CMDB & Discovery
Device42 vs Obelinf
CMDB discovery and IT asset management vs managed infrastructure documentation
Device42 is an established self-hosted platform with automated discovery and app dependency mapping. Obelinf delivers the documentation side as a managed platform with predictable pricing.
Nothing to install. Nothing to patch.
Device42 ships as a self-hosted virtual appliance on Linux with a bundled PostgreSQL database. Installation is only the beginning; the real cost comes after, with OS patches, application updates, database maintenance, backups, monitoring, and troubleshooting when something breaks.
As infrastructure grows, the Device42 server needs more resources, and discovery collectors may need to be deployed across distributed locations. For a small team, every hour spent patching the Device42 server is an hour not spent on actual infrastructure work.
A modern interface your team will actually use.
Device42's interface is functional but shows its age: server-rendered pages, more page reloads than a modern app, and common workflows that take more clicks than they should.
Obelinf is built for keyboard-driven daily use. A command palette jumps to any entity type, full-text search works across every entity and attribute, and results are connected, so you see the full context of what you are looking for.
Control over every record.
Automated discovery is Device42's strongest feature. Agents scan the network with SNMP, WMI, SSH, and APIs, so the CMDB fills itself and stays current. For thousands of devices across multiple locations, that is genuinely valuable.
Obelinf takes a different route: you enter data through the interface or the API. Discovery is powerful, but automatically collected data still requires validation. Infrastructure teams often need human context around ownership, intended state, and relationships that scanners cannot infer.
Every change, recorded automatically.
Device42 has audit logging, but it is not as granular or as consistently surfaced as you would expect from the platform that is supposed to be your record of record.
Obelinf's changelog records every create, update, and delete with the user, timestamp, and field-level diffs. There is no configuration and no extra tooling. It is always on, always complete, and always available.
Cables that draw themselves.
Device42 handles basic cable connections between devices and patch panels. Obelinf manages cables with both physical and logical connection tracking, and every connection is reflected live in the interactive topology diagram.
When you create a cable connection in Obelinf, the topology updates immediately, so cabling errors surface visually instead of living in a spreadsheet nobody checks.
Discovery tells you what exists. Documentation tells your team what it means. Device42 excels at the first part; Obelinf is built for the second, turning collected data into a maintained source of truth with live topology, verified connections, and an audit trail.
Predictable pricing. No per-device scaling.
Device42 is priced per managed device, as an annual subscription. Pricing is based on managed assets and typically scales with deployment size. As environments grow, licensing costs increase alongside the operational cost of running the platform.
Obelinf uses a flat subscription: free for personal use, $99 and $299 per month for teams. There is no per-device scaling, no collectors to deploy, and no servers to provision.
Different approaches to infrastructure data
Device42 is built to discover everything automatically. Obelinf is built to maintain a clean infrastructure source of truth. Those are different philosophies, and which one fits depends on where your data problem actually is.
Device42 is best when you need:
- Automatic discovery
- Application dependency mapping
- Broad IT asset visibility
Obelinf is best when you need:
- A clean infrastructure model
- Accurate DCIM/IPAM data
- Team collaboration
- Predictable operations
Who should choose Device42?
Choose Device42 if:
- You need automated infrastructure discovery
- You need application dependency mapping
- You need broader ITAM capabilities
- You manage thousands of unknown assets
Choose Obelinf if:
- Your inventory is already known
- You need a reliable source of truth
- Your team needs fast documentation workflows
- You want predictable SaaS pricing
Moving from Device42 to Obelinf
Use Device42's REST API or CSV exports to pull devices, IP addresses, subnets, and connections out of the CMDB.
Load the data through Obelinf's REST API or CSV import, and verify counts before you switch.
Set up organization membership and roles so everyone lands with the right permissions from day one.
There is no appliance to migrate and no infrastructure to stand up, so the cutover is immediate.