Cisco DNA Analytics and Assurance vs. OpenNMS Meridian

So not everyone is in need of a smart AI checking their network metrics looking for issues before they happen or finding and alerting on problems that the network staff may not have noticed, but if you have the budget for it, it could be a huge time saver for your whole department.

Incentivized

I would recommend all system administrators use some form of network monitoring if they are not already doing so, and I'd definitely recommend people consider OpenNMS if they're shopping around. Small businesses will benefit from the low-cost of entry (it's free!), whilst getting all the enterprise features. Larger businesses can benefit from paid support plans.

However, there's no getting around the fact that you will require some advanced networking and sysadmin knowledge to get the most out of OpenNMS, or at least, be prepared for a steep learning curve. If you don't have the resources to devote this time initially, you may struggle.

Incentivized

• Identify devices and their connectivity to the network
• Troubleshoot device connectivity paths
• Give us visibility into possible issues with network devices

Incentivized

• Report on SLA
• Group network areas
• Discovery of elements

Incentivized

• Early on the product was unstable. Since fixed.
• The need to contact the BU when TAC cannot solve the issue. This happens all the time.
• Upgrades to the product are not smooth and take a great deal of time.

Incentivized

• We've had a few issues with delayed alerting.
• I haven't quite figured out how to make topologies work yet, but I haven't spent a ton of time on it either.
• We've also had a bit of trouble importing some MIBs, but that usually boiled down to working with the vendor to make sure we had the right MIBs and dependencies.

Incentivized

Cisco DNA Analytics and Assurance definitely has a steep learning curve. While it's had an upgrade to its onboarding, it's still a very technically heavy application that requires knowledge of Cisco networking and terminology. I think keeping that in mind helps with the expectations, but anyone can use the application with a little training and experience.

Incentivized

We moved away from Solarwinds during the breach. Haven't touched them with a 10 foot pole since.We looked at Splunk but decided to stick with a Cisco product since we are a Cisco shop

Incentivized

OpenNMS's more attractive GUI and its price break were the main reasons our company chose to explore and use this product. However, it never managed to actually replace Nagios which had a much more established hold within the company. Perhaps we were over-monitoring, but our company claimed a $100k loss per hour of downtime.

Incentivized

• Loads of time saved diagnosing network issues.
• Much effort saved having to determine network performance metrics by hand.
• The Cisco brand is generally safe and trusted so you get that additional peace of mind.

Incentivized

• Initial adoption required quite a lot of resources and time to get everything right. Totally worth it for us; just be prepared for a gradual process that will get better and better with time.
• Once setup and running smoothly, it provides us with all the reporting we could hope for, at near zero cost.
• With OpenNMS, we're able to offer a much more reliable service to our customers, and spend a lot less time dealing with issues.

Incentivized