SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer Reviews and Ratings

Rating: 5.7 out of 10

Score

5.7 out of 10

Community insights

TrustRadius Insights for SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer are summaries of user sentiment data from TrustRadius reviews and, when necessary, third party data sources.

Pros

User-Friendly Interface: Users appreciate the SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer for its straightforward and easy-to-understand interface. They find it intuitive and user-friendly, even for new users with minimal training.

Real-Time Analysis and Support: The tool's real-time analysis capabilities and support services are highly valued by users. They mention that it helps them promptly identify and resolve performance issues in SQL databases, such as errors, long-running queries, or system-blocking problems.

Wide Range of Supported Databases: Users find the extensive range of supported databases to be a valuable feature of the tool. It allows them to monitor and analyze the performance of multiple databases from one centralized interface.

Reviews

113 Reviews

DPA Delivers Tremendous Value

Rating: 10 out of 10

Incentivized

August 2, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Our e-commerce platform = crown jewels (i.e. all revenue flows in via website). Knowing the in/outs of DB performance is a business requirement.

DPA is a *tremendous* tool. It provides a deep dive across all critical metrics on our ORA RDS & EC2. I find the table/query advisories to be of great use.

Would deploy across any DB if I could - the info is gold.

Pros

Drill-down into expensive queries.
Table/Query Advisor.
Easy to interpret graphing.

Likelihood to Recommend

DPA would be useful in QA if one could run load simulations against the site/DB. Probably not viable for a lot of companies - though the cost per instance is peanuts.

Michael P. O'Hara

Head of Cyber Security in Information Technology at The Avon Company (now owned by LG H&H) (1001-5000 employees)

Vetted Review

3 years of experience

View profile

Hands Down: SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer Beats SQL Profile and Database Engine Tuning Advisor

Rating: 10 out of 10

Incentivized

April 21, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Spitfire deploys a software platform backed by a Microsoft SQL Database with over 140 tables and more than 650 procedures. The size of the database typically surpasses millions of records and several hundred GB. SQL creates query plans that differ for each client depending upon their unique distribution of data. Some have only a few dozen projects a year - others a couple of thousand. Clients create budgets with different levels of detail and then create material purchases - sometimes one line each, others 500 lines. So a one-size-fits-all query is a challenge. SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer gives us real-time, ongoing visibility into the performance of our queries across a real-world deployment.

Likelihood to Recommend

This is an easy 10 because I actually have recommended this product to multiple clients and colleagues! Any shop that writes its own SQL queries will benefit from the insight provided by SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer, so they know which of their queries is causing a bottleneck. Small shops or databases with only a few tables likely will see far fewer opportunities for optimization.

Pros

Identifies objects causing bottleneck by real wait time
Identifies specific section of a large query that needs attention
Lets you see what index is actually being used
Helps you see if CPU, RAM or DISK is the limiting resource

Cons

View Plan Details is actually a bit weaker than SSMS because all the lines are the same width
The "View SQL Text" viewer could be fancier - but it does clearly identify the problem section

Stan York

VP of Development in Information Technology at Spitfire Management, LLC (11-50 employees)

Vetted Review

4 years of experience

View profile

SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer is a great addition to your DBA and Development toolkit

Rating: 8 out of 10

Incentivized

April 21, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer is our primary monitoring and analysis tool for our SQL server instances. We leverage it for both production and non-production environments. It gives us visibility into system and query performance, alerts us to issues so they can be remediated, and allows us to dig into performance trends of queries and look for key opportunities to make our systems more performant. It is used both by our DBAs and our development team.

Likelihood to Recommend

I believe that SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer is a great choice for an organization that does not have a specific DBA or one that is still growing into the role. SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer is filled with hints, tips, and explanations of the various readings and metrics. This is very useful to help understand what is happening and why, what it means, and what some potential solutions are towards remediating any issues. This is extremely valuable for our development team, allowing them to be more proactive with the queries they write in viewing how they perform and where bottlenecks might be.

Pros

Ease of configuring alerting
Excellent tooltips and descriptions of issues
Clear breakdown of multiple metrics and performance statistics
A plethora of metrics are captured for analysis

Cons

Being able to alert on blocked sessions over a time period, rather than a flat value threshold

Verified User

Manager in Information Technology (501-1000 employees)

Vetted Review

2 years of experience

SolarWinds Database Performanc Analyzer - DPA Saves The Day!

Rating: 10 out of 10

Incentivized

February 4, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

The tools you decide to use in your environment are only as good as the effort put in to make it a valuable asset to your organization. We run a Computer Aided Dispatch application that looks like a wagon wheel with interfaces. The application interfaces communicate to a database instance running in a cluster. Database Performance Analyzer has allowed our organization to fine-tune the database to the extent that we now know exactly when the database may be experiencing issues. The issues before used to be queries and users (machines). The database is running so efficiently now, we drill down to the machine that is causing the issue. It is generally a user that has kicked off a query that they should be running against the reporting server, not the live database. DPA is an amazing tool. I have a dashboard of off the "current" 10-minute slice in time. I can tell by a visual look if something is not right.

Likelihood to Recommend

Database Performance Analyzer is a great fit for any database big or small. We also use it to monitor our GIS Database which is only accessed by a single user at this time. The tools assist in providing efficiency recommendations. When anyone uses a database, performance always seems to be an issue. DPA allows you to monitor systems, providing information to database administrators on how they can better manage the database. There are so many aspects to managing a database, it is really nice to have a tool that displays those granular issues that could never be solved without visibility into how the applications are interacting with the database.

Pros

Great Visual Display from Console - at a glance you can tell if there are issues
Drill down on a single query to get recommendations on tuning the statement
Automated Notifications, which can be customized / modified
Live view on Storage I/O
Resource Monitor is a plus - CPU Utilization - Instance and OS

Cons

Recently addressed - protect the supply chain
I can't keep up with all the improvements to tell you the truth ... Database Performance Analyzer is Awesome
Demo Database Performance Analyzer - you will not be let down
Join THWACK so you get the most out of your product. Great forum to get answers from colleges that may be experiencing the same issue!

Jennifer Aguilar

Senior Network Administrator in Information Technology at County of El Paso 911 District (11-50 employees)

Vetted Review

7 years of experience

Verified on LinkedIn

Best Commercial Analysis Tool for Your SQL Server

Rating: 10 out of 10

Incentivized

January 20, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer has been a crucial part of maintaining uptime on our databases. It helped find many issues, current or historical, on our databases. The main use case for getting SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer in the first place was to find out why we were having application problems and remove the black box state of our databases. Except for this, SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer has proven useful in other areas as well such as the overall maintenance and performance analyzing of our databases.

Likelihood to Recommend

Currently, we use mostly use SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer for:

<ul><li>Database alerts</li><li>Quick Analysis of performance for both the database and the server hardware</li><li>Root cause analysis of historic issues</li><li>Suggestions on improving the databases</li></ul>

Pros

Database performance analysis
Root cause analysis
Database alerts

Cons

Database job analysis
Tuning alerts as they are not as critical as they appear to be on the dashboard

Andre Du Plessis

Senior Developer in Information Technology at Johnson Matthey (1001-5000 employees)

Vetted Review

7 years of experience

View profile

Great Database Performance Analyzing and Monitoring Tool

Rating: 9 out of 10

Incentivized

January 19, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer (DPA) is used by our organization for monitoring our Oracle and SQL Server Databases. It is a complete Database monitoring and performance management tool used by our Database Team for optimizing Database performance and fine-tuning. It identifies bottlenecks and root causes for any issues related to the database. It has inbuilt anomaly detection for proactive monitoring (machine learning). It helps identify issues related to Storage IO, provides Query and Table Advisors for fine-tuning database queries, resources being used by the databases (CPU, Memory, Disk, ASM, etc.)

Likelihood to Recommend

It helps identify underlying issues with the database, related to database performance, slow response, and long-running queries. It pinpoints application-related issues due to database performance. It is cross-platform and can support Oracle, SQL Server, and other database platforms on Windows, Red Hat, and Solaris.

Pros

Anomaly Detection.
Optimizing Database Performance.
Tuning Advisors and Query Wait Time Improvements.

Cons

Integration with Orion Platform.
Product Cost is High.
Anomaly Detection is only available for certain Database attributes (Wait Time).

Verified User

Consultant in Information Technology (201-500 employees)

Vetted Review

4 years of experience

DPA is hell lot of a Business for Database world

Rating: 10 out of 10

December 23, 2020

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We are using Solarwinds Database Performance Analyzer for few of our customers to help in monitoring their Database Environment which includes Microsoft SQL, Postgre SQL, Oracle etc. Solarwinds DPA is primarily used by Database Administrators, Application Engineers (Read Only) and Tools Administrators. There are few interaction with Key Management stakeholders for data analysis but its relatively less.

Likelihood to Recommend

Solarwinds Database Performance Analyzer is well suited in below Scenarios -

1. End to End Database Instance Monitoring.

2. Database in Clusters Monitoring such as Availability Group in MS SQL, CDB in Oracle etc

3. If you want detailed monitoring with historical analysis.

4. SQL Statement Deep Dive Analysis for WAIT Time reason, Blockers, Deadlocks etc

Solarwinds DPA is not well suited if you are looking for Detailed VM, OS monitoring where Database is installed.

Pros

Multi Vendor Databases Monitoring
Agentless Monitoring
Less Dependency on DB Admins
Less Resources consumption on target databases
API based integrations

Cons

Cloud Database Monitoring such as Google native SQL service
Modern (no SQL ) database monitoring
Dashboard Flexibility
Reporting Flexibility

Nikhil Kumar Sharma

Associate Consultant in Engineering at HCL Technologies (10,001+ employees)

Vetted Review

5 years of experience

View profile

DPA offloads developers onto a tool rather than a person

Rating: 7 out of 10

Incentivized

December 19, 2020

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

It is being used mostly by the development team as a self service gateway to view the database transactions that they don't have physical access to. This allows the database team to not have to take time out of their day to perform query analysis, etc..

Pros

It allows us to have a gateway to the databases that the users would not normally have access to.
It allows the database admins to not have to provide analysis as users can do their own through the interface.
It's a quick place to do an initial view into performance issues for DBA.

Cons

Would be nice to have more granular permissions.

Likelihood to Recommend

It's well suited as a self help tool. It really saves time on our team so we don't have to provide guidance on issues or questions.

daniel harty

Operations Manager in Information Technology at Kayak software (1001-5000 employees)

Vetted Review

3 years of experience

Faster resolution in the blink of an eye

Rating: 9 out of 10

Incentivized

December 18, 2020

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer is used by the whole department, mainly for addressing performance issues; deadlocks; growth of database; DB reports; server reports; CPU, memory, and disk health; and their storage.

We're also setting up alerts as per the requirement.

Pros

Tuning
Deadlock issues
Blocking
Alerts
Reports
Performance tuning

Cons

Graphical representation of SQL agent jobs
Easy to create any graphs by adding tables or columns
Change the home page for more options
Best possible recommendations

Likelihood to Recommend

If your operation is data driven, then you need to improve performance where SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer helps. It is helpful if you have a big environment where your databases are dependent on timely fixes. It can also be used for resolving application deadlocks and the health of the database--also setting up alerts and adding more custom graphs.

Verified User

Manager in Information Technology (10,001+ employees)

Vetted Review

6 years of experience

SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer solves problems that OEM can't even recognize are occurring

Rating: 10 out of 10

Incentivized

December 14, 2020

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

[SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer is] used to monitor the performance on mission critical application databases, both bespoke and packaged applications. For bespoke applications, it is used to ensure that the code developed by our technology partners meets or exceeds the defined SLAs, as well as to alert of problems before they become critical issues. For packaged applications, it has been used to extract detailed information on performance issues, such that we were able to log extremely detailed issues with the vendors, such that they have all of the information needed to correct the underlying issue. For example, we were able to extract the run time of stored procedures, including all of the SQL statements executed, such that the vendor was able to pinpoint the issue rapidly and provide a resolution.

Pros

Maintains historical SQL execution data, enabling forensic analysis
Has the ability to slice and dice the data so that you can drill down to the execution of a single SQL statement being executed by a stored procedure
Alerts to when the consumption pattern changes
Shows historical average run times against the current, illustrating problems when they arise
Provides tuning advice based on best practices

Cons

Everything is displayed visually, if you need detailed metrics, you have to extract manually, it could use a report writer with export to Excel.
When a SQL statement is very long running, i.e. longer than the display interval, the display says that there are no statistics, it should on the other hand, show that the SQL statement is still running.
When you name a SQL statement, it should be by DB, rather than global

Likelihood to Recommend

Very appropriate for use in performance testing

Very appropriate for alerting to performance issues before they become critical

Can be challenging when monitoring an Oracle active-active RAC database, as each instance is effectively a separate database.

Verified User

Employee in Information Technology (1001-5000 employees)

Vetted Review

13 years of experience

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Reviews and Ratings

SolarWinds Database Performanc Analyzer - DPA Saves The Day!

Rating: 10 out of 10

Incentivized

February 4, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Likelihood to Recommend

Pros

Great Visual Display from Console - at a glance you can tell if there are issues
Drill down on a single query to get recommendations on tuning the statement
Automated Notifications, which can be customized / modified
Live view on Storage I/O
Resource Monitor is a plus - CPU Utilization - Instance and OS

Cons

Recently addressed - protect the supply chain
I can't keep up with all the improvements to tell you the truth ... Database Performance Analyzer is Awesome
Demo Database Performance Analyzer - you will not be let down
Join THWACK so you get the most out of your product. Great forum to get answers from colleges that may be experiencing the same issue!

Jennifer Aguilar

Senior Network Administrator in Information Technology at County of El Paso 911 District (11-50 employees)

Vetted Review

7 years of experience

Verified on LinkedIn