Item: SolarWinds SQL Sentry
Rating: 9
Author: Verified User

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

SQL Sentry is being used to monitor performance and support troubleshooting issues in our SQL Server infrastructure. It provides thorough and more complete information than the native tools. We use it across the main SQL Server Farm by a team of 5 DBAs

Pros and Cons

Provides a real-time view of performance.
Provides comparison to historical performance baselines.
Has valuable reports for the executive summary.

Difficult to limit email alerting to only actionable events.
Drill down in the event calendar is difficult and can be confusing.

Alternatives Considered

Redgate SQL Monitor and Idera Uptime Capacity Monitor

SQL Sentry gives a more complete view of the environment with the advantage of making recommendations of fixes to performance issues.

Other Software Used

Oracle Application Express

Likelihood to Recommend

This product has value for medium to large SQL Server infrastructures. Smaller instantiations of less than 10 instances will derive value but not as much as those organizations with 10 or more servers to monitor. SQL Sentry's newer product (SQL Sentry Essentials) is the appropriate choice for these cases.

SQL Sentry - Best of Breed

Overall Satisfaction with SQL Sentry

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Pros and Cons

Alternatives Considered

Other Software Used

Likelihood to Recommend

SolarWinds SQL Sentry Feature Ratings