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Nagios XI vs Wireshark comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Nagios XI
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
58
Ranking in other categories
Network Monitoring Software (25th), Server Monitoring (14th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (28th), Cloud Monitoring Software (26th)
Wireshark
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
63
Ranking in other categories
Network Troubleshooting (4th)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Network Management solutions, they serve different purposes. Nagios XI is designed for IT Infrastructure Monitoring and holds a mindshare of 3.2%, down 3.7% compared to last year.
Wireshark, on the other hand, focuses on Network Troubleshooting, holds 13.5% mindshare, up 13.0% since last year.
IT Infrastructure Monitoring Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Nagios XI3.2%
Zabbix11.1%
Datadog4.8%
Other80.9%
IT Infrastructure Monitoring
Network Troubleshooting Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Wireshark13.5%
LinkRunner12.0%
NetAlly EtherScope nXG9.0%
Other65.5%
Network Troubleshooting
 

Featured Reviews

Amir  Said - PeerSpot reviewer
Effective alerting enhances network monitoring experience with an easy setup
We love Nagios XI due to the fact that JPS Web is very useful. JPS monitors the modem and performs switching, monitoring the computer, and performing switching. We implement some applications and traffic monitoring. The alerting system is very effective. For instance, if we have an alarm on some RAM storage if the traffic is cut or dropped.
Vijay Duggal - PeerSpot reviewer
Provides detailed traffic analysis and helps troubleshoot issues
There is a disadvantage when it comes to sampling intervals. While the solution supports sampling as fine as one millisecond, it requires a copy at that interval. My Python script allows me to achieve a granularity of up to ten microseconds, but I can't go beyond that. When dealing with provisioning on both issues, it would be beneficial if I could go down to the microsecond level, if not the nanosecond. Additionally, I've heard from a colleague that Wireshark might be less effective in the voice domain.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Nagios XI simplifies our setup and reduces the time spent configuring monitoring tools."
"Nagios XI helps us monitor the bandwidth of the internet connection, HTTP, DNS, active directory services, and exchange data availability. We have multiple servers to monitor databases, availability of servers, and ping."
"The features I've found the most useful are the plug-ins, the fact that you can connect almost everything to it. That's very useful."
"The most useful aspect of this solution is the ability to customize it for the client agent."
"BPI: It allows defining peripherals to map business criticality for efficient monitoring, as required."
"It's a monitoring agent. It's designed to do one thing. Its most valuable feature is its monitoring."
"The solution is pretty stable."
"Nagios XI helped me to draw the network and check for system failures."
"It is a stable product. I would rate the stability a ten out of ten."
"I can save the traffic and analysis when I want to. Also, it's especially helpful to follow the stream (TCP, UDP, etc.)."
"I have found the most valuable feature you can design your sniffer the way you want to."
"It has good basic features."
"The feature to incorporate Voice over IP (VoIP) incidents into network traffic analysis is valuable. Capturing voice or SIP communication allows for examination of interactions between SIP clients and SIP servers. This helps the team investigate or analyze issues related to call center servers and operators."
"The filter option provided by Wireshark is its most valuable feature...Scalability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"The most valuable feature is the traffic gate, which shows which IPs are getting more bandwidth or traffic."
"The drill-down available for packet analysis is great. It gives a network security engineer insight into what is going on at the packet level and enables better troubleshooting."
 

Cons

"The reporting structure could be more streamlined."
"The reporting part should be made simpler. While we can obtain all the reports we need, we always have to create work-arounds to get them."
"The GUI could be improved. It's a bit too basic, and maybe having a GraphQL interface would resolve this."
"Nagios XI can improve network and hardware monitoring, these parameters should be simplified to allow usage for monitoring. Additionally, if there was automatic reporting it would be helpful."
"The scalability of Nagios XI is scalable. However, it is not easy to do."
"The PNP4Nagios plugin not working easily with XI is an issue for me, because some open source monitoring plugins do not work out of the box. But in the end, you learn to live with it."
"The user interface needs improvement."
"The tool's AI model needs to be fixed."
"The solution has a steep learning curve. There are so many filters and features that are frequently being updated, it takes research, experience and familiarity to be able to use them. It could be a lot more user-friendly."
"Whenever we select one of the packets, in terms of the number of bytes, for example, there are three planes, and in the detailed plane, I have to count the number of bytes manually."
"A room for improvement in Wireshark is its ease of use for beginners. It could be better. Another room for improvement in the tool is for it to provide more details about the traffic load. At the moment, Wireshark is adequate for me, so there isn't anything I'd like added to it in its next version."
"Wireshark gets stuck when it is a larger file."
"Wireshark could be improved with a delay option when getting data automatically."
"I have not used Wireshark to an advanced point where I could provide a detailed opinion on improvements needed."
"I would like better control of bandwidth from the service provider."
"Big trace files (more than 1,000,000 packets) can be slow, but then you can use "TraceWrangler" (also free) to help with slicing and dicing the data."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Nagios XI is open source."
"Nagios Core does not have any payment, but Nagios XI requires payment for the license."
"As it is not an agentless tool, I think it is expensive."
"The licensing fees for this solution are approximately $3,000 USD per year."
"We are using the free version of this solution."
"The pricing is high with separate licensing for the product and support."
"The pricing is really cost efficient. The licensing is perpetual and can be renewed very easily."
"This solution is very expensive, at approximately $5,000 USD when I purchased it, which is why I haven't upgraded my version in several years."
"It is free."
"I've never personally had to pay for it, making it a highly valuable internet resource that's accessible for use. While they offer some paid versions, our firm has utilized the free version for the past three years."
"The solution is open source so is free."
"Wireshark is free of charge, and there's no license involved."
"Wireshark is free software, so you can download it and use it for free with no licensing fees."
"I am using the free version of this solution."
"We are using a freeware version of this solution, so there are no licence costs involved."
"It is an open-source solution."
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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
13%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
8%
University
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
Hospitality Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business22
Midsize Enterprise17
Large Enterprise21
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business31
Midsize Enterprise11
Large Enterprise27
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Nagios XI?
The pricing for the Nagios XI product is good and better than other solutions. I would give it a four or five.
What needs improvement with Nagios XI?
The user interface needs improvement. Many tools have poor user interfaces, making them hard to manage and navigate.
What is your primary use case for Nagios XI?
I normally use Nagios XI for our servers. It's not particularly used for network equipment, however, I use it for monitoring our server performance, including CPU, memory, data, and services runnin...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Wireshark?
Wireshark is priced at a medium range, not too high, not too low. The pricing could be more flexible, and they might make it more expensive. That said, compared to other products, it is competitive.
What needs improvement with Wireshark?
The speed of the Internet could be improved, especially its performance. Performance can sometimes be a challenge due to numerous factors.
 

Comparisons

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Nagios has over one million users globally, including AOL, DHL, McAfee, MCI, MTV, Yahoo!, Universal, Toshiba, Sony, Siemens, and JPMorgan Chase.
Comversion, ADP, Talbots
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