Azure Network Watcher vs SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer comparison

"The most valuable features I have found are typology, visualization, and capture."

"The stability is very good. I rate it a ten out of ten."

"We use the solution to monitor network services. It helps to capture any network issues."

"It provides good visibility."

"The most valuable feature of Azure Network Watcher is using the gateways with the connections. The monitoring is useful for the logs and application insights into the data. The traffic filtering issues when it comes to deploying those applications are helpful."

"The solution is stable."

"What I like most about Azure Network Watcher is that it's focused more on the architecture. I also like that it has a packet capture feature that tells you how the packet travels and whether it's exiting Azure, etc."

"The solution is good for monitoring device behavior."

"It provides proactive monitoring, rather than waiting for applications to go down due to heavy bandwidth or latency."

"The support is excellent."

"This solution gives us important information about the utilization of protocols, particularly in terms of how often they are used."

"What I like the most is the bandwidth assessment."

"It helps us know when a branch is down because it has a graphic presentation of all the locations a node represents."

"It is great at telling you if your devices are working and it keeps an eye on your network's overall performance."

"The bandwidth monitoring functionality is one of the most important features for our customers. When the customer notices that their bandwidth usage is too high for some reason, they will use the traffic analysis within SolarWinds NTA to identify which protocols (e.g. HTTPS) or applications are using up the bandwidth."

"I find this tool very helpful in identifying the top traffic paths from source to destination, and determining which routes are consuming the most resources."

"User experience could be improved."

"Azure Network Watcher needs to have better documentation and it needs to capture information accurately."

"Azure is good, however, the Fortinet GUI is more intuitive and I like it more than anything else."

"The initial setup and initial learning curve could be improved to be easier."

"I still use Wireshark and Azure Network Watcher to get the required data. My team captures the traffic from Azure Network Watcher, downloads it, then imports that traffic into Wireshark to get more details on the number of hits and replies, for example. If you can do that on Azure Network Watcher and have Wireshark built-in, that would make Azure Network Watcher better. If Azure Network Watcher has that functionality where you won't need a third-party tool to get what you need, that would be helpful. I'm also expecting more from Azure Network Watcher. It's more complex than knowing how the IP flows from its source to the destination. The tool also needs more open-source features, such as having some built-in Wireshark that improves monitoring for customers. Sometimes, you encounter a VPN tunnel, network, or routing issue, but finding out more about the blockage is challenging. Is it one hundred percent an Azure issue? Is it a peer issue? You don't get complete information from Azure Network Watcher, so you must use other tools and depend on your strategies to resolve a specific issue. If more features could be added in the next release of Azure Network Watcher, specifically ones you can find on open-source tools, then that would be a plus point for the tool."

"The initial setup and deployment could be improved to be simplified."

"Technical support from Microsoft needs significant improvement compared to other product vendors."

"The solution could improve by limiting the need to clarify the logs. When the clarification is minimized, it is better for everyone involved."

"The price of the solution is a bit high for our clients. They should consider adjusting their price model."

"It's not a cheap product, so the pricing could be improved."

"This solution does not do a very good job when I am trying to look deeper into my internal network, in particular with respect to individual ports."

"The solution needs better log management and log coordination with tools."

"One area that we struggle with is the price. Because the price of this solution is so high, we are largely unable to introduce it into the local market, and only the banking sector has the means to afford it."

"SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer could improve its flexibility and integration with AI to provide analytics beyond just showing up/down statuses and traffic volumes."

"If your network is on SolarWinds, and you notice that the traffic is bad because it says "user downloading a heavy file," it doesn't indicate which endpoint is downloading those heavy files. SolarWinds doesn't have the tools to be able to handle this kind of situation. You can just notice through your network device that the traffic is becoming overwhelming or heavy, but you cannot go inside and get more details related to the endpoint where it is happening. We would like SolarWinds to be able to handle this kind of situation and even manage the traffic inside a network from the endpoint to the network device. These would be good enhancements. It is mostly stable. The problem comes only when we want to add another SolarWinds model. SolarWinds has so many models, and sometimes when we want to add other models on the platforms that are reserved for our firm, it freezes. When this happens, we have to create a new VM for that model."

"An area for improvement in SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is the dashboarding. The user interface also has room for improvement because it's currently clunky."

"Price-wise, I have no information on how much Azure Network Watcher costs."

"The pricing is good. It's not too expensive."

"Azure Network Watcher is a little bit expensive."

"The price of the solution is reasonable."

"The pricing is reasonable."

"We pay yearly, and we are happy with its price."

"The price of this solution is exceptional."

"SolarWinds' pricing structure is the primary reason why some customers opt for another solution such as ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer. In NTA, you are charged per port, meaning that if you have a 24-port switch you will be charged for 24 individual nodes. ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer, on the other hand, charges per switch, such that if you add a switch, the entire switch will count as one single node."

"NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is reasonably priced."

"I don't have information on the licensing cost for SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer because it's bundled with another SolarWinds solution. My organization has seven different models and pays for the license yearly. My organization also had to deploy additional pollers, but the cost wasn't very expensive, though I can't give the exact numbers."

"For our environment, we pay approximately $25,000 USD yearly."

"We have licenses for SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer. In terms of pricing, its license is not that expensive versus other tools such as HP."