Ooook, so, I'll take a stab at this. Basically, 10gR2 Grid Control is a significantly improved product over R1. It still requires a very heavy agent on your databases, and it still only does the vast majority of its functionality on 10gR2. A lot of the stated functionality is little more than proof-of-concept code, and only going to work in a very vanilla (Read: Linux, 10gR2, RAC) environment. The UI is terrible, as its based on one of the Oracle applications components (forms? portal?), and its very geared towards you "touching" one database at a time. It's perfectly fine for basic monitoring, some basic performance data, and some basic operational mangement. Beyond that, you're going to have to look elsewhere. (Full disclosure: we make a software product that is often compared to Grid Control, though I'd argue they're very different beasts). Thanks, Matt -- Matthew Zito Chief Scientist GridApp Systems P: 646-452-4090 mzito@xxxxxxxxxxx ________________________________ From: oracle-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:oracle-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Jared Still Sent: Wednesday, April 05, 2006 4:17 PM To: Oracle-L Freelists Subject: Re: Grid Control - opinions please Hmmm... Two hours and no responses. GC does not appear to be in wide use. On 4/5/06, Jared Still <jkstill@xxxxxxxxx > wrote: Well, is that subject a loaded question, or what? Background: I have never used OEM. Well, I have actually, but only long enough to try it and discard it because I didn't like it too much. I've been told that GC is completely re-written and a much better product than OEM. What I want to find out is if there is some community concensus to back up that claims. Let's assume none of the add-on packs ($$$$) will be used, and RAC is not involved. What does GC bring to the table that is worthwhile in your opinion? I was also told that GC could be used to (easily?) download and apply Critical Patch Updates. Maybe not quite automated, but simplified at least. Has anyone experienced that? It was also stated that this beast would require 8Gig of RAM, which seems rather excessive. TIA, -- Jared Still Certifiable Oracle DBA and Part Time Perl Evangelist -- Jared Still Certifiable Oracle DBA and Part Time Perl Evangelist