What is our primary use case?
We used NetBrain for troubleshooting our network. For example, it would show an example of latency and then identify where in the process there's a breakdown. We could also see the network traffic, network load, and other statistics.
What is most valuable?
This product has good network monitoring and troubleshooting capabilities.
What needs improvement?
Each device needs to be configured to allow NetBrain to poll for the information it needs, which can be very time-consuming for a large network.
For how long have I used the solution?
At my previous company, I was in charge of the NetBrain implementation for the past five years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
NetBrain is a stable solution.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
In my organization, we had 130,000 network devices that needed to be brought into the solution and mapped. NetBrain can handle the scale but the engineers that manage those devices have to go in and update all of them to allow NetBrain permission to poll them.
It can get a little stressful for everybody when you're trying to roll out new stuff when you've got other issues that have to be addressed with other devices. In some cases, our devices had no automation at all.
One example is the Cisco 3650. Right now, if you went through the inventory list, you see that we have different versions running. Some are on one version, whereas others are on another version. The problem with upgrading them is that they need to be done overnight because we don't want to disrupt any network traffic during business hours. Consequently, it could take us years to upgrade the versions before we can even get them onto these new tools.
This may be an internal issue but it's a big one when you have a lot of devices. Even if you had 10,000 devices, it's still an issue. You have to consider the compatibility of the device against the tool, and being able to use certain commands to upgrade it.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup was lengthy because we had 130,000 network devices and one of the first things is that you need to reconfigure each of the devices. We had to set the security such that NetBrain was able to poll each one and gather the information that it needed.
Corporate security was another department but in order to get a complete view of the network, we had to allow NetBrain to poll the firewall. The security team had a major issue with allowing us to configure the devices so that they could communicate with NetBrain.
Essentially, you can't get complete end to end monitoring unless you've got agreement from all of the organizations that manage network components.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Licensing is based on a per-device basis, which means that it can get very expensive if you have a large number of devices.
We had a problem with NetBrain because we were re-using licenses after a device was retired, and they didn't like that. They wanted to charge us on a per-device basis, where licenses could not be reused. Ultimately, we had to make a decision on what the highest priority devices were because otherwise, it was far too expensive.
Of our 130,000 devices, approximately 30,000 are Wi-Fi and you don't necessarily want them on NetBrain. However, for the remaining 100,000, we wanted to make sure they were covered. The devices included large pieces of equipment such as load-balancers and firewalls. Load-balancers, in particular, are one of the highest priorities.
What other advice do I have?
This tool is exactly what we wanted and needed. The only problem is that it was taking forever, internally, to roll it out because of all of the different constraints and dependencies that you have.
My advice for anybody who is implementing NetBrain is to have a dedicated project manager and, if possible, a dedicated engineer or a few engineers to work on that project. With the setup alone, if you don't set up the hierarchy correctly, you're going to have to go back and change it. You really have to put thought into how you want to build your devices in NetBrain.
I would rate this solution a nine out of ten.
*Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
