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SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor: THE leader in network monitoring
Updated July 17, 2020

SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor: THE leader in network monitoring

Anonymous | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor (NPM)

SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor is being used primarily by the Network Team to monitor for various alerts directly related to the network infrastructure. There is a limited number of other teams within our organization that use it mainly to monitor bandwidth and CPU utilization. We have a lot of infrastructure. Without NPM we could have extended outages. It allows us to see issues and address them right away.
  • Alerting is easy to set up and customize--without good alerting, why bother?
  • The custom charts can be a real lifesaver at times. Many times I have been asked to essentially prove that a particular network component or circuit was not to blame. Custom charts make it quick and easy to put a graphic together to share.
  • Easily customizable dashboard with widgets galore allows us to see the things we really care about at a glance.
  • I personally find the maps a little cumbersome to work with. Yeah, you can create one pretty quickly, but it's a bit of work to make it look nice.
  • The upgrade process hasn't gone as smoothly as we expected in the past. We haven't upgraded to 2020 yet, so maybe that will go better.
  • I wish I could provide more cons, but it really is a great product. If they can make the maps easier to deal with, and streamline the upgrade process, it will be nearly a perfect product.
  • Gives us good visibility into the network health, which reduces downtime
  • Let's us know when certain parts of the network are reaching critical thresholds, which allows us to fix problems, before they become a problem.
We really haven't had the need to shop around for other platforms, since we're completely satisfied with SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor. There is a group within our organization that does use Netcool. The comparison isn't even close. SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor is the leader in this field.
Monitoring network infrastructure (routers, switches, LAN/WAN circuits) is where SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor really shines. I frequently use it to pull historical graphs to show other teams where specific network components were either behaving properly or poorly at times of observed issues.

NPM doesn't have a whole lot of drawbacks. I guess you could say that server type devices don't benefit from it as much as network infrastructure.

SolarWinds NPM Feature Ratings

Network Performance Monitoring
8.6
Automated network device discovery
8
Network monitoring
10
Baseline threshold calculation
8
Alerts
10
Network capacity planning
8
Packet capture analysis
8
Network mapping
6
Customizable reports
10
Wireless infrastructure monitoring
8
Hardware health monitoring
10

SolarWinds NPM ROI Questions

Yes - I'd rather not say, but our old monitoring platform did not work very well. Let's just say that Solarwinds is a leader; maybe the leader, in the monitoring field.
  • Product Features
  • Product Usability
When we initially demo'd the product, it was readily apparent that it had the features that we needed. NPM does everything you need in a monitoring platform, and it does it exceptionally well. I'm really not sure how I can elaborate on that any more. It's a great product, and I recommend it.

Using SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor (NPM)

20 - The primary users of NPM are the network team in order to monitor routers. switches, firewalls, and load balancers. We do have a small number of non-network IT folks that use it to monitor specific subsets of the Kohl's network that are important to them.
3 - We have a small number of network team members that support NPM, but once it's up and running there isn't much to worry about. There's they typical admin work of adding and deleting devices when needed, updating maps, etc. Other than that there's occasional version updates. It's all pretty easy stuff that does not require a high level of technical skill.
  • We recently started monitoring our Cisco ASA firewalls that were previously monitored by a different platform. We were pleasantly surprised by how much better Solarwinds worked for this.
  • I can't say there is much else that would strike me as unexpected or innovative. It does what it's supposed to do and it does it well.
  • We need to set up more alerting for sure. We currently only have email alerts for our "critical" devices, and sometimes other device problems slip through the cracks. That's all on us though and not on NPM.
It's a great product that does what it's supposed to do. Ease of use is also a big factor. It's very easy to use and maintain. It really is a leader in the monitoring field.

Using SolarWinds NPM

ProsCons
Like to use
Relatively simple
Easy to use
Technical support not required
Well integrated
Consistent
Quick to learn
Convenient
Feel confident using
Familiar
None
  • Adding new nodes to monitor is super simple and intuitive.
  • Drilling down into a node to find the details that you are looking for is very easy. I could teach a non technical person how to do this in just a couple minutes.
  • The graphs are really nice and easy to navigate.
  • I cannot overstate the ease of use of this platform. If I had to pick something I'd say setting up custom monitoring by MIB browsing is cumbersome. However, doing that with any monitoring platform would be cumbersome. I really can't list any faults that I've noticed. It's a well polished product.