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SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor

Overview

What is SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor?

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor (SAM) delivers application and server monitoring capabilities. SAM allows for self-service for easy setup, 1200+ monitoring templates, and customization options, as well as integrate with other SolarWinds products.

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Recent Reviews

TrustRadius Insights

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor is a versatile tool that has been widely used across various industries and departments for …
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TrustRadius Insights
TrustRadius Insights

True Insight

10 out of 10
January 27, 2022
Incentivized
I use SolarWinds Server Application Monitor to monitor my infrastructure as well as applications within that environment. It provides a …
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Awards

Products that are considered exceptional by their customers based on a variety of criteria win TrustRadius awards. Learn more about the types of TrustRadius awards to make the best purchase decision. More about TrustRadius Awards

Popular Features

View all 12 features
  • Server availability and performance monitoring (269)
    9.8
    98%
  • Application monitoring (266)
    9.0
    90%
  • Threshold alerts (271)
    8.9
    89%
  • Out-of-the box templates to monitor applications (256)
    7.9
    79%
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Pricing

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SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor

N/A
Unavailable

What is SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor?

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor (SAM) delivers application and server monitoring capabilities. SAM allows for self-service for easy setup, 1200+ monitoring templates, and customization options, as well as integrate with other SolarWinds products.

Entry-level set up fee?

  • No setup fee
For the latest information on pricing, visithttp://www.solarwinds.com/products/pric…

Offerings

  • Free Trial
  • Free/Freemium Version
  • Premium Consulting/Integration Services

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SolarWinds Pingdom

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Features

Application Performance Management

Application performance management software monitors software to ensure performance and availability

8.7
Avg 7.6
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Product Details

What is SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor?

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor (SAM) delivers application and server monitoring capabilities for IT pros enabling them to diagnose and troubleshoot issues faster. The vendor’s value proposition is that this solution prevents slow applications and downtime from impacting end-users and business services. Users can use this tool to pinpoint the root cause of application issues across various layers of the IT stack.

The vendor says SolarWinds SAM is affordable, easy to deploy, use and customize. Users can automatically discover their systems environment and start monitoring in about an hour. No professional services or consultation needed.

SAM is built on SolarWinds Orion® platform enabling native integration with Network Performance Monitor and other IT management software from SolarWinds.

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor Features

  • Supported: Single Web interface to monitor multi-vendor applications and server infrastructure.
  • Supported: Out-of-the-box monitoring templates for 200+ enterprise applications.
  • Supported: Easily extend monitoring to virtually any custom or home-grown applications.
  • Supported: Gain contextual visibility of relationships and dependencies between applications and physical and virtual servers.
  • Supported: Monitor server hardware health, perform capacity forecasting, and manage asset inventory. Remediate server issues remotely with built-in management actions.
  • Supported: Monitor VMware and Hyper-V environments to identify problems impacting application performance.
  • Supported: Centrally manage IT asset inventory and keep track of server hardware and software information.
  • Supported: Leverage the wealth of built-in alerts and reports, and easily customize them as needed.
  • Supported: SAM is an agentless monitoring software. Optional agent installation extends monitoring to the cloud.

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor Screenshots

Screenshot of Multi-vendor application performance monitoringScreenshot of Multi-vendor server monitoringScreenshot of Application dependency mapping with AppStackâ„¢ dashboardScreenshot of Microsoft Exchange performance monitoring with AppInsightâ„¢ templateScreenshot of Microsoft IIS performance monitoring with AppInsightâ„¢ templateScreenshot of Server hardware health monitoringScreenshot of Built-in virtualization monitoring for VMware and Hyper-V environmentsScreenshot of Easily extend monitoring to any custom or home-grown application

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor Videos

An introduction to and a brief overview of SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor
In this video, the TrustRadius team is going to take a look at Solarwinds Server and Application Monitor, a powerful tool that can help you monitor your systems and identify issues early. We'll explore the overview, user sentiment, pricing, top features, and use-case, and help...
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Watch SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor Training Videos

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor Integrations

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor Competitors

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor Technical Details

Deployment TypesOn-premise
Operating SystemsWindows
Mobile ApplicationNo
Supported LanguagesEnglish

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor Downloadables

Frequently Asked Questions

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor (SAM) delivers application and server monitoring capabilities. SAM allows for self-service for easy setup, 1200+ monitoring templates, and customization options, as well as integrate with other SolarWinds products.

Progress WhatsUp Gold, Nagios Core, and Tivoli Monitoring (legacy) are common alternatives for SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor.

Reviewers rate Server availability and performance monitoring highest, with a score of 9.8.

The most common users of SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor are from Enterprises (1,001+ employees).
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Comparisons

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Reviews and Ratings

(648)

Community Insights

TrustRadius Insights are summaries of user sentiment data from TrustRadius reviews and, when necessary, 3rd-party data sources. Have feedback on this content? Let us know!

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor is a versatile tool that has been widely used across various industries and departments for monitoring and managing servers, applications, and network infrastructure. Users rely on the software to ensure that critical systems are up and running smoothly. With its ability to monitor servers, applications, and network nodes, customers appreciate the comprehensive insights it provides into their IT environments.

One of the key use cases of SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor is its role in proactive monitoring and alerting. Users have praised the software's capability to detect issues such as CPU utilization, memory usage, response time, and low disk space. By setting up corresponding alerts, users can address potential problems before they impact end-users. This proactive approach helps prevent system failures and ensures optimal performance.

Another important use case of SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor is its ability to provide detailed insights into server metrics and application performance. Users can monitor various elements such as CPU, memory, and disk usage on servers, as well as track the health of applications like Exchange, SQL, IIS, and SharePoint. The software's integration with other products in the SolarWinds Orion family enhances network management capabilities, allowing for a unified view of segmented networks.

Additionally, SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor is valued for its flexibility in monitoring different types of systems and services. It supports Windows, Linux, Unix, and AIX servers both on-premises and in the cloud. Users have leveraged the software to monitor services, processes, URLs, IP addresses, MAC addresses, SMTP devices like networked cameras, and even Linux services such as IPTables. This broad range of monitoring capabilities makes it a valuable tool for organizations with diverse IT infrastructures.

Overall, SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor has proven to be instrumental in maintaining system stability by providing real-time alerts for potential issues and facilitating efficient troubleshooting. Its ease of use and customization options allow different departments and administrators to tailor monitoring and alerts to their specific needs. The software's comprehensive insights, proactive monitoring, and wide range of supported systems make it a valuable asset for organizations looking to ensure optimal performance and availability of their IT infrastructure.

Customizable Dashboard: Users appreciate the fully customizable dashboard in SolarWinds SAM, which allows them to tailor it to their specific requirements. This feature has been mentioned by several reviewers and enables users to easily access the information they need for effective monitoring.

Proactive Alerting: Reviewers have praised SAM's proactive alerting capabilities, with alerts being triggered for offline servers, low disk space, rebooted servers, and critical network device outages. This feature has been highly valued by users as it helps them stay on top of potential issues and address them promptly.

Reporting Capabilities: SAM's reporting capabilities have received positive feedback from users who find the detailed reports provided by the software helpful for meeting regulatory requirements and ensuring system stability and performance. The granularity in alerts and reporting has been mentioned by multiple reviewers as a valuable feature of SAM.

Confusing User Interface: Users have expressed frustration with the user interface of SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor, stating that it is confusing and difficult to navigate. Some users feel that there is a steep learning curve and find it overwhelming, especially for first-time users.

Lack of Comprehensive Documentation: Several users have criticized the documentation provided for SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor, stating that it is spotty and lacking in examples. They believe that more comprehensive and detailed documentation would greatly aid in understanding and troubleshooting the software.

Poor Customer Support: There have been complaints about the customer support provided by SolarWinds. Multiple users have reported that customer support has worsened over time, causing frustration due to delays in reaching the correct support team and resolving issues in a timely manner.

Users have recommended several key actions for users considering SolarWinds based on their experiences. These include:

  • Recommending utilizing the software for internal use, specifically for monitoring servers and applications.
  • Suggesting taking advantage of the free trial to test the software before making a purchase decision.
  • Advising researching and planning before implementation to ensure the software is suitable for one's needs.
  • Encouraging careful design of the environment, especially when using the software in different locations.
  • Recommending purchasing a license that matches the number of components needed for monitoring.
  • Urging cautiousness when it comes to support and potential glitches with the software.
  • Suggesting working with a detail-oriented engineer for proper setup and configuration.
  • Promoting interaction with the user community site to learn from others' experiences and share knowledge.
  • Emphasizing the need to understand the licensing model before signing up and selecting appropriate licensing based on the number of nodes to be monitored.
  • Suggesting exploring other SolarWinds offerings and using them in conjunction with this software.

While users find SolarWinds to be a valuable tool, they also mention that it may not be suitable for beginners due to its learning curve. Overall, it is recommended to carefully consider setup, pricing, and requirements before implementing SolarWinds.

Attribute Ratings

Reviews

(51-75 of 278)
Companies can't remove reviews or game the system. Here's why
September 25, 2020

Best for Network monitoring that can also monitor servers, storage, databases and application!

Verified User
Engineer in Information Technology
Computer Software Company, 1001-5000 employees
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Likelihood to Recommend
For anything to do with network monitoring switches, routers and such SolarWinds is very good and highly recommended.
For open source tools for example Linux, Ceph KVM, etc., I can say SolarWinds has plenty of room for improvement, this is also true for hardware monitoring of servers such as IPMI.
September 03, 2020

SAM Review

Verified User
Administrator in Information Technology
Hospital & Health Care Company, 5001-10,000 employees
Score 6 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Likelihood to Recommend
SAM allows for specific, custom and in depth monitoring. However, the node based pricing makes the cost justification difficult for the majority of nodes that only use a few component monitors.
August 21, 2020

Application monitoring made easy using SolarWinds SAM module

Verified User
Project Manager in Information Technology
Pharmaceuticals Company, 10,001+ employees
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Likelihood to Recommend
It's easy to use and navigate and provides a lot of features to monitor servers and applications. It covers a lot of customer needs and can do a lot of customization using the scripting option provided in the SolarWinds SAM module.
July 24, 2020

My Opinion on SolarWinds SAM

TK
Tim Kovars
Sr. Systems Engineer
Quarles & Brady, LLP (Law Practice, 1001-5000 employees)
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Likelihood to Recommend
I feel it shines in monitoring a mix of virtual and physical servers. There are other products that have issues with that physical piece, but SAM doesn't care which one it is. While a bear to maintain at times, the custom-ability is another place it does well. Being able to monitor things not included/out of the box is a key feature. The user community is strong and has a lot of useful input.
July 22, 2020

SolarWinds makes sure we're in control!

Verified User
Manager in Information Technology
Information Technology and Services Company, 201-500 employees
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Likelihood to Recommend
SolarWinds Server is ultimately suited for small to mid-sized companies wanting to monitor their in-house applications and servers, as "one pane of glass" - tool for the internal IT Department. Also suited for managed services providers as allows for 'multi-tenant' setup. Less suited for specific applications that are not supported out-of-the-box or for companies running iSeries.
July 20, 2020

SolarWinds SAM - one stop shop for monitoring your enterprise

Verified User
Administrator in Information Technology
Civil Engineering Company, 1001-5000 employees
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Likelihood to Recommend
Discovering applications such as Exchange, SQL, and SharePoint for monitoring is very straightforward. The basic thresholds are very good, however combining thresholds for applications and OS sometimes cause issues. As an example, Exchange will use as much RAM as the OS has available which in turn will trigger OS alerts due to high CPU memory utilization.
July 17, 2020

SolarWinds makes your life easier and your network more efficient.

CG
Callen Gilmartin
Network Services Specialist
Nevada Legislature (Government Administration, 201-500 employees)
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Likelihood to Recommend
The best use for SolarWinds is a comprehensive organizational and network monitoring tool. The network atlas/mapping tool is extremely useful for visualization of the physical locations of cameras, switches and numerous other network devices. SolarWinds is not the be-all-end-all when it comes to performance, however. It should be used only on large-scale server clusters that can handle the load efficiently.
July 17, 2020

Mission Critical, we can't live without Server and Application Manager.

Verified User
Engineer in Information Technology
Telecommunications Company, 501-1000 employees
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Likelihood to Recommend
SAM is both extremely easy to use out of the box, as it is customizable for advanced users and complex environments. The user community is an outstanding resource for users trying to take their monitoring to the next level using advanced scripts and customization. I still struggle with full app stack monitoring, and we lack visibility with some of our custom apps (Java), where I'm hoping to see some growth out of the AppOptics purchase.
July 17, 2020

I am a new user with great power in his hands.

Verified User
Employee in Information Technology
Mining & Metals Company, 5001-10,000 employees
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Likelihood to Recommend
We have an internal data transfer application that is used and it can calls multiple side-application.
With all the application monitored, we know where there's a bottleneck when the end-user doesn't receive his data.

By having everything monitored in SAM, we know exactly where it goes wrong and where to address the issue.
July 17, 2020

SolarWinds SAM Review

Verified User
Professional in Information Technology
Information Technology and Services Company, 11-50 employees
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Likelihood to Recommend
If you need an application to help with database performance then this is a fantastic tool. It can do all kinds of databases and the connection set-up is very easy. I personally use this on both SQL and Oracle, but Oracle is our main focus.
July 15, 2020

be prepared to roll up your sleeves

BB
Bret Brutlag
Sr. Systems Administrator
GateHouse Media (Newspapers, 5001-10,000 employees)
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Likelihood to Recommend
With a limited operations staff it would be next to impossible to get the insight into all the server and applications stacks in our environment. The reality is that there would be issues that would go undiscovered for who knows how long. If there's no smoke you might not notice many issues. SolarWinds Server & Application Manager (SAM) has worked well for us to work with application owners to show that performance issues that they may perceive are not part of the environment but the application configuration. The biggest benefit to me is just shortening the time to resolution for issues and more importantly providing me with information that allows me to be proactive and attack problems before they are noticed by our users.
July 14, 2020

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor: a must have tool for IT departments everywhere.

Verified User
Executive in Information Technology
Hospital & Health Care Company, 5001-10,000 employees
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Likelihood to Recommend
SAM can be a very valuable tool to help troubleshoot application performance issues. There are so many features and tools that you can go as deep as you would like. Options such as Application Dependency Mapping provides insight to the connections coming into a server and you can also monitor response times to help pinpoint issues (is it the server, client, network, etc.). Because we utilize Cisco UCS servers for our voice infrastructure, the ability to monitor the health and performance of those servers is critical. Similar insight to our HP server infrastructure is also available using SAM.
July 14, 2020

Infrastructure at a glance with DB as a side note

ZAREH OHANIAN (MSM, CISSP, ITIL) | TrustRadius Reviewer
ZAREH OHANIAN (MSM, CISSP, ITIL)
Infrastructure and Security Operations
SatelliteHealthcare (Health, Wellness and Fitness, 1001-5000 employees)
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Likelihood to Recommend
I see SolarWinds to be an invaluable tool for an infrastructure team for Network as well as DB monitoring point of view. It is not a tool to perform application performance troubleshooting, but can assist in that area indirectly.
July 14, 2020

Out of the box SAM is great! Can't wait to fully deploy and watch the magic happen

Jeff Allen | TrustRadius Reviewer
Jeff Allen
Director of IT
Beavers Holdings (Food Production, 201-500 employees)
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Likelihood to Recommend
Again, not fully deployed. Where it has made a big impact is visibility of our exchange server, SQL server, and virtualization to prevent issues from rising during the production day. I will note that SAM brought to my attention a server that was using up way too many resources for its role, and after investigating, we identified the server was hacked.
April 24, 2020

One monitoring tool for all your application monitoring needs

Verified User
Administrator in Information Technology
Banking Company, 1001-5000 employees
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Likelihood to Recommend
Best suited if you are interested in monitoring applications (SQL/SharePoint/IIS, etc.) running on your server. To just monitor the CPU/memory/hard disk, if you already have SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor, that would be enough. Even though monitoring systems like SCOM can do the same thing, SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor is much easier to configure as there are inbuilt templates for each.
April 16, 2020

Good tool for application monitoring, with its limits

Lasha Jojua | TrustRadius Reviewer
Lasha Jojua
Head Of IT Monitoring
adjarabet.com (Gambling & Casinos, 1001-5000 employees)
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Likelihood to Recommend
Agent install is really easy when simple applications are used. But, only install, then you need to do almost everything manually, check/search/try and mostly again one more circle. One case I had with Redis app, data about one app server cannot be checked on one page, if you don't do some custom dashboards, oh, dashboards are fully editable. TBH, after almost 2 year, am still searching how to. Overall, tool does what it is for.
March 29, 2020

Satisfied with SolarWinds SAM?? I AM!!

Ramoan Seymour | TrustRadius Reviewer
Ramoan Seymour
Sr. Network Engineer
Institute of Nuclear Power Operations (Utilities, 201-500 employees)
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Likelihood to Recommend
It is well suited for monitoring IIS Websites and keeping track of associated components like app pools, expiring certificates, With Server and Application Monitor, you can detect and be alerted when app pools have degraded. It also allows you to see how much resources an app pool uses so that you can make a decision on increasing the resources.
March 22, 2020

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor Review

Verified User
Team Lead in Customer Service
Hospital & Health Care Company, 5001-10,000 employees
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Likelihood to Recommend
SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor is perfect for monitoring infrastructure and drive space. It works well for multi-tenant environments, as that is the way we are currently using it. You can use PowerShell to write custom monitors for your specific applications in your environment. It has a configurable web interface that allows for easy setup.
March 20, 2020

SolarWinds Assessment -- Can we monitor the monitoring system?

Verified User
Employee in Information Technology
Hospital & Health Care Company, 1001-5000 employees
Score 5 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Likelihood to Recommend
The size of our environment seems well suited to SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor. There are about 2000 nodes, 13000 elements, 6000 volumes, and 4000 interfaces. I am sure it can be scaled up to accommodate larger organizations, but that would require additional investment in hardware. The server requirements are very high and pushing desired guest Virtual Machines specifications on our current hosts. Unfortunately, being a Health Care organization is not a good fit when not having high availability implemented. I do not have experience with other large scale enterprise monitoring systems, but reliability is my concern with SolarWinds.
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