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N-able N-central vs. SolarWinds Network Automation Manager (NAM)

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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    N-able N-central

    Score9.2 out of 10
    N/AMSPs and IT professionals use N-able™ N-central® to monitor and manage devices and complex networks remotely. N-central provides visibility and efficiency as the user's needs scale. N-central can help users: 1. Proactively monitor everything on a customer network—not just servers and workstations—and troubleshoot. 2. Stay on top of threats with features like MFA, antivirus, integrated endpoint detection and response, data backup, disk encryption, email protection,…N/A

    SolarWinds Network Automation Manager (NAM)

    Score8.1 out of 10
    N/ASolarWinds Network Automation Manager is designed to scale to environments of all sizes while providing comprehensive performance, traffic, WAN, and switch port monitoring, automated change and configuration, and IP address management in a single, unified software solution. Key differentiators: Customizable, single-pane-of-glass network monitoring software Topology- and dependency-aware intelligent alerts Real-time config change…N/A
    Pricing
    N-able N-centralSolarWinds Network Automation Manager (NAM)
    Editions & Modules
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    N-able N-centralSolarWinds Network Automation Manager (NAM)
    Free Trial
    NoYes
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeOptional
    Additional Details—SolarWinds professional support is included to help customers on active maintenance 7 days a week, 365 days a year. We can help you get back up and running when issues occur to keep your systems meeting your needs. Ask your account manager for more information about SolarWinds Premier Support offerings.
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    N-able N-centralSolarWinds Network Automation Manager (NAM)
    Considered Both Products
    N-able
    No answer on this topic
    SolarWinds
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    73%
    Would buy again
    11 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Delivers good value for the price
    79%
    Delivers good value for the price
    11 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Happy with the feature set
    80%
    Happy with the feature set
    12 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    60%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    6 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Implementation went as expected
    77%
    Implementation went as expected
    10 Answers
    No answers on this topic
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    User Ratings
    N-able N-centralSolarWinds Network Automation Manager (NAM)
    Likelihood to Recommend
    8.7
    (25 ratings)
    9.5
    (2 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    9.1
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Usability
    7.3
    (7 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Support Rating
    1.0
    (8 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    8.4
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    N-able N-centralSolarWinds Network Automation Manager (NAM)
    Likelihood to Recommend
    N-able
    N-Able is perfect for an MSP environment. It gives all the standard functionality an IT professional needs out of the box and can be configured to show almost anything required. For example, we have configured a dashboard to show when our backups need attention for each customer. This is achieved by running a small script on repeat via N-Central everyday/evening, and the result gives us information on the dashboard to help us identify exactly what is working and what needs looking into.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SolarWinds
    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
    Read full review
    Pros
    N-able
    • Remote tasks - entry-level techs can run basic tasks without physically touching a piece of equipment.
    • Remote support - remote controlling user devices is easy and saves a lot of time with having to initiate a remote session.
    • Management of devices, particularly patch management and anti-virus management - you can automatically approve and deploy patches and schedule automatic AV scans.
    Read full review
    SolarWinds
    • Fault and Performance Monitoring
    • Devices Configuration Backup
    • IP Address Management
    • Voice Infrastructure Monitoring
    • Users Ports monitoring
    • Netflow Traffic Utilization
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    N-able
    • Customer support just points to online guides and I feel they aren't helpful.
    • During the trial they turn on a lot of features. In my experience, if you play around with the features, they charge you for them. Keep this in mind if you move forward with N-Able - they will charge for "trialed" services.
    • In my experience, some services that you're being charged for can't be disabled or monitored by you or your team. You only see them on the monthly invoice.
    • In my opinion, the "Scripting Automation" doesn't provide value. You're either going to be writing your own batch or Powershell to make scripting work.
    • In my opinion, monitoring software deployments is painful.
    • The default monitoring template can't be duplicated, edited, or referenced. You'll find that the default monitors in an unusual way and will throw needless recurring alerts into your ticketing system. To avoid this, you need to create a template from scratch which takes many hours to set up.
    • In my opinion, they're more concerned about a quick buck than customer service. "Buyer beware" company.
    Read full review
    SolarWinds
    • Support for more call infra provider vendors
    • Cloud Network Monitoring
    • Event Management
    • Predictive Intelligence using AIOps and ML
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    N-able
    Overall we have liked our solar winds experience, however, as our company has grown to support larger enterprises, this product does not have the functionality that our teams need in order to fully support them. The lack of granularity with backups and lack of ability to support nutanix environments is slowly drawing us into the use of other tools.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SolarWinds
    No answers on this topic
    Usability
    N-able
    The user interface is fairly straight forward, with logic groupings for objects. I did not deploy this software, but am one of the daily administrators. Once you get the correct agent package (Which can be a challenge) the integration into AD is not bad. The UI could be more customized, but that may have been a design choice.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SolarWinds
    No answers on this topic
    Support Rating
    N-able
    Every time we have reached out to SolarWinds they are quick to respond, even offering support chat 24/7. Their support team is great and works with you to find solutions to issues. They have taken items we had issues with before and used those to create updates so that the issue is handled better in the future.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SolarWinds
    No answers on this topic
    Implementation Rating
    N-able
    Make sure if you your using a vm you follow the instructions for provisioning to the letter or it will be starting from square one
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SolarWinds
    No answers on this topic
    Alternatives Considered
    N-able
    Our version of SolarWinds was old and running on old hardware, but it was way easier to setup and do things with. It did not do everything N-able does such as patch management, or at least we didn't have a module to do so if one existed. However it definitely seemed easier to use and possibly more stable.
    Read full review
    SolarWinds
    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
    Read full review
    Return on Investment
    N-able
    • We have lost hundreds of hours on the phone/emailing support with no resolution for any of our issues
    • We had to move all of our services away which was very painful
    • Staff satisfaction was low having to deal with this company
    Read full review
    SolarWinds
    • 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
    Read full review
    ScreenShots

    N-able N-central Screenshots

    Screenshot of N-able N-central DashboardScreenshot of Remote desktop access with Take Control

    SolarWinds Network Automation Manager (NAM) Screenshots

    Product screenshotProduct screenshotProduct screenshotProduct screenshotProduct screenshotProduct screenshot