IBM Tivoli NetCool vs SolarWinds Network Configuration Manager comparison

"The solution has very good integration capabilities."

"NetCool has a huge database that can collect and process about one million alarms a day."

"Anything is possible with Tivoli. It's quite a robust system."

"The feature I have found most valuable with NetCool is how it collaborates all the alarms, and then it does a predictive analysis, providing a consolidated alarm view and management."

"The tool is much easier to manage than running scripts and figuring out how many endpoints have been exceeded."

"Tivoli NetCool allows us to grasp a lot of data that can be applied toward predictive analytics and auto-remediation."

"Support is one of the best aspects of this solution. NetCool is a good product that has good flexibility. There are a lot of documents available online which is one of the best features of IBM Tivoli Suite. Whenever an issue happens, rather than going to technical support, if you find the exact issue in Google, you can get tech notes for that particular issue."

"The tool had many built-in automation capabilities."

"NCM also helps with vulnerability assessment and remediation."

"What's nice with NCM is you can set up policies that you can then check against the configs to ensure that your device configs adhere to a baseline or standard that you've set in place."

"SolarWinds NCM provides updates on the status of your network infrastructure. If any issues arise, such as a link failure or a device going offline, you will receive notifications and alerts. Additionally, if someone unplugs a cable, SolarWinds NCM will detect it. It also features a Topology Mapper that displays the connectivity of your network devices, giving you a visual representation of the network's structure. With SolarWinds NCM, you have a clear understanding of what's happening within your network and can generate comprehensive reports."

"This solution has helped our organization by allowing us to store all the device configurations for the various network devices in NCM and making it easy for us to retrieve and look them over."

"We push all our configurations to the servers with ease and the logs capture almost all the transactions needed for an internal audit."

"The features we find most valuable is the configuration backup automation, the configuration compliance, the security vulnerability detection and upgrading devices."

"It is pretty straightforward to set up."

"It allows us to manage backups in big companies. It is also useful in managing the configuration changes."

"The solution is not user-friendly."

"The installation could be simplified, and technical support could be faster."

"Tivoli NetCool's has medium scalability - there are some problems with its replications not being mature."

"The solution is too expensive."

"In terms of improvement, I would like to see more AIOps, Artificial Intelligent Operations in the next release. IBM develops new features for Power BI or Cognos Analytics, which is good. As of now, we use Cognos Analytics, we are not using Power BI. They have the Insight concept but we don't like that."

"The installation could be simplified, and technical support could be faster."

"Customization and integration that you need to do to make the product fit your needs is very complex. It is not a product that somebody could easily pick up without any prior training or experience."

"The solution does not have any AI capabilities."

"The Network Configuration Manager needs to improve the access control list compliance."

"Further improvements in automation are needed. Currently, there are limitations in performing tasks without logging into routers directly, and we expect more comprehensive device control."

"We want to be able to store it in a data warehouse format and integrate it with Google single sign-on."

"It would be great if they include a network service manager, network performance manager, or a privileged assessment in the next release."

"There is room for improvement in automation."

"The third-party plugins available in the solution could improve. I have received some issues with the templates."

"I would like to see more features in terms of wireless reporting and more historical information for client connectivity in SolarWinds Network Configuration Manager."

"The only thing that requires some experience, and training doesn't fix, is how to set up your custom policy-based reports to check compliance."

"Customers are required to pay a licensing fee."

"It costs around 100k for every ten servers, which is lower than similar products from other vendors."

"The price of the product is too expensive."

"Licensing fees are paid on a yearly basis."

"With a minimal bundle, we pay about $3000 a year in licensing costs. If you have multiple devices in your network, you must buy the bundle, which is 100% identical for your infrastructure. If you have 15 devices, you need 15 licenses, for example. That's one bundle. You don't pay for anything over and above that."

"We have to pay additionally for its support and maintenance."

"The price of the solution is high compared to other solutions."

"Additional costs beyond the standard licensing fee are inevitable."

"Available at a moderate price"

"I have a yearly subscription."

"Pricing is reasonable and competitive."

"The pricing is good."