SolarWinds Remote Monitoring & Management (RMM) is a cloud-based system monitoring offering for Managed Service Providers. It provides a full monitoring and management suite, including automation and threat detection capabilities, and can integrate with other SolarWinds products.
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SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer (NTA)
Score 9.4 out of 10
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SolarWinds 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.
It's great for the basics of device management for Windows PCs, I wouldn't recommend it for Mac other than asset management. The patch management and monitoring templates are helpful for the day-to-day, and the "Take Control" feature for remote assistance allows us to provide fast service to clients - we often are on a machine within 5 minutes of receiving a ticket.
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
It provides fantastic remote access capabilities. The Take Control tool gives us a robust platform that is capable of remote controlling almost any endpoint we need to and the chat, file transfer, and screen recording tools are all exceptionally useful.
SolarWinds RMM is particularly useful as a single pane of glass solution that allows us to monitor and manage thousands of endpoints across dozens of different clients. It does a solid job of allowing us to sort, organize, and filter based off of who and what we want to see at any given time.
Due to its client based nature, the platform excels at in-depth monitoring of services, event logs, and the functionality of systems with custom script checks.
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.
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.
The interface is easy to navigate. Setting up policies is straight forward. The antivirus and web filter are simple and exceptions are easy to make. Upgrading the agent is made simple and creating scripts is made fool proof. (Well, almost)
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.
The ease of use, full functionality, reliability and excellent support.[N-able RMM (formerly Solarwinds RMM)] gives users a full suite of tools with a single installable file. Unlike standard tools, you don't have to install several different executables to be able to have fully protected end points.
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.
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.
Ultimately, we chose to stay with N-able N-sight due to their competitive pricing and billing system that we integrated into our accounting. The other competitors do offer better-made modules/new technology, but we were not ready to make this big move because of the cost. In the future, perhaps, we will still consider NinjaOne.
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.
The ROI is immediate for us. The advanced alerting alone makes this product an ace in our bag. The confidence you have in your network is wonderful.
Another big ROI we get from the advanced alerting is the peace of mind that our engineers feel. We are a 24/7 shop, so being on-call goes from being hectic to extremely manageable.
The only negative I can honestly say is when the time comes to patch the product. Micro-patches are easy enough, but jumping versions can be a bit taxing.
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??
