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SCOM vs SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer 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:
 

ROI

Sentiment score
6.4
SCOM users experience varied ROI, with advantages in monitoring and management offset by potential licensing costs and latency issues.
Sentiment score
4.0
SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer offers ROI through bandwidth management, yet budget-conscious users consider cheaper alternatives with similar features.
There is a return on investment when purchasing SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer, as in the long run, there is a return on investments.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.8
Microsoft customer service is generally viewed positively, with efficient assistance and experienced staff, despite occasional consistency issues.
Sentiment score
6.5
SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer's customer service receives mixed feedback, with varying response times and expertise contributing to inconsistent experiences.
They often treat issues in isolation, not considering how one problem might relate to another.
When I was working directly with Microsoft at TCS, my first company, the support experience was quite smooth, and we received solutions promptly.
They often say that only premium subscribers receive support within one or two hours.
I would rate support eight out of ten.
I received efficient responses to many questions.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
6.9
SCOM offers scalable management, efficient load balancing, and high availability but faces challenges with non-Microsoft integration and diverse device monitoring.
Sentiment score
6.6
SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is scalable but costly, with performance challenges in large infrastructures due to licensing and capacity limits.
The scalability of SCOM, meaning its ability to adapt to our needs, is excellent because we are working with SQL systems and multiple servers.
SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is a scalable solution, and by adding licenses, I can use the same deployment and instance to onboard more elements and nodes.
The license is based on the count of the ports.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.1
SCOM's stability has improved significantly, especially in newer versions like 2019, with proper configuration and resource allocation.
Sentiment score
6.4
SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is stable and reliable, though occasional performance issues exist, especially in demanding environments.
I have not seen many errors or frequent data loss because once we have installed the agent on the system and have the details, not much manual intervention is required.
SCOM is a bit unstable lately, primarily due to a lack of resources.
 

Room For Improvement

SCOM needs better dashboards, lower licensing costs, easier integration, improved reporting, enhanced support, and efficient alert management.
SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer needs improved integration, AI, documentation, performance, security, UI, and reduced licensing costs for better user experience.
I would like to see a software-as-a-service version in Azure to eliminate the need for on-premise infrastructure.
SCOM is likely to be phased out in favor of more compatible tools like Icinga for application monitoring or when moving to cloud solutions like CloudWatch and Azure.
It would be beneficial to have a summary on one single dashboard, as there are many more possibilities available.
Ideally, NetFlow should have a robust alerting mechanism.
It should be like a Meraki cloud, where if you are familiar with Meraki devices, you can locate any device directly on the world map.
Deployment needs improvement; the process is complicated, requiring attention to infrastructure settings and installation of components like the origin application server, platform, close storage, and policy agents.
 

Setup Cost

SCOM pricing varies with agreements, often part of cost-effective Microsoft packages, though licensing can be complex initially.
Enterprise users find SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer valuable, though its pricing can be high compared to alternatives, especially when scaling.
provide a rating of nine out of ten
SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer's model is quite costly compared to other brands.
 

Valuable Features

SCOM efficiently monitors Microsoft environments with integration, customizable dashboards, real-time reporting, and automated alerts for proactive management.
SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer provides traffic analysis, bandwidth monitoring, and customizable reporting for efficient network management and performance tracking.
It assists me in detecting server downtime and delivers basic performance monitoring right out of the box.
The most valuable feature of SCOM is its monitoring capability, and we have integrated SCOM with Grafana, which is a dashboarding tool.
SCOM integrates several systems and offers correlation features, like setting up everything around Active Directory or DNS.
It provides proactive monitoring, rather than waiting for applications to go down due to heavy bandwidth or latency.
This tool provides insights into top utilization applications or it identifies which circuit or application is consuming the most on the complete one-gig circuit traffic path.
The bandwidth indicates the utilization of the devices; if any issue occurs, it triggers an alert for me.
 

Categories and Ranking

SCOM
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
83
Ranking in other categories
Event Monitoring (4th), Network Monitoring Software (13th)
SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic ...
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
43
Ranking in other categories
Network Traffic Analysis (NTA) (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Network Management solutions, they serve different purposes. SCOM is designed for Event Monitoring and holds a mindshare of 8.9%, up 8.4% compared to last year.
SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer, on the other hand, focuses on Network Traffic Analysis (NTA), holds 5.6% mindshare, down 6.6% since last year.
Event Monitoring
Network Traffic Analysis (NTA)
 

Featured Reviews

MarcMermuys - PeerSpot reviewer
Has efficient monitoring with robust integration capabilities
We use SCOM to configure different monitors using several management packs. It integrates systems like Active Directory and correlates them, and it is used for monitoring and managing systems SCOM allows integration of several systems, providing correlation between different systems such as…
Raja Xabi - PeerSpot reviewer
Improved bandwidth management and network visibility have resulted in financial benefits and streamlined operations
There is always room for improvement in SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer, such as implementing instant reporting based on business intelligence reports and more granular filters in their dashboard to improve the GUI view and reporting. The licensing model of SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is always an issue for users because competitors offer unlimited and perpetual licenses, and SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer's model is quite costly compared to other brands. If users are comfortable with SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer, they have to make the hard decision to invest, and it's suggested from a user's perspective that SolarWinds should improve their financial model and licensing to become competitive, especially for small to medium businesses.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
14%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Educational Organization
14%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
10%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about SCOM?
The tool helps to monitor Windows servers. It offers alerts from a central location.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SCOM?
I am not aware of the exact pricing as it is managed by my supervisor. As an academic institution, we receive substantial discounts.
What needs improvement with SCOM?
We believe that the dashboarding in SCOM needs to be improved or enhanced because it is not too expressive in reporting. We can work on deploying new ways of viewing things and modifying visualizat...
What is the best network monitoring software for large enterprises?
I have worked from 1973 with all kind of systems in large enterprises across the world. And have experience with all kind of software in monitoring from infra to end to end, it depends on the funct...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer?
The licensing model of SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is always an issue for users because competitors offer unlimited and perpetual licenses, and SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer's model i...
What needs improvement with SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer?
There is always room for improvement in SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer, such as implementing instant reporting based on business intelligence reports and more granular filters in their dashboa...
 

Also Known As

System Center Operations Manager, SCOM 2012
Netflow Traffic Analyzer
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Dialog Telekom
Oceaneering International, Asia Pacific Network Information Centre, 335th Signal Command, Immofori
Find out what your peers are saying about SCOM vs. SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer and other solutions. Updated: September 2020.
862,499 professionals have used our research since 2012.