Free inventory software for your network like SpiceWorks.
Your friendly neighborhood admin was in need of a FREE inventory management program for a non-profit charity I help out. I went through my mental RSS Feed and pulled up an article by one of our own guest bloggers – El Di Pablo. He was talking about a piece of software that would do exactly what I needed it to do and for the low, low price of FREE! Check it out:
The other day I was perusing some of my RSS feeds, and going to some of my favorite blogs, when I was reading someone’s comment about a very cool asset management/network inventory software. This was a few days ago, so I can’t remember which blog it was (Otherwise I would post a link to it) but the commenter said this particular software was a lot like Spiceworks, except without the ads.
I decided to set it up at my work on VM to test it out, and you know what? It is now one of our production products. My boss was extremely happy about it, and before long he was asking me to customize reports, and change different reporting features. It was an instant hit!
This product is called Lansweeper. By adding a simple line to our network logon script, I am able to capture info about all of our workstations and servers. One of the things I found using the program today was that our Help Desk was giving local admin rights to all sorts of users in the field. I was able to squash that right away thanks to Lansweeper!
Here is a list of features from their website:
Lansweeper 3.1 is freeware and contains no ads.- Run the server application on as many servers as you like.
- Use with unlimited clients (no restrictions).
- Reporting : over 75 hardware, software, network & server reports included.
- Software and operating system licensing reports and license cost calculation.
- Launch custom commands and programs from the web interface to support your clients (Remote Control), ping, event viewer, remote screenshot, …)
- Win32 Gui to make easy configuration changes.
- Intuitive new web interface
- Asset Tag integration
- Wake on Lan support (WOL)
- Automated installer
Setup was really easy, all you need is to install SQL Express 2005 (Also free) and away you go. The download comes with comprehensive instructions.
What sort of tools do you use to gather information about your network? I love testing this stuff out, especially if I can find one as useful as this.
August 6, 2008 - 8:30 am
This is a great find. Thanks Admin and El Di Pablo! As you always say Free is for ME!
Click to Reply to This Comment.
Karl L. Gechlik | AskTheAdmin.com Reply:
August 6th, 2008 at 8:33 am
I am loving it as well. These customizable actions are awesome. I would love to play with the pro set if the author could provide the demo.
Oh and Netsed comments/Replying to comments are now working. As well as email notifications on replies.
Sweet.
Click to Reply to This Comment.
August 6, 2008 - 11:43 am
I am in need of just a product like this. I will definitely download and take a look at it.
Click to Reply to This Comment.
August 6, 2008 - 1:05 pm
So far I haven’t found anything that would entice me to give up spiceworks, I use the adblock plus firefox extension, so I never see thir ads anyway. Just the fact that spiceworks is agentless is a HUGE plus for me.
Click to Reply to This Comment.
August 6, 2008 - 4:00 pm
Lansweeper doesn’t require an agent on your computers.
the lsclient just informs the service that a client needs to be scanned. This make sure that all your firewalled clients are discovered even if they only show op once every month in your network (spiceworks will not find these clients)
Click to Reply to This Comment.
August 6, 2008 - 4:39 pm
I’m loving it especially the actions. No client run through a login script. Running it this month and then going to do a comparison between it and TrackIt – which I hate with a passion.
Joe what do you love about SpiceWorks?
Click to Reply to This Comment.
Joe Glessner Reply:
August 7th, 2008 at 3:44 pm
I love many things about SpiceWorks, but especially the way it lets me tie together IT Servie providers, helpdesk tickets, and inventory.
It’s really become a central repository for the information that my IT department needs to have for everything we manage. For instance, I get a call from a user telling me that they are having issues with Timberline (our Accounting and ERP product). I can then look up every issue that everyone in the company has had with Timberline, any issues specific to that user’s machine, and get contact information for Sage’s tech support (they make Timberline) all in one place.
I also really like the ease of setup of the helpdesk system.
Reporting is pretty good as well.
Overall I think SpiceWorks’ strongest feature is the spiceworks community.
Click to Reply to This Comment.
Slothman Reply:
August 7th, 2008 at 4:24 pm
Glad to see I am not the only dope out there who has to live in Timberline land. I yearn for the day we ditch them for a Web 2.0 style accounting app because Timberline will never got that way.
Anywho…
I have been playing with Lansweeper and Spiceworks the last day or so. Both are great products. If we were smaller and I just looking for inventory, LS would win. But I too like the inventory, plus service management, plus Helpdesk app on Spiceworks. I am going to have to show the COO this as we might want to go forward with it.
Spiceworks reminds me of a pay product that is out there that is similar, but much more in depth, however too much in depth for our needs.
Click to Reply to This Comment.
Joe Glessner Reply:
August 7th, 2008 at 5:14 pm
If you work for an Electrical contractor check out Spectrum from Dexter + Cheney. It’s everything that Timberline is not, and everything you want from software like this.
Click to Reply to This Comment.
Karl L. Gechlik | AskTheAdmin.com Reply:
August 7th, 2008 at 8:05 pm
Spiceworks is a million times better than what we are currently using for inventory, help desk and a bunch of other tools.
After a short eval period both of these will find loving homes within my IT dept.
I recently switched erp systems to Sage’s Mas 500 anyone – else using this?
Click to Reply to This Comment.
Karl L. Gechlik | AskTheAdmin.com Reply:
August 8th, 2008 at 3:32 pm
I am not caught up with that particular product from Sage – but they got us with Mas 500 for our entire ERP. Warehousing, accounting, customer service, order… The whole 9.
So far it’s better than what we were using before (Lawson) but it is damn ugly!
Click to Reply to This Comment.
August 6, 2008 - 5:07 pm
I don’t have access to domain settings (complex bureaucracy) so I use sysinternals psexec and bit of AutoIt scripting to scan part of LAN needed and make all PCs dump reports in shared folder. Hack-ish but works. :)
Click to Reply to This Comment.
Karl L. Gechlik | AskTheAdmin.com Reply:
August 8th, 2008 at 3:30 pm
We love hack-ish! Custom methods for what works in your environment are much better than forcing corporate solutions to fit your needs especially if they do way too much or not enough!
Click to Reply to This Comment.
August 21, 2008 - 12:50 pm
I tried Spiceworks but wasn’t too happy with it. I found GLPI located at http://www.glpi-project.org
Very robust!
Click to Reply to This Comment.
NinjaAdmin Reply:
August 21st, 2008 at 8:44 pm
What didnt you like about spice works? What features does this have over spice works?
Click to Reply to This Comment.