What users are saying about
718 Ratings
<a href='https://www.trustradius.com/static/about-trustradius-scoring' target='_blank' rel='nofollow noopener'>trScore algorithm: Learn more.</a>Score 7.7 out of 100
Based on 718 reviews and ratings
SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
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118 Ratings
<a href='https://www.trustradius.com/static/about-trustradius-scoring' target='_blank' rel='nofollow noopener'>trScore algorithm: Learn more.</a>Score 7.4 out of 100
Based on 118 reviews and ratings
Feature Set Ratings
- SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM) ranks higher in 1 feature set: Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)

6.6
AlienVault USM
66%

7.6
SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
76%
SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM) ranks higher in 6/7 features
SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM) ranks higher in 6/7 features
Centralized event and log data collection

6.8
68%
5 Ratings

8.5
85%
18 Ratings
Correlation

7.1
71%
5 Ratings

7.6
76%
15 Ratings
Event and log normalization/management

6.7
67%
7 Ratings

7.3
73%
36 Ratings
Deployment flexibility

6.0
60%
5 Ratings

7.9
79%
18 Ratings
Integration with Identity and Access Management Tools

6.6
66%
3 Ratings

7.9
79%
13 Ratings
Custom dashboards and workspaces

6.1
61%
7 Ratings

4.9
49%
34 Ratings
Host and network-based intrusion detection

6.7
67%
4 Ratings

9.0
90%
4 Ratings
Attribute Ratings
- AlienVault USM is rated higher in 1 area: Likelihood to Recommend
- SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM) is rated higher in 2 areas: Likelihood to Renew, Support Rating
- AlienVault USM and SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM) are tied in 1 area: Usability
Likelihood to Recommend

8.1
AlienVault USM
81%
389 Ratings

7.7
SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
77%
46 Ratings
Likelihood to Renew

7.2
AlienVault USM
72%
19 Ratings

7.3
SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
73%
2 Ratings
Usability

6.7
AlienVault USM
67%
35 Ratings

6.7
SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
67%
5 Ratings
Availability

6.4
AlienVault USM
64%
6 Ratings

SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
N/A
0 Ratings
Performance

7.3
AlienVault USM
73%
6 Ratings

SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
N/A
0 Ratings
Support Rating

7.3
AlienVault USM
73%
51 Ratings

7.4
SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
74%
26 Ratings
In-Person Training

4.5
AlienVault USM
45%
1 Rating

SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
N/A
0 Ratings
Online Training

8.3
AlienVault USM
83%
6 Ratings

SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
N/A
0 Ratings
Implementation Rating

6.4
AlienVault USM
64%
76 Ratings

SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
N/A
0 Ratings
Product Scalability

6.3
AlienVault USM
63%
3 Ratings

SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
N/A
0 Ratings
Likelihood to Recommend
AlienVault USM
At this point I'm saying a 4. While the marketing material make it appear to be easy to use and it was relatively easy to set up, as previously mentioned, each event description is based upon the individual asset making it nearly impossible for the administrator to be a SME for each asset. For example, if one of the assets reporting is a router, the administrator monitoring alerts would need to know what the various events are that can be triggered as an event for the particular router; however, if the asset is a workstation, the administrator would need to know the various events that are triggered for workstations.

Verified User
Manager in Other
Legal Services Company, 501-1000 employeesSolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
Solarwinds SEM is great for generating reports for investigation purposes. Once you set up the connectors you can walk away and the product runs without needing maintenance. It was however pretty difficult to create the reports and alerts when now starting out and it can be very intimidating for new users.

Verified User
Engineer in Information Technology
Computer Networking Company, 1001-5000 employeesPros
AlienVault USM
- AlienVault USM is simple and easy to deploy. Sensors can be deployed in as little as 15 minutes through the setup wizard.
- The USM UI is easy to understand. I've trained multiple analysts who are able to perform their duties on their first day, in part because of USM Anywhere's ease of use.
- Top-notch built-in compliance templates and reporting features.
Tier II SOC Analyst
Rendition Infosec LLCInformation Technology & Services, 11-50 employees
SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
- It does a great job of notifying us when accounts have been locked out. We can then find out the device on the network where the login attempt occurred.
- Searching for incidents is now a lot faster with the implementation of the HTML 5 interface.

Verified User
Engineer in Information Technology
Utilities Company, 201-500 employeesCons
AlienVault USM
- Personally, I've wished I could purchase a service that would configure AV for my environment. I get a lot of traffic on a daily basis and I almost need to hire an analyst that just works on AV.
- Some of the filters when looking for a specific alert aren't that easy to use.
System Administrator
Enthought, Inc.Computer Software, 51-200 employees
SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
- All SolarWinds product suffer from slow response times in management portals. SolarWinds SEM is no exception. While it is much preferred over a "thick client" there is much room for improvement in speed.
- If you use the email alert features with SolarWinds make sure to prepare you staff and team for the large amount of emails they could receive. Make sure to reduce the number of alerts so your team does not ignore the alerts.
Director of IT Engineering
Pearl River ResortGambling & Casinos, 1001-5000 employees
Pricing Details
AlienVault USM
General
Free Trial
Yes
Free/Freemium Version
Yes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
Yes
Entry-level set up fee?
Optional
Starting Price
$1,075 per month
AlienVault USM Editions & Modules
Edition
Essentials | $1,0751 |
---|---|
Standard | $1,6951 |
Premium | $2,5951 |
- per month
Additional Pricing Details
—SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
General
Free Trial
Yes
Free/Freemium Version
—Premium Consulting/Integration Services
—Entry-level set up fee?
No
Starting Price
—SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM) Editions & Modules
—
Additional Pricing Details
—Likelihood to Renew
AlienVault USM
AlienVault USM 7.2
Based on 19 answers
The centralized logging and retention for PCI compliance was our main driver, and it is meeting that need. Otherwise there has been enough frustration with the lack of documentation and the need to customize through the CLI that I would be open to alternatives.
IT Systems Architect
ROTHSTEIN.ioRestaurants, 5001-10,000 employees
SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM) 7.3
Based on 2 answers
It is pretty likely that we will renew SEM when the time comes up. It is easy to use and maintain so there isn't much of a need to replace this product. It is also a pretty fair price for the capabilities provided by the SEM

Verified User
Analyst in Information Technology
Telecommunications Company, 1001-5000 employeesUsability
AlienVault USM
AlienVault USM 6.7
Based on 35 answers
Once you are able to navigate the different panels, finding what you need is quite easily. Before getting used it it can be a bit of challenge .Each panel is quite well laid out and the filtering search capabilities are quite strong.

Verified User
Engineer in Information Technology
Government Administration Company, 201-500 employeesSolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM) 6.7
Based on 5 answers
If you are familiar with SolarWinds then you can use this product it's as easy as that. If you have never used a SolarWinds product then it will take a minute to get how they do reports and make dashboards but that being said the tool is great and can make things very easy once you get a feel for how it works and get everything setup how you like it.
Infrastructure Administrator
Compsource MutualInsurance, 201-500 employees
Reliability and Availability
AlienVault USM
AlienVault USM 6.4
Based on 6 answers
We do have issues with maintenance on the AlienVault USM as the disk fills up from time to time with other data sources. Sources for scanning logs and net flow data isn't calculated in regular disk maintenance and can easily fill up our disk if we do not keep an eye on it with some custom Nagios plugins. The system does properly trim logging data from logging sources properly.

Verified User
Engineer in Information Technology
Information Technology and Services Company, 201-500 employeesSolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
No score
No answers yet
No answers on this topic
Performance
AlienVault USM
AlienVault USM 7.3
Based on 6 answers
With the latest release of AlienVault USM overall performance has not been an issue. We have noticed single source events per second does not scale well with the overall system. 2,000eps on a vmware system with a single source produces delays of up to an hour for us. Pages, reporting and even raw log searches are rather quick though.

Verified User
Engineer in Information Technology
Information Technology and Services Company, 201-500 employeesSolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
No score
No answers yet
No answers on this topic
Support Rating
AlienVault USM
AlienVault USM 7.3
Based on 51 answers
The support we received from alienvault was excellent. They went above and beyond in making sure everything was working as it needed to be. They REALLY want their product implementation to be a success and our security goals be achieved. They are like a member of our security team.

Verified User
Project Manager in Information Technology
Higher Education Company, 201-500 employeesSolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM) 7.4
Based on 26 answers
The quality of support can vary depending on whom you end up speaking with. I was fortunate enough to work with a support representative who was very familiar with the product. He had even authored some of the support documentation on the website. On the flip side, I had two other experiences where I was simply directed to online training material.
Systems Administrator
SEKISUI SPIPlastics, 201-500 employees
In-Person Training
AlienVault USM
AlienVault USM 4.5
Based on 1 answer
I did not have any experience with "in person" training directly. The free online classes offered for a half a day are based on the actual training offered. These little teasers are very good and well worth your time to learn a few quick and dirty ways of getting more information from your SIEM

Verified User
Engineer in Information Technology
Information Technology and Services Company, 201-500 employeesSolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
No score
No answers yet
No answers on this topic
Online Training
AlienVault USM
AlienVault USM 8.3
Based on 6 answers
It was very well organized and helpful in using the product to the fullest extent. The instructor allowed time for folks who were involved with managed services to receive tuning tips in order to better support their customers. In addition, the course materials were automatically updated when the new version came out.

Verified User
Director in Information Technology
Higher Education Company, 501-1000 employeesSolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
No score
No answers yet
No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating
AlienVault USM
AlienVault USM 6.4
Based on 76 answers
AlienVault USM was a very simple to implement and get up and running. We started with a trial version and had that up and going within an hour of receiving email instructions from the sales engineer. We never had to contact support to get the system up and going. It was extremely easy to convert over to a full license once we started with a paid version.

Verified User
Supervisor in Information Technology
Utilities Company, 51-200 employeesSolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
No score
No answers yet
No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered
AlienVault USM
Splunk's ES is a paid add-on on top of an already pricey product. Finding a MSSP that supports Splunk and isn't a 6 figure annual commitment seems unlikely. LogRhythm did not have a cloud-based solution when we were considering SIEMs. Fantastic product though and have a good MSSP base.Devo did not have a MSSP partner base when we looked. Their product is fantastic too.AlienVault USM has good partners to choose from as well as an affordable cloud model, that's why we chose it.

Verified User
Director in Information Technology
Staffing and Recruiting Company, 51-200 employeesSolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
Splunk was a pretty good product but the licensing structure needed a lot of work. They changed the structure three times that I am aware and I still had problems understanding LogRhythm had a lot of issues correlating users to IP addresses, the mappings were frequently wrong so this product could not be trusted in my environment as all our access logs are IP based and this needs to be matched to usernames from AD Fortianalzyer is a great product but it can only do logs from Fortigates so that was not helping for anything other than our firewalls.

Verified User
Engineer in Information Technology
Education Management Company, 1001-5000 employeesScalability
AlienVault USM
AlienVault USM 6.3
Based on 3 answers
The AlienVault USM is not very scalable. Some scalability can be achieved by installing additional sensors, but this only offers 500eps per sensor and is still overall limited by the installation type of VM or physical. We have also noticed the EPS (events per second) is rated overall and not towards a single source. A single source on a very healthy VMware partition tops out at 2,000eps for us, no matter how we configure it. Maybe this is a problem of the 5.2 release?

Verified User
Engineer in Information Technology
Information Technology and Services Company, 201-500 employeesSolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
No score
No answers yet
No answers on this topic
Return on Investment
AlienVault USM
- Compliance
- Threat detection
- Easy asset management
- Save on vulnerability scanning

Verified User
Employee in Engineering
Security & Investigations Company, 11-50 employeesSolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
- For the price, it produced a decent value. It did a lot of the easy stuff well. I can't give any specific data given the objective of the product was to monitor very basic events in the environment.
- There are free options that can do a better job.

Verified User
Analyst in Information Technology
Marketing and Advertising Company, 201-500 employees