Cisco Intersight vs SolarWinds NPM comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary
 

Categories and Ranking

Cisco Intersight
Ranking in IT Infrastructure Monitoring
26th
Average Rating
7.8
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Management (15th)
SolarWinds NPM
Ranking in IT Infrastructure Monitoring
4th
Average Rating
8.2
Number of Reviews
150
Ranking in other categories
Network Monitoring Software (4th), Cloud Monitoring Software (6th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2024, in the IT Infrastructure Monitoring category, the mindshare of Cisco Intersight is 2.8%, up from 2.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds NPM is 4.3%, down from 4.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
IT Infrastructure Monitoring
Unique Categories:
Cloud Management
2.0%
Network Monitoring Software
5.2%
Cloud Monitoring Software
6.9%
 

Featured Reviews

Hussein Taha - PeerSpot reviewer
Nov 21, 2022
Expands well, offers great features, and gives a great inside view of all our data centers
The major challenge for us and for Cisco Intersight is the upgrade process. Sometimes when we ask for the upgrade, we had to have a discussion internally with the team and with our Cisco tech engineer regarding the latest version. The current version for us was 4.52B and we were exploring the idea of moving to 2C, and they recommended going first to 2E. When we asked why they told us that version was very stable and came highly recommended. I know there is a difference between the long-term upgrade and the feature upgrade. Sometimes you need the new batches to eliminate any vulnerabilities or fix any bugs.
RK
Jul 2, 2024
Optimally utilizes the resources of the underlying hardware used for monitoring and management and offers a very good GUI
SolarWinds is always up to date with the latest versions and firmware. The earlier challenge of increasing resources has been solved since moving to the cloud. We can now increase resources anytime and reduce downtime for monitoring services. With around 10,000 devices and 30,000+ elements, manual monitoring during downtime was a headache. But now there is no problem, as we can increase the underlying infrastructure resources in real-time, and performance is increased on the SolarWinds cloud. We lack database monitoring. I have proposed that the DPA license be onboarded for database monitoring. In the current infrastructure, database monitoring is done manually. I have proposed this enhancement to the client, but there are some commercial constraints. It is in process, and maybe next year, they will budget for it. The market is changing, and people are expecting automation. I think that's a disadvantage, but it's temporary because SolarWinds is continuously pushing clients to onboard the observability AI feature. They have already worked on it, and people only need to invest in it and onboard to meet the current market requirement, which is AI-driven automation for monitoring and decision-making.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"Provides an overall view using a single portal."
"The product has good integration."
"The tool helps to manage Cisco servers."
"Scalable portfolio of services for remote device management, with good cloud integration. It's also easy to set up."
"Cisco Intersight has valuable features for workflow automation and inventory administration."
"We enjoy having an inside view of all the data centers and all the EdgeX nodes within a single portal rather than going into the EdgeX connections one by one."
"I like Intersight because of the integration with HashiCorp, Kubernetes, and each cloud because Intersight is the IO module."
"Intersight can validate our environment."
"This solution offers a very good view of our network and allows us to effectively monitor performance."
"The solution is extremely stable. We haven't had any issues in that regard. We haven't had issues with bugs, glitches, or crashes."
"The most valuable feature is the way it monitors the environment, and how user-friendly the console is for the end-user. The interface is also very easy and it captures all the information very well."
"The solution is very user-friendly."
"The product is lightweight in terms of memory use, requiring only 10 megabytes or less."
"Technical support has always been great. They are very responsive. We've been satisfied with their level of support."
"SolarWinds' network and server application monitoring features are strong."
"I found a lot of valuable features in SolarWinds NPM, such as the customized application monitoring that allows you to customize any monitoring and script customization, and you also have the option to deploy and upgrade SolarWinds NPM online, which is very useful for my organization."
 

Cons

"The unique problem with Cisco Intersight is that it's not supporting some players."
"When new features are added, the service becomes full of bugs."
"The product could be easy to use."
"The solution needs some enhancement in order to build the cluster in two nodes."
"Cisco Intersight needs some improvement in terms of stability. Hybrid cloud management and proper hyperscaler tie-up are other areas for improvement."
"An area for improvement in Cisco Intersight is automation. It needs more automation capabilities. Apart from enhanced automation, I want Cisco Intersight to integrate with third-party monitoring tools in its next release."
"It's a very complex solution."
"In the future, the solution needs to plan on an extension to cover a broader range of objects since, at present, there are some Cisco devices within the range of Intersight UCS that it can't manage."
"Fortigate firewalls are one example of a product that we are unable to monitor properly via SolarWinds NPM."
"The integration needs to be improved."
"In terms of scalability, there is room for improvement. When you start monitoring, if you have so many interfaces and you're trying to monitor them at a faster interval, or a shorter interval, you get to a point where you need to request another node."
"One of the challenges with SolarWinds is that in order to pull the data, we have to have a lot of false positives."
"The solution is not always good with new features, so it's take a long time."
"Consolidation of platforms would provide a smoother experience."
"The evaluation time for the product is too short especially for large corporations."
"An area for improvement would be the use of modular licenses, which are not practical for big clients."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Cisco Intersight has competitive pricing. On a scale of one to five, my rating for its pricing is four."
"Cisco Intersight is not cheap, but it's not the most expensive product either."
"It's just the standard licensing cost. There are no additional fees."
"You can get a free license for monitoring but need to purchase a license if you need extra control."
"The product is cost-effective."
"We pay approximately $4,000 annually for SolarWinds NPM. There are no additional fees required other than the standard fees."
"I find that the pricing is acceptable."
"The cost of the personal perpetual license for SolarWinds NPM is approximately $2,000."
"It is expensive."
"Licenses depend on the number of devices, but all license levels come with technical support."
"The NPM component of the system costs approximately $1,000 USD per year."
"SolarWinds NPM is very expensive, and we pay ten thousand yearly."
"SolarWinds is expensive. That's why it's primarily banks using the solution. Small businesses can't afford it. Due to its pricing, most smaller enterprises like manufacturing companies are not interested. For example, we have a client who is also interested in traffic monitoring, but they are not purchasing SolarWinds because of the cost."
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Comparison Review

it_user174738 - PeerSpot reviewer
May 31, 2015
Nagios vs. Zabbix vs. PRTG vs. Spiceworks vs. Solarwinds Network Performance Monitor
I have researched a quite a few network monitoring tools which can be used for various monitoring purposes of not only the servers, but the intermediate routers as well. There are majorly three types of these softwares. Ones which are completely open-source, you can do almost anything you want…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
44%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Healthcare Company
5%
Educational Organization
53%
Computer Software Company
7%
Manufacturing Company
5%
Government
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Cisco Intersight?
Intersight can validate our environment.
What needs improvement with Cisco Intersight?
We used the solution's automation capabilities, but it wasn’t easy. It was part of why we took some time to deploy the solution. It didn't give us much value. It wasn't that good. Intersight is a p...
What is your primary use case for Cisco Intersight?
We use the solution for server management across various locations.
What is the best network monitoring software for large enterprises?
It actually depends on the exact purpose or kind of devices (network devices, servers, something else). Some tools are better for only network devices while others are better for a cloud monitoring...
What is the best network monitoring software for large enterprises?
We are partners with SolarWinds and we sell a lot of Network management to large enterprises also because of scalability, products like Network Performance Monitor & Netflow Traffic Analyzer ar...
 

Also Known As

Intersight
Solarwinds Network Performance Monitor, SolarWinds Network Bandwidth Analyzer
 

Learn More

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Overview

 

Sample Customers

EXMAR, RapidScale
Microsoft, Federal Express, Hewlett-Packard, and MasterCard
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Intersight vs. SolarWinds NPM and other solutions. Updated: July 2024.
793,295 professionals have used our research since 2012.