Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (Formerly DCNM) vs Fortinet FortiSIEM comparison

The compared Cisco and Fortinet solutions aren't in the same category. Cisco is ranked #16 in NMS , with an average rating of 8.2, and holds a 0.5% mindshare in the category. Fortinet is ranked #7 in SIEM , with an average rating of 8.1, and holds a 3.3% mindshare. Additionally, 92% of Cisco users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 82% of Fortinet users who would recommend it.

Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabri...

Read 25 Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (Formerly DCNM) reviews

839 Views
822 Comparison Views

92% willing to recommend

Fortinet FortiSIEM

Read 74 Fortinet FortiSIEM reviews

5,920 Views
4,203 Comparison Views

82% willing to recommend

Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabri...

Fortinet FortiSIEM

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (Formerly DCNM) and Fortinet FortiSIEM based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out in this report how the two Network Monitoring Software solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.

To learn more, read our detailed Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (Formerly DCNM) vs. Fortinet FortiSIEM Report (Updated: May 2020).

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (Formerly DCNM) vs. Fortinet FortiSIEM

May 2020

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Helped 861,390 peers since 2012

Review summaries and opinions

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

Categories and Ranking

Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabri...

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Network Monitoring Software (16th)

Fortinet FortiSIEM

Average Rating

7.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.5

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) (7th)

Mindshare comparison

Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (Formerly DCNM) and Fortinet FortiSIEM aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (Formerly DCNM) is designed for Network Monitoring Software and holds a mindshare of 0.5%, up 0.4% compared to last year.
Fortinet FortiSIEM, on the other hand, focuses on Security Information and Event Management (SIEM), holds 3.3% mindshare, up 3.0% since last year.

Network Monitoring Software

Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)

Featured Reviews

Upul Abhayasena

Manager - Technology at a engineering company with 10,001+ employees

Robust management tool with an easy setup and room for more features

DCNM is used by one of the airline customers in Qatar to manage many data centers and rack switches running on normal Nexus or NX-OS mode. They required a controller platform to manage these Nexus switches, and thus, they utilized DCNM as a Fabric controller. Given that ACI deployment is very low…

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Oliver Jackson

Network Engineer at Laminar Communications Pty Ltd

Systems monitoring enhanced by firewall and intrusion detection features

My primary use case for Fortinet FortiSIEM is systems monitoring and alerting. I use it for standard functions like log monitoring, incident detection, and notification. My customers are mostly medium-sized enterprises ranging from engineering companies, mining companies, independent schools, and…

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The monitoring capability is the best in Cisco Data Center Network Manager. It helps me improve network management tasks and optimize processes."

"VCNM provides a unique capability of managing the admin VDCs of Nexus boxes."

"I like that is easy to work on and straightforward."

"The feature I find most valuable, is the stability of the solution."

"The most valuable features of Cisco Data Center Network Manager are consistency and the core server. The teams have had a good experience."

"The most valuable feature is the connectivity monitoring."

"Monitoring system provides a clear indication of what's going on in the network."

"You can integrate all the networks into the software."

More Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (Formerly DCNM) pros

"Analytics is the most valuable feature. The business service summaries in the dashboards and the correlations for the SIEM are also valuable features."

"I like FortiSIEM because it integrates natively with our other Fortinet solutions and the Fortinet Fabric, but it also integrates with Cisco, Palo Alto and other security fabrics."

"The most valuable features of the solution is its integration with other technologies, especially its ability to collect logs from Cisco and Aruba devices along with Fortinet products."

"It is used as an alerting platform."

"This solution offers extensive customization options, making it possible to adapt it precisely to their requirements."

"The Threat Hunting feature provides complete traffic analysis."

"The most valuable feature is the anomaly-reporting alarms."

"The CMDB and the device discovery features are most valuable."

More Fortinet FortiSIEM pros

Cons

"The automation feature could be improved."

"One of the biggest challenges is that we aren't always able to push the configuration onto the target device. Whenever this happens, we have to do a factory reset, put on the script, and then reconfigure it again. In the next release, I would like to have a troubleshooting feature."

"The visibility of applications is not great."

"The delivery Cisco Data Center Network Manager could improve if it was easier. Additionally, some feature improvement is needed."

"The configuration is too complicated and you have to create templates and use a lot of menus."

"The tool should be more user-friendly and improve AI integration."

"If the customer thinks about using additional solutions, Cisco should make sure they are not left out."

"It's a relatively expensive product for some clients."

More Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (Formerly DCNM) cons

"The deployment of the platform took some time to set up and configure."

"The product does not have Security Orchestration and Automation Response, I would recommend adding this feature."

"The only drawback is the licensing model. It can get expensive if you want to integrate more solutions."

"Sometimes, if there are changes made by a user on a database server, it can be difficult to get that information on the fly. I would like to see a situation where once I specify a user with the database server I need, and with the changes they have performed on that, I don't need to continue my search pattern to drill down just to get the information."

"FortiSIEM could be better integrated with other vendors."

"Their product support, in general, is not that great. The product support is in the same ecosystem. Their support is improving but it's not that great.vvv"

"Patching is not great - we're not getting the support we'd expect."

"Their technical support is horrible. By horrible, I mean a train wreck of a disaster that has fallen off a bridge and caught fire."

More Fortinet FortiSIEM cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"On average, Data Center Network Manager's pricing isn't too costly unless you choose a premier license."

"I would say that the pricing offers great value for the money."

"When we purchase a Nexus box, the MDS CM license comes with it."

"The solution is very expensive."

"The tool is always expensive, but their service, product quality, and support are good. We're happy with it, but it's still an expensive solution. There are cheaper alternatives but no similar platform across all domains."

"We usually opt for a yearly plan, commonly for three or five years upfront. Some customers may not utilize all the features included in the product, and this can lead to them paying for functionalities they don't need."

"The price of Cisco Data Center Network Manager is expensive compared to other vendors on the market."

"The product is licensed with contracts that work on a yearly basis rather than a monthly model."

"The price is competitive."

"Manageable, however would be better as pay as you go versus CapEX."

"There is a need to make yearly payments towards the licensing charges attached to the product. The free version license of the product is available for two months."

"The price of the solution is expensive. The license is scalable. If there are 10 devices it is simple to license."

"FortiSIEM's licensing is based on EPS, and its pricing is competitive in the market."

"Pricing is acceptable for more than 90% of our customers, as they normally get discounts."

"If one is cheap and ten is expensive. I rate the tool's price as an eight out of ten. Compared with Splunk or Oracle, Fortinet is cheap."

"Fortinet FortiSIEM is very cost-efficient compared to other SIEM solutions."

More Fortinet FortiSIEM pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

15%

Government

12%

Financial Services Firm

Real Estate/Law Firm

Computer Software Company

14%

Financial Services Firm

Comms Service Provider

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Cisco Data Center Network Manager?

It uses push technology, which pushes the changes to all relevant devices to ensure they are updated accordingly.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco Data Center Network Manager?

The tool is always expensive, but their service, product quality, and support are good. We're happy with it, but it's still an expensive solution. There are cheaper alternatives but no similar plat...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Cisco Data Center Network Manager?

In a mixed architecture where Nexus switches are used as border devices and are connected to a Palo Alto firewall (e.g., version 9.1 or 10.1), you might encounter issues with BGP peering. For insta...

See all answers

What do you like most about Fortinet FortiSIEM?

Fortinet FortiSIEM needs to provide better API integrations to users.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fortinet FortiSIEM?

The pricing is reasonable, which is why it is preferred by government customers. Windows agent licenses cost around 3,000 Rupees per device per year.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Fortinet FortiSIEM?

Fortinet FortiSIEM should broaden its remediation part to include more features for incident management. Currently, to manage repetitive incidents or for remediation, I need to use a separate softw...

See all answers

Comparisons

Cisco DNA Center vs Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (Formerly DCNM)

Compared 61% of the time

Zabbix vs Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (Formerly DCNM)

Compared 15% of the time

SolarWinds Network Automation Manager vs Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (Formerly DCNM)

Compared 14% of the time

Icinga vs Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (Formerly DCNM)

Compared 10% of the time

More Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (Formerly DCNM) Competitors

Wazuh vs Fortinet FortiSIEM

Compared 13% of the time

IBM Security QRadar vs Fortinet FortiSIEM

Compared 12% of the time

Splunk Enterprise Security vs Fortinet FortiSIEM

Compared 9% of the time

LogRhythm SIEM vs Fortinet FortiSIEM

Compared 7% of the time

Microsoft Sentinel vs Fortinet FortiSIEM

Compared 5% of the time

More Fortinet FortiSIEM Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (Formerly DCNM)

July 2025

Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (Formerly DCNM) report

Download Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (Formerly DCNM) product report

Buyer's Guide

Fortinet FortiSIEM

July 2025

Download Fortinet FortiSIEM product report

Also Known As

Cisco Data Center Network Manager

FortiSIEM, AccelOps

Overview

The Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (NDFC) offers a comprehensive solution for managing Cisco NX-OS switches in hybrid-cloud environments, providing automation, visibility, and consistent operations. Designed to simplify and enhance data center management, NDFC integrates with Cisco Nexus Dashboard to streamline network connectivity, reduce deployment times, and ensure seamless transitions with minimal disruptions. Its modular architecture, new user interface, and support for non-Nexus OS platforms make it a robust tool for LAN, SAN, and IP Fabric for Media management. Additionally, NDFC enhances fabric reliability, automates workflows, and supports cloud connectivity with AWS and Microsoft Azure, making it ideal for businesses adapting to increasingly complex digital environments.

Cisco

FortiSIEM (formerly AccelOps 4) provides an actionable security intelligence platform to monitor security, performance and compliance through a single pane of glass.

Companies around the world use FortiSIEM for the following use cases:

Threat management and intelligence that provide situational awareness and anomaly detection
Alleviating compliance mandate concerns for PCI, HIPAA and SOX
Managing “alert overload”
Handling the “too many tools” reporting issue
Addressing the MSPs/MSSPs pain of meeting service level agreements

Fortinet

Sample Customers

Banco de Guayaquil, Cox Communications, Kuwait Petroleum Italia, Roper St. Francis, University of British Columbia

FortiSIEM has hundreds of customers worldwide in markets including managed services, technology, financial services, healthcare, and government. Customers include Aruba Networks, Compushare, Port of San Diego, Cleveland Indians, Infoblox, Healthways, and Referentia.

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (Formerly DCNM) vs. Fortinet FortiSIEM

May 2020

Free Report: Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (Formerly DCNM) vs. Fortinet FortiSIEM

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