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KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) vs. SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer (NTA)

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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    KACE Systems Management Appliance

    Score8.9 out of 10
    N/AQuest now offers the KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) as an IT Asset tracking and management appliance (also available as a virtual deployment if hardware requirements are met). Beyond discovery, inventory tracking and license management, KACE emphasizes automating software upgrade distribution with minimal end-user disruption, featuring remote replication for multi-site upgrades and rollouts. KACE SMA may be bundled with KACE Cloud Mobile Device Management (MDM) to form a complete UEM…N/A

    SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer (NTA)

    Score8.5 out of 10
    N/ASolarWinds Netflow Traffic Analyzer is a network monitoring tool within the broader SolarWinds ecosystem. It includes core traffic monitoring features, as well as customizable traffic reports and alerts.N/A
    Pricing
    KACE Systems Management ApplianceSolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer (NTA)
    Editions & Modules
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    KACE Systems Management ApplianceSolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer (NTA)
    Free Trial
    NoYes
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeOptional
    Additional Details——
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    KACE Systems Management ApplianceSolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer (NTA)
    Considered Both Products
    Quest Software
    No answer on this topic
    SolarWinds
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    80%
    Would buy again
    4 Answers
    95%
    Would buy again
    42 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    No answers on this topic
    95%
    Delivers good value for the price
    37 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    80%
    Happy with the feature set
    4 Answers
    95%
    Happy with the feature set
    42 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    No answers on this topic
    95%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    36 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    No answers on this topic
    88%
    Implementation went as expected
    37 Answers
    Features
    KACE Systems Management ApplianceSolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer (NTA)
    IT Asset Management
    Comparison of IT Asset Management features of KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) and SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer (NTA)
    Feature
    KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA)
    8.6
    12 Ratings
    11% above category average
    SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer (NTA)
    -
    Ratings
    Software and hardware inventory tracking10.012 Ratings00 Ratings
    License management9.011 Ratings00 Ratings
    Asset lifecycle monitoring8.010 Ratings00 Ratings
    Contract management6.06 Ratings00 Ratings
    Asset relationship management10.08 Ratings00 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    KACE Systems Management ApplianceSolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer (NTA)
    Small Businesses
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Medium-sized Companies
    KACE Asset Management Appliance
    Score8.9 out of 10
    Darktrace
    Score8.3 out of 10
    Enterprises
    Lansweeper
    Score8.7 out of 10
    Darktrace
    Score8.3 out of 10
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    User Ratings
    KACE Systems Management ApplianceSolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer (NTA)
    Likelihood to Recommend
    9.0
    (12 ratings)
    9.0
    (62 ratings)
    Usability
    8.6
    (3 ratings)
    10.0
    (11 ratings)
    Support Rating
    9.5
    (4 ratings)
    8.0
    (49 ratings)
    Online Training
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    Vendor post-sale
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    Vendor pre-sale
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.1
    (1 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    KACE Systems Management ApplianceSolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer (NTA)
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Quest Software
    I think it has added value for any organization. It reduced our Tech Support cost by: -Supporting users anywhere -Reducing users downtime as well keep them informed with the status of their tickets -Managing software and hardware actively -Processing automation -deploy mass software installs, patching or updates - Provide approved software's to users to install without IT help
    Incentivized
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    SolarWinds
    We use and depend on it for status state of our network gear, switches and routers. It does an excellent job of getting you the details you need to confirm all devices and products are working at the level needed. At times, it does tend to flag network switch ports and/or switches themselves as exceeding their rated capacity when frequently it was a quick blip of high traffic due to downloads, or uploads causing the max'ing of the device. Again, you can adjust the settings but then you adjust it too high and miss real activity. It can become nuisance alerting when you tend to then ignore
    Incentivized
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    Pros
    Quest Software
    • Inventory: KACE provides a ton of hardware and software inventory information that is easy to search, filter, and export. This is critical when we need to find the answers to questions about how many of such and such we have in our fleet.
    • Patch Management: We were using WSUS before and it was altogether too cumbersome. KACE has given us the power, flexibility, and verification we need to feel comfortable our patches are up-to-date.
    • Service Queue: We made KACE our help desk system and it does everything we need it to do. Great improvement over our old system.
    Incentivized
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    SolarWinds
    • The level of customization possible with Network Bandwidth Analyzer is very valuable. Rather than being stuck with a "one-size-fits-all" presentation, an administrator can easily create customized views, reports, and alerts so that users can have a more tailored view of the data provided by Network Bandwidth Analyzer. This has the effect of making the tool more attractive to the end user.
    • The NetFlow Traffic Analyzer piece of Network Bandwidth Analyzer provides the details on bandwidth usage on the network. More than knowing how much bandwidth is being used, one is provided with detailed information on how that bandwidth is being used. This provides invaluable information for capacity planning and even certain forensic tasks faced by the network engineer.
    • The ability to produce network maps provides an easy way to create an attractive and functional NOC/SOC view of the entire network. Both technician and the occasional passerby can quickly determine if there are issues to be addressed. The ability to customize a map with background images and custom icons and stencils can make these maps really pop.
    Incentivized
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    Cons
    Quest Software
    • The KACE SMA needs a better way to handle different roles in the software so certain users can access or administrate certain parts of the software, but not the entire software installation.
    • The KACE SMA could improve the ticketing process of projects. The aspects of the title and some information do not always flow down from the parent ticket to its child tickets.
    • The KACE SMA could improve the UI of the software with the addition of different CSS color schemes.
    Incentivized
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    SolarWinds
    • The ability to intuitively and quickly serve up specified information up to a dashboard for general “public” consumption, that cycles through several pages of information.
    • The ability to intuitively set up alerting on bandwidth levels, instead of having to dig through all types of alerts available to find the one needed.
    • Provide a pricing model based on different support levels: if I want only available update installations, don’t make me pay the same amount as those wanting full support.
    Incentivized
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    Usability
    Quest Software
    Overall, the software is simple to understand and use. That said, most vendors have been slowly updating their user interfaces to HTML5 so that they have a clean updated look and feel. This is where KACE falls short in that the UI is great for a packaged software 10 years ago. This isn't a major limitation as the software is really meant primarily for technology users.
    Incentivized
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    SolarWinds
    As far as rating for usability is concerned I would give 10/10 as NTA is very easy to use. All you need to do is install that module and ask network Team to configure the Netflow towards Server IP. [The] rest is pre-configured and reports are pre-built. Moment you receive the flows from Network all you will have is information about traffic.
    Incentivized
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    Support Rating
    Quest Software
    KACE does exactly what you need it to do, it maintains your computer environment. You can set patch schedules, inventory computers, setup software catalogs; basically everything you need to ensure the computers on your network are being actively managed. This is all with little need for constant configuration or updating the setup.
    Incentivized
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    SolarWinds
    I know we could probably pay for it, but it would be nice if we could get to a tier 2 technician faster. Spending a couple of hours on the phone with the level 1 technician, when we have already tried the troubleshooting they are walking us through, is just a waste of time.
    Incentivized
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    Online Training
    Quest Software
    No answers on this topic
    SolarWinds
    The training offered by SolarWinds is some of the best out there. They have several different videos that go into great detail from initial setup to advanced configurations. In addition to the view at your own pace video, they also have live training for customers that focus on a single product and you can ask questions with the folks who develop the software. I have had good success with their live sessions and getting questions answered.
    Incentivized
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    Alternatives Considered
    Quest Software
    We have selected this software because it rolls several different systems into one. We have a helpdesk system with this and an asset and inventory management system as well. We pay one price for the whole system instead of paying multiple companies different amounts that would have totaled more than we pay for the single system.
    Incentivized
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    SolarWinds
    SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer compared to Wireshark and PRTG Network Monitor beats it by just the simple interface. Though all are manual setup, NTA takes it a step further with graphs and reports that analyze the data for you. In comparing to Extrahop from a bandwidth comparison, Extrahop wins but Extrahop is a lot more than just a bandwidth monitoring and cost.
    Incentivized
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    Return on Investment
    Quest Software
    • KACE has saved us from having to spend several days of employee hours in crafting DVDs and duplicating them (100+ DVDs)
    • KACE has saved us on the postage required to send out those DVDs for every update (monthly) to all of our customers electronically
    Incentivized
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    SolarWinds
    • Be prepared to answer lots of questions. When people see the data in NTA they are going to want to know why App A is talking to App B. Be ready to explain!
    • Hand the keys to the NTA kingdom to the network team. They will thank you. Everyone wants to have friends on the network team, right?
    • Be prepared to invest in some significant compute and storage performance to keep up with your NTA monitoring
    • Running the latest firmware for your network gear is (often) required to take advantage of all the flow-monitoring. You upgrade regularly, right??
    Incentivized
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    ScreenShots