Cisco Meraki Dashboard vs. SolarWinds Network Automation Manager (NAM)

Cisco Meraki Dashboard is a great solution for managing a large number of networks across a single organization or multiple. For new projects we are able to set up the entire network in the dashboard with all of the needed settings, plug all of the devices in at our office and have them download their settings, so on the date of deployment, the equipment comes online and is ready to go immediately.

Incentivized

Well Suited Areas - 1. Network Fault and Performance Monitoring 2. Network Devices Configuration Backup and Configuration Push 3. Netflow Analysis 4. Call Quality Monitoring for Cisco and Avaya 5. Users Ports Management 6. DSN/DHCP Monitoring 7. Alerting and Integration Not Well Suited - 1. Predictive Intelligence based Alerting or data analysis 2. REST API Based Monitoring. 3. SD-WAN Monitoring

Incentivized

• The ability to monitor any port and get accurate information on its activity.
• The ability to port cycle and reboot remotely. This is best for off-hour reboots.
• Being able to search for devices through the client page with an IP address or MAC address saves time on device searches.
• It is an easy process to add and remove devices to different organizations.

Incentivized

• Fault and Performance Monitoring
• Devices Configuration Backup
• IP Address Management
• Voice Infrastructure Monitoring
• Users Ports monitoring
• Netflow Traffic Utilization

Incentivized

• Cloud communication could be improved
• Rebooting network switch like an MS120 remotely takes more time vs MX64 for some reason
• Quicker response time for status updates. Cisco Meraki Dashboard take too long to update sometimes
• Uptime for all devices not just the switches but firewalls and APs would be great to have
• Timeline improvements/more detail timeline

Incentivized

• Support for more call infra provider vendors
• Cloud Network Monitoring
• Event Management
• Predictive Intelligence using AIOps and ML

Incentivized

The dashboard is easy to navigate and offers many pages that are loaded with information. Cisco Meraki adds new features to the dashboard based on customer feedback and I have seen so many updates and changes that have improved upon the previous version. Most recently they have added Cisco's AI and are looking at an Automation option that will only further improve usability.

Incentivized

Support seems very knowledgeable and provides detail summary about the call. They even follow up later to check on your case.

Incentivized

The Cisco Meraki Dashboard is of course the most user friendly and the NDFC is being modified to look similar to the Cisco Meraki Dashboard as of today.

Incentivized

Well Solarwinds is placed much ahead of these products because of the following reasons - One single tool which can perform Fault, Performance Monitoring, Network Bandwidth Utilization, Devices configuration backup, IP Address Management, NetPath, Voice Infra Monitoring, Traps and Syslog Logging, Alerting's, Users Ports Monitoring, Rpeorting etc and hence this make Solarwinds a complete solutions. Whereas other products Like Microfocus requires multiple modules and installation is not easy. LogicMonitor on the other side is well competing (Specially SD-WAN Monitoring) with Solarwinds but it still lacks Devices Configuration Push feature, IP Address Management, NetPath, Users Port Monitoring etc.

Incentivized

• It's definitely allowed us to operate with a smaller team and allowed us to troubleshoot issues quicker. The Meraki dashboard with Meraki APs has helped us identify issues on our wireless network, monitor the health, and really help our remote locations out with troubleshooting and getting devices online quicker.

Incentivized

• Our Network Health has improved with Proactive Monitoring
• Cost reduction on additional products like PowerBI for Reporting
• Service Now Integration was easy enough and hence less efforts and cost

Incentivized