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Contents 
Introduction
Mercury Load Runner
IBM Rational Tester
Segue SilkPerformer
NeoLoad
Specifications
How we tested
Editor's choice
About RMIT |
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This large company is suspicious that bottlenecks occur during heavy transaction periods. The IT manager wants to monitor system loading and is not sure which product to choose.
Concerns: Recording and playing back transactions, supported platforms, reporting, pinpointing of bottlenecks, test script management, leasing arrangements with virtual clients.
Scenario winner and Editor's choice: Mercury Load Runner 8.0
There is a reason why Mercury is the market leader in this area -- it is at least one generation ahead of the rest. Segue is fantastic with its ease of use and script customisation features. It offers excellent technology support and reporting but we found it not to be as strong in diagnostics. Rational, on the other hand, was the most difficult product to use but is part of this whole Development Platform, which combines your development area, functional testing, and performance testing into one central space. Segue tries to do something similar but it's somewhat messier. We also preferred the diagnostic capabilities in Rational over Segue's so really, when you paste together all the positive things from these two, you get something like Mercury's Load Runner -- without the whole development platform.
With standard Load Runner licensing, the licence is locked to a particular node but there is no charge to move around. With the enterprise-wide Load Runner licensing (called Performance Center), licences are pooled and each virtual user type is licensed separately. This can work out very expensively.
IBM's Rational Performance Tester doesn't cost as much as Mercury and it is more flexible with their licensing -- you don't pay extra for different protocols. Segue were also very expensive but are flexible with their licensing like Rational. Additionally Segue customers can "check out" a licence from the SilkMeter server onto a laptop for mobile computing (as they may want to work from home on a weekend or have to travel to a remote office).
I think you missed iMacros in your review. We use it to test our websites. It's great! It has by far the best support for AJAX and Flash applets and the scripting interface is extremely powerful.