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Microsoft BI (MSBI) vs. SAP Crystal

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Microsoft BI (MSBI)

934 Reviews and Ratings

SAP Crystal

556 Reviews and Ratings

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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Microsoft BI (MSBI)

    Score7.1 out of 10
    		N/AMicrosoft BI is a business intelligence product used for data analysis and generating reports on server-based data. It features unlimited data analysis capacity with its reporting engine, SQL Server Reporting Services alongside ETL, master data management, and data cleansing.

    $14

    per month per user

    SAP Crystal

    Score7.5 out of 10
    		N/ASAP Crystal is an analytics and reporting software solution for SMBs. SAP Crystal comprises Crystal Reports for pixel-perfect reporting, and SAP Crystal Server for automated distribution and self-service access to reports, dashboards and data exploration.

    $295

    per single user license

    Pricing
    Microsoft BI (MSBI)SAP Crystal
    Editions & Modules
    Power BI Pro
    $14
    per month per user
    Power BI Premium
    $24
    per month per user
    Upgrade Version to SAP Crystal Reports 2020
    $295
    per single user license
    SAP Crystal Reports 2020 64-Bit
    $495
    per single user license
    SAP Crystal Reports 2016 32-Bit
    $495
    per single user license
    SAP Crystal Server 2020 1 NUL
    $869
    per user license + first year maintenance to be added
    SAP Crystal Server 2020 5 CAL
    $8,744
    5 concurrent users + first year maintenance to be added
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Microsoft BI (MSBI)SAP Crystal
    Free Trial
    NoYes
    Free/Freemium Version
    YesYes
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoYes
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeOptional
    Additional Details—* SAP Crystal Reports 2020 Viewer allows you to view static data within a SAP Crystal Reports file. * SAP Crystal Reports 2020 - Full version allows you to create powerful, richly formatted, and dynamic reports from virtually any data source, delivered in dozens of formats, in up to 28 languages. If you already have an older version of Crystal Reports, buy a license for SAP Crystal Reports 2020 - Upgrade at a discounted, upgrade price. * SAP Crystal Server 2020, 1 NUL includes 1 license of: SAP Crystal Reports 2020 - SAP Crystal Server 2020. * As an add-on to SAP Crystal Server 2020 1 NUL, SAP Crystal Server 2020 5 CAL allows you to support a wider, intermittent audience of end users, up to five logged on at the same time.
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    Microsoft BI (MSBI)SAP Crystal
    Considered Both Products
    Microsoft
    Al Mubassir Muin
    Software Engineer in Information Technology at Prime Tech Solutions Ltd. (Information Technology & Services, 51-200 employees)
    Chose Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    Better integration with Microsoft products is one of the advantages of using Business Intelligence (BI). It's simple to understand, and plenty of resources are available to outsource it. Many of our existing clients have Microsoft licensing agreements. It's an obvious path when …
    Incentivized
    Nilufa Hossain
    IT Specialist in Research & Development at Lamda I-TECH (Information Technology & Services, 11-50 employees)
    Chose Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    MSBI is great for data collection and reporting, but it lacks the visual appeal and features of Power BI. Even though it's still useful, it falls short of Power BI in terms of features. There's no reason to doubt MSBI's findings. MSBI has a proactive customer service team that …
    Incentivized
    Verified User
    Chose Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    A lot of our existing client base has licensing agreements in place with Microsoft, couple that with decision-makers wanting to achieve the outcome with the least amount of additional licensing costs added, and it becomes an obvious path, however, it is very crucial to first …
    Incentivized
    Alexander Lubyansky
    Technical Leader for Modeling and Simulation in Research & Development at MITRE (Management Consulting, 5001-10,000 employees)
    Chose Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    Looking at the visualization portion of BI, there are three types of tools.
    1. Programming packages. Free and powerful, they let you make any diagram, at the cost of difficulty of use.
    2. Specialist software like Tableau and Microsoft BI. This is the best choice in most cases due to …
    Incentivized
    Mashhood Syed
    Business Intelligence Specialist in Information Technology at Kaiser Foundation Health Plan (Transportation/Trucking/Railroad, 501-1000 employees)
    Chose Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    -Tableau is clearly more cutting edge when it comes to data visualization and connecting to multiple data sources (support for MongoDB, Hadoop, etc).
    -Assuming your data is not that sophisticated, Microsoft BI is a great product. I would say its a good "all around" BI tool. It …
    Sean Brady
    Business Intelligence Architect in Finance and Accounting at BAASS Business Solutions (Transportation/Trucking/Railroad, 5001-10,000 employees)
    Chose Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    Microstrategy - I went with Microsoft BI because of features, usability, integration capabilities, performance, availability of talent, cost, and end-user (self-service) capabilities.
    SAP
    Verified User
    Chose SAP Crystal
    We actually have all 3 in place and all 3 are used in different situations. Some are bundled with certain products so we continue to use them. Others such as BI from Microsoft are stand alone and allow for easier data visualizations than SAP Crystal does. We chose SAP Crystal …
    Incentivized
    Himanshu Singh
    Product Manager in Product Management at ANS Commerce - E-commerce Solutions for India (Internet, 11-50 employees)
    Chose SAP Crystal
    Due to its bigger brand and excellent user support, it is better than many competitors. If you have huge organization support, then operating it will make your reporting system much better. Otherwise, you might need better employee support for operating it. Otherwise, the whole …
    Incentivized
    Sofia Boiesan
    AP Specialist & Payroll Practitioner in Finance and Accounting at William Kelly & Sons Group of Companies (Construction, 51-200 employees)
    Chose SAP Crystal
    We are very happy with SAP Crystal Server and we chose to go with SAP Crystal Server because it was the best fit for all the different departments that use it. With the other programs that we evaluated, we could not come to a consensus because certain critical features were …
    Incentivized
    Verified User
    Chose SAP Crystal
    SAP Crystal Server was chosen because of the scheduled reports capabilities that it had and because we were happier with the end look of the reports. We found the reports that are obtained with SAP Crystal Server easier to interpret than some what some of the other BI programs …
    Incentivized
    Verified User
    Chose SAP Crystal
    When we evaluated several options, we found SAP Crystal Server to be more reliable than some of its competitors. We wanted something that we could customise to use in several departments and for all different types of situations where reports would be useful. We also use other …
    Incentivized
    Verified User
    Chose SAP Crystal
    My department actually had a preference for another more powerful product but in the end I think SAP Crystal Server was chosen because it met our needs and it was within the budget we were looking to allocate to this type of software.
    Incentivized
    Ercole Lugari
    SQL & Business Objects Analyst Developer in Information Technology at London Stock Exchange (Financial Services, 1001-5000 employees)
    Chose SAP Crystal
    SAP Crystal Reports has a long service experience and is graphically superior.
    Incentivized
    Nathan Patrick Taylor
    Clinical Informatics Consultant in Corporate at Symphony Post-Acute Network (Hospital & Health Care, 1001-5000 employees)
    Chose SAP Crystal
    Crystal Reports fits a niche for us in standard reporting. We don't use it for creating dashboards or interactive data analysis. That's where Tableau excels. For on-demand reports, we prefer Microsoft Reporting Service and Analysis Services. Crystal Report is very good when it …
    Incentivized
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Delivers good value for the price
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Happy with the feature set
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Implementation went as expected
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Features
    Microsoft BI (MSBI)SAP Crystal
    BI Standard Reporting
    Comparison of BI Standard Reporting features of Microsoft BI (MSBI) and SAP Crystal
    Feature
    Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    8.7
    48 Ratings
    SAP Crystal
    9.3
    121 Ratings
    Pixel Perfect reports9.041 Ratings8.0110 Ratings
    Customizable dashboards8.048 Ratings10.097 Ratings
    Report Formatting Templates9.046 Ratings10.0114 Ratings
    Ad-hoc Reporting
    Comparison of Ad-hoc Reporting features of Microsoft BI (MSBI) and SAP Crystal
    Feature
    Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    8.8
    48 Ratings
    SAP Crystal
    9.6
    133 Ratings
    Drill-down analysis9.043 Ratings10.0114 Ratings
    Formatting capabilities8.048 Ratings10.0132 Ratings
    Integration with R or other statistical packages9.038 Ratings8.662 Ratings
    Report sharing and collaboration9.048 Ratings10.0117 Ratings
    Report Output and Scheduling
    Comparison of Report Output and Scheduling features of Microsoft BI (MSBI) and SAP Crystal
    Feature
    Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    9.0
    47 Ratings
    SAP Crystal
    9.4
    133 Ratings
    Publish to Web9.043 Ratings9.288 Ratings
    Publish to PDF9.043 Ratings10.0130 Ratings
    Report Versioning9.039 Ratings9.092 Ratings
    Report Delivery Scheduling9.042 Ratings9.095 Ratings
    Delivery to Remote Servers9.023 Ratings10.052 Ratings
    Data Discovery and Visualization
    Comparison of Data Discovery and Visualization features of Microsoft BI (MSBI) and SAP Crystal
    Feature
    Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    9.0
    47 Ratings
    SAP Crystal
    8.0
    87 Ratings
    Pre-built visualization formats (heatmaps, scatter plots etc.)9.046 Ratings7.650 Ratings
    Location Analytics / Geographic Visualization9.043 Ratings8.574 Ratings
    Predictive Analytics9.041 Ratings7.841 Ratings
    Pattern Recognition and Data Mining9.01 Ratings00 Ratings
    Access Control and Security
    Comparison of Access Control and Security features of Microsoft BI (MSBI) and SAP Crystal
    Feature
    Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    9.0
    48 Ratings
    SAP Crystal
    8.6
    86 Ratings
    Multi-User Support (named login)9.045 Ratings7.879 Ratings
    Role-Based Security Model9.042 Ratings7.778 Ratings
    Multiple Access Permission Levels (Create, Read, Delete)9.045 Ratings8.478 Ratings
    Report-Level Access Control9.01 Ratings10.01 Ratings
    Single Sign-On (SSO)9.027 Ratings9.038 Ratings
    Mobile Capabilities
    Comparison of Mobile Capabilities features of Microsoft BI (MSBI) and SAP Crystal
    Feature
    Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    8.5
    38 Ratings
    SAP Crystal
    8.4
    62 Ratings
    Responsive Design for Web Access8.035 Ratings8.760 Ratings
    Mobile Application8.026 Ratings7.643 Ratings
    Dashboard / Report / Visualization Interactivity on Mobile10.035 Ratings9.057 Ratings
    Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding
    Comparison of Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding features of Microsoft BI (MSBI) and SAP Crystal
    Feature
    Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    8.8
    20 Ratings
    SAP Crystal
    6.9
    43 Ratings
    REST API9.018 Ratings7.48 Ratings
    Javascript API9.018 Ratings6.035 Ratings
    iFrames9.017 Ratings7.18 Ratings
    Java API9.016 Ratings6.035 Ratings
    Themeable User Interface (UI)9.017 Ratings8.337 Ratings
    Customizable Platform (Open Source)8.016 Ratings7.031 Ratings
    User Ratings
    Microsoft BI (MSBI)SAP Crystal
    Likelihood to Recommend
    9.0
    (72 ratings)
    10.0
    (155 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    8.0
    (25 ratings)
    10.0
    (19 ratings)
    Usability
    8.9
    (14 ratings)
    9.5
    (28 ratings)
    Availability
    9.5
    (2 ratings)
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    Performance
    7.0
    (2 ratings)
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    Support Rating
    8.9
    (15 ratings)
    8.6
    (21 ratings)
    In-Person Training
    6.9
    (3 ratings)
    10.0
    (1 ratings)
    Online Training
    8.5
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    9.6
    (7 ratings)
    8.8
    (14 ratings)
    Configurability
    10.0
    (2 ratings)
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    Data Sharing and Collaboration
    8.5
    (42 ratings)
    8.8
    (124 ratings)
    Data Sources
    8.4
    (41 ratings)
    9.2
    (129 ratings)
    Ease of integration
    -
    (0 ratings)
    7.0
    (1 ratings)
    Product Scalability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    7.0
    (1 ratings)
    Vendor post-sale
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    Vendor pre-sale
    -
    (0 ratings)
    7.0
    (1 ratings)