktop", he could totally take care of it on his own.  I've never felt good about dropping folks, but that one was about 10 straws too many. jesus christ it was so hard to be polite.
mindphlux fucked around with this message at 03:55 on May 16, 2014 |
|
#
?
May 16, 2014 03:53
|
|
|
I own/run a MSP and I will tell you with absolute certainty that you will lose piles of money trying to chase pennies with cheap clients.
|
|
#
?
May 21, 2014 17:07
|
|
|
The poster above me speaks the truth. Unfortunately, I think a lot of business owners need to feel the pain for themselves (with this, and other challenges).
|
|
#
?
May 22, 2014 23:43
|
|
|
What does everyone use for password management? Ours are a bit scattered so I'm looking into solutions, I've used Keepass prior and use lastpass personally. Anyone use lastpass enterprise?
|
|
#
?
Jun 6, 2014 14:49
|
|
|
We implemented Secretserver, it's been decent, the auditing on it is invaluable when employees leave.
|
|
#
?
Jun 6, 2014 15:40
|
|
|
sanchez posted:We implemented Secretserver, it's been decent, the auditing on it is invaluable when employees leave. Yeah, secretserver has been the universally "least bad" option the last 2-3 places I've worked.
|
|
#
?
Jun 6, 2014 16:20
|
|
|
Looks nice, rather pricey though considering there are a lot of features I doubt we'd use. We could make use of the API, but I don't want to know what Enterprise Plus costs. 
|
|
#
?
Jun 6, 2014 16:48
|
|
|
For a deal that size I'd try to hustle their sales a bit, I'm sure you can get a discount. They were willing to work with us.
|
|
#
?
Jun 6, 2014 20:10
|
|
|
sanchez posted:For a deal that size I'd try to hustle their sales a bit, I'm sure you can get a discount. They were willing to work with us. Yea I'm sure, we don't buy anything retail. I'll test it next week and see.
|
|
#
?
Jun 6, 2014 22:04
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 24, 2024 06:50 |
|
|
We use lastpass enterprise. I was a roboform fan but their group package pricing was LOL. Lastpass is pretty good. I liked roboform's interface a bit better.
|
|
#
?
Jun 7, 2014 15:43
|
|