Redgate Monitor vs. SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor

With mission-critical SQL Server instances at multiple physical locations and in the cloud, it's critical for us to know immediately when there are performance issues or outages. The Redgate SQL Monitor provides an intuitive dashboard that allows for detailed resource monitoring. Perhaps not as useful in a 100% managed SQL environment.

Incentivized

It is a well-suited software for monitoring and surveillance of your deployed nodes. The error-readability and filter options for filtering out logs and errors could be improved. But overall, it has a good UI design, is user-friendly, and is very easy to learn and access for new users.

Incentivized

• It is easy to use and provides very good reporting on the SQL servers being monitored. These reports are used in our monthly customer reports.
• Redgate does a very good job at improving the product, fixing bugs and adding new features compared to other products I have researched.
• The insights provided makes it an ideal tool for database administrators and software developers.

Incentivized

• Monitor Azure Cloud Severs- We use SolarWinds SAM to monitor Active Directory and DNS on Several DCs published on Azure Cloud.
• Monitor Hyper V and VMware - SolarWinds SAM monitors applications on both Hyper V and VMware, while also monitoring the physical host machines.
• It also helps us monitor Warranty expiration for physical servers.

Incentivized

• Openness - They are too attached to their Intellectual Property to the detriment of usability, stability and reliability. So once its is installed and working leave it alone. Best run it on a VM as that can be restored quickly for when it breaks.
• If they exposed an API/SDK that allowed you to leaver their products life would be far sweeter, it would feel less of a battle.
• Add WebHooks to SQL Monitor to enhance integration to other subsystems.
• Make it easy to install in default mode. So you are not forced to use TomCat Use as ASP.Core Selfl Hosting options.

Incentivized

• Custom application monitors can be a little tricky to configure.
• Logic in custom alerts can be a little hard to follow and figure out.
• Inability to monitor certificates on custom applications or SQL Server.
• Can be a little slow at times with on-prem SQL server.

Incentivized

We are heavily invested in Solarwinds products for a reason. They are generally easy to setup and run with, requiring only some interfacing with support or help articles on rare occasions. They do what we bought them to do and we can't ask for more.

Incentivized

In general, the Redgate dashboard is one of the most thorough yet intuitive products I've had the pleasure of using. Compared to other vendors in different verticals, the Redgate dashboard's deployment, configuration, monitoring, and reporting is second to none

Incentivized

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor is quite easy to use and super versatile. It allows you to do just about anything you can through premade templates or through scripting. You can use an agent on the servers if you want to, or you can monitor through WMI or SNMP credentials. You can customize thresholds for alerting quickly, and you can configure alerts to be as complex or as simple as you want.

Incentivized

The tool works and monitors items 24x7, it only requires maintenance a little more frequently due to security fixes in the Windows operating system.

Incentivized

The graphical interface and the performance of the database leave a little to be desired, they could be better explored.Some functionality and screens do not work well depending on the browser used. The integrations never had any problems or caused crashes in other systems.

Incentivized

Fast support responses from Redgate

Incentivized

I think there was only a couple times I had to open a support case for SAM and one time they got multiple engineers on the phone to get a better idea what I was trying to monitor and was able to point me in the best direction to monitor that system.

Incentivized

It was sufficient to read their documentation and watch videos.

Incentivized

Make sure SNMP and WMI are configured ahead of time

Incentivized

I personally prefer SQL Sentry due to the flexibility in the custom metrics/monitoring but this is still a great product!!

Nagios requires far more manual work to configure than SolarWinds does, though that also encourages customization and perfect-fit solutions. Nagios also requires far, far fewer resources to run than SolarWinds: SolarWinds wants great gobs of memory and disk, while Nagios is refreshingly humble. Nagios starts working from the first minute, too, whereas SolarWinds needs lots of set-up time.

Incentivized

It is hard to find the recommended SQL setup and convince others that is the way you should configure the server when you set it up

Incentivized

• Allows us to proactively fix issues before they happen
• Allows us to quickly react to issues without having to wait for someone else to notice
• Cuts down on the amount of time spent doing daily checks

Incentivized

• Ability to sunset multiple legacy monitoring platforms.
• A single pane of glass across global locations (Enterprise Operations Console) simplifies monitoring for junior staff.
• A single toolset allows staff from across the global environment to share knowledge and quickly set up/modify monitoring.

Incentivized