NETSCOUT Network & Application Observability Reviews

The major use case for me is that it gives me insight into the consumed bandwidth. My company has 12 sites over one region, and sometimes we have high consumption for the bandwidth. We need to investigate, and NETSCOUT nGeniusONE was able to help me specify what is the source and the destination of this huge traffic. This is use case number one.

The second use case is that we have some applications that have issues in the quality of it or in its operation. We rely on NETSCOUT nGeniusONE to identify whether it is a network latency or application latency or the server itself. Based on the analysis NETSCOUT nGeniusONE can provide, we could specify what the root cause is, whether it is network or application level.

The real-time insights that NETSCOUT nGeniusONE provides are very helpful. We can create alerts and so on, which if there is a latency in some sort of communication, we get alerts. This gives me very sufficient insight about our network and our application performance.

Regarding predictive analytics, it helps to address IT issues. During our implementation, we create predictive alerts, which can give me insight into what the issue is before it begins or enlarges. So we can take action.

It gives me a measurement of whether I am using sufficient bandwidth or not, so the answer is definitely.

They need room for improvement about the spare parts. There are shortages in Egypt in their stock. We tried to make RMA for specific parts, and it took a long time. Comparing this to a vendor like Cisco, who provides any component next business day, NETSCOUT nGeniusONE took a long time. This needs more improvement.

I believe it is expensive. They need to reduce its budget a little bit. Comparing to other solutions, it is very expensive.

I am using NETSCOUT nGeniusONE for about four months, as the phase one implementation finished.

NETSCOUT nGeniusONE is stable. I did not notice any issues in its performance.

It is expandable.

We opened many cases, and they respond, but a little bit slowly. Not compared to Cisco, it is a little bit slow.

We tried Riverbed, a solution from Riverbed, and it was very similar to the functionality of NETSCOUT nGeniusONE. As we use NETSCOUT nGeniusONE only in monitoring network and application performance, Riverbed has a solution with the same capabilities as NETSCOUT nGeniusONE, and it was lower in price.

The setup is very complex.

The biggest challenge was to install the hardware physically. You need to remove all the cables and insert fiber taps, and this breaks down the operation.

NETSCOUT nGeniusONE has a distributor in Egypt. We recalled NETSCOUT nGeniusONE, and they directed us to deal with the distributor.

There is no impact on my IT operations regarding the performance of the product in general, such as network performance. Just the implementation where we disconnect the cables and put the taps during the maintenance window.

Regarding its high price, I give NETSCOUT nGeniusONE a seven.

Our business is not that critical because I am not banking. My operation is providing some sort of service for the National Government section. But it does not give me this impact. So it is just monitoring. I rate this review a seven overall.

Most of the use cases for NETSCOUT nGeniusONE are in network monitoring. There are some people who say it has functions for front-end monitoring, but the majority, especially in banks or insurance teams, are using NETSCOUT nGeniusONE to find error traces, specifically for syslog analyses throughout the packets. Dynatrace and other APM solutions cannot do that, so they are just using NETSCOUT nGeniusONE for network monitoring.

The biggest advantage of NETSCOUT nGeniusONE is that when gathering logs, which require substantial bandwidth of more than 50 TB or 100 TB of data, NETSCOUT nGeniusONE can gather as much as possible. Another feature is their analysis capability, which actually surpasses other APM solutions, which is why customers love it. Toss Bank particularly appreciates the analytic part.

Another valuable aspect is that NETSCOUT is focusing on network monitoring, specifically packet analysis, which sets them apart. This creates a significant difference between Splunk and Datadog. Datadog focuses on infrastructure and application monitoring, while Splunk, which used to handle SIM and log monitoring, is trying to shift to APM; however, they currently cannot find any single customer for APM in Korea. Datadog is performing well by targeting very small customers and selling at cheap prices to ensure wider adoption, but NETSCOUT is unique. They focus on larger finance or manufacturing companies that truly face significant network issues and require specific analysis of each log, though not every customer needs that. These big customers need NETSCOUT, as they operate in a distinct market.

The price is really high, making it difficult for many financial companies to purchase immediately; it will take time for them to afford any budget for the purchase.

The traffic data correlation feature's effectiveness with performance issues for clients remains uncertain as there are questions that need to be addressed through engineers regarding how many customers are actually using it.

Regarding pricing and value for money, while the solution has the potential to save time and money for clients in the long term, monitoring solutions for performance management or network monitoring do not cause immediate damage to a company. It could lead to damage over time, but financial and management teams typically cannot see the immediate crisis. This is why many big companies Samsung and Hyundai try to build their own monitoring solutions using open-source tools and their own engineers, though it has not been successful.

I have been dealing with NETSCOUT nGeniusONE for less than three years, but we already have experience with the DC RUM, which is part of NETSCOUT nGeniusONE.

The deployment process is really complicated and takes time.

There have been some stability problems with NETSCOUT nGeniusONE. Whenever they upgrade the software, issues arise, which is common across all software. However, customers are more sensitive about NETSCOUT nGeniusONE's upgrades because it has hardware. Sometimes customers feel there is a malfunction in the hardware, which is not always the case. There are usually minor issues that occur during upgrades for either minor or major versions. There are small problems, and we often go through patches to resolve the issues. If we cannot resolve them, we apply for RMA to headquarters to get a new device, which usually takes about two months.

Regarding scalability, NETSCOUT nGeniusONE is an appliance that has a collective server and analyzing server. Both of them require the customer to buy huge servers, so physically, it is large. Therefore, scalability is not easy. We are dealing with one company, but it takes time for us and the customer to evaluate whether they can add or purchase more. It is a long-term project, usually taking two or three months to go through POC to ensure the customer can purchase more. It is not similar to software solutions Datadog or Dynatrace where they can easily add agents without problems. Additionally, shipping these servers from the US to Korea takes three to four weeks, making it challenging for everyone.

I am actually happy with technical support from NETSCOUT. In the market currently, there are not many competitors, so there are not many personnel who are experts about NETSCOUT. They do not have enough personnel, but it is acceptable to understand the situation, and we appreciate their support.

Positive

I am not using Catchpoint anymore because Catchpoint is one of the best front-end monitoring solutions in the market currently. Customers think the same thing, but when comparing it to Datadog or other similar options, customers think that in terms of front-end engineering, the front-end monitoring price is actually more expensive than Datadog. Another issue is that in Korea, Catchpoint has a minimum required number of licenses they have to purchase. That number is actually higher than Datadog's. Datadog does not have a limitation and does not require a minimum amount of licenses to be purchased, but Catchpoint has it. Additionally, there is no marketing or sales unit in APAC for Catchpoint; there is nobody working for the marketing activity in Korea.

There is not actually any solution that can cover Datadog, Dynatrace, and NETSCOUT together in the market. Many customers such as Samsung, LG, and Hyundai want a specific solution integrated with NETSCOUT and Dynatrace, but those are two totally different solutions. Whether they have an agent or not, they select totally distinct solutions, so there is no such solution in the market yet, but many customers want to have it.

Cisco recently acquired Splunk and AppDynamics, so they actually call it one team. Cisco is a big company, and they acquired the AppDynamics part two years ago, and they previously acquired Splunk.

We are actually a reseller, but we are not just a regular reseller. We provide technical support that goes far beyond what the actual vendor offers. Even though Datadog or Dynatrace have personnel in Korea, they only have presales engineers who are supposed to support customers to try. However, there is no engineering unit available to support customers after the sale, so we are the technical experts providing the support for Dynatrace, NETSCOUT, and AppDynamics.

Most clients that have NETSCOUT nGeniusONE are using it on-premises. Only one customer, Delivery Hero in Korea, is using NETSCOUT nGeniusONE in a cloud environment with AWS. Most companies will move to the cloud, but some cannot because of security reasons. If they do move to the cloud, they will attempt to purchase NETSCOUT nGeniusONE for cloud use. However, purchasing it based on the cloud means it is based on VM; this makes it cheaper than purchasing big hardware, but that implies that the NETSCOUT Korea sales representative will have smaller benefits.

I would rate NETSCOUT nGeniusONE a 7 out of 10 because it is a really good solution, but we cannot sell it to everyone. We need to target specific clients for specific solutions.

We are a system integrator, and I recommend NETSCOUT nGeniusONE to our customers.

NETSCOUT nGeniusONE helps us by providing root cause analysis when it comes to latency and performance issues. The real-time traffic intelligence is very useful for analyzing data in real time, particularly with comparison between real-time and historical packet levels.

Deep packet inspection is a very useful tool as it works in real time and uses serial packet-level analysis. The network-centric monitoring helps us troubleshoot network performance. The capability of real-time traffic intelligence is also very useful because it allows for the comparison between real-time and historical packet levels.

I would recommend enhancing the APM capabilities. Customers want to have service assurance, including NPM and APM, from one vendor.

We have been dealing with NETSCOUT nGeniusONE for three years.

Datadog is more stable than NETSCOUT nGeniusONE, being a SaaS-based solution compared to on-prem solutions like NETSCOUT.

The technical support by NETSCOUT is good. I would rate their support an eight out of ten, though they need to work on their response time and overall competence.

Positive

We worked with Riverbed before switching since it was expensive and too complicated.

The initial setup is medium in difficulty.

You need to have at least some NETSCOUT experience to have a smooth setup.

The pricing is a bit high yet not overly expensive. The cost depends on the size of the customer, as sizing controls the pricing.

We evaluated Datadog, which is a SaaS-based solution. It has more constraints here due to the inability to use cloud-tier deployment.

I would recommend NETSCOUT nGeniusONE to others yet not for small SMBs due to the pricing. It is important to have the necessary NETSCOUT experience for smooth integration. The automated issue detection sometimes has a few false positives but is overall cost-effective for our customers.

I'd rate the solution eight out of ten.

Negative

Our primary use case for NETSCOUT nGeniusONE is to provide a holistic view of a core banking solution's current networks. It helps pinpoint faults and checks the overall infrastructure to ensure smooth operations.

With NETSCOUT nGeniusONE, the organization was able to achieve real-time data visibility for critical systems, which is crucial for core banking operations. This helps in identifying and resolving network issues promptly.

We utilize the InfiniStream NG appliance for network observation. The packet-based searching capability of NETSCOUT is highly valued as it allows us to better analyze the network. This feature gave us a competitive edge over other solutions such as Riverbed. 

Additionally, the system has helped identify network flaws during POC, which led to immediate purchasing decisions by our end users.

During implementation, we did not encounter any issues with integration. However, it would be beneficial to see more AI capabilities included in nGeniusONE to further streamline processes and allow lower-level tech support to handle issues more effectively without escalating them.

I have been working with NETSCOUT nGeniusONE for just over a year. It was the first project involving this product from my end.

I rate the stability of NETSCOUT nGeniusONE as ten out of ten since we have not experienced any escalations or downtime issues from the end user's side.

I find the scalability of the solution to be ten out of ten. The solution is highly scalable and accommodates the growth needs effectively.

Most of our technical support interactions are handled by the distributor. We haven't directly dealt with NETSCOUT's support, but the distributor's support is rated an eight out of ten, indicating room for improvement in SLA handling.

Positive

I am currently evaluating other solutions like WhatsApp Gold due to pricing considerations. NETSCOUT is more suitable for enterprise-level operations. It can be pricey for smaller clients.

The initial setup is straightforward but involves multiple systems. With NETSCOUT as the last integration, it took a few days to complete the setup, mainly due to system dependencies.

The implementation was managed by the technical engineers from the NETSCOUT distributor. I was involved in the design phase rather than the actual deployment.

The system's ability to prevent downtime represents a significant return on investment, but I do not have specific numerical data.

The licensing cost for NETSCOUT is on the pricier side; however, it is justified by the solution's value. The pricing could benefit from being somewhat lower for broader adoption.

I have evaluated alternatives like WhatsApp Gold due to pricing considerations. While not on the same level, some clients might opt for less comprehensive solutions.

NETSCOUT nGeniusONE is best recommended for enterprise-level organizations, particularly in critical sectors like banking. 

My overall rating for the product is nine out of ten.

The most valuable features of the solution stem from its ability to deal with raw traffic and the fact that you can use it anytime to analyze and find problems, which may not be current ones but issues from a few hours ago. In our company, we see everything when we analyze raw traffic with the tool.

NETSCOUT nGeniusONE is a complex product since it deals in areas like network packet brokers and packet analysis, making the tool complicated for end users. The aforementioned area can be considered for improvement in the product.

I have been using NETSCOUT nGeniusONE for two or three years.

Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten.

Scalability-wise, I rate the solution an eight out of ten. In my company, we use our own components for the systems in our environment.

Our company provides technical support for our customers. I don't know how vendor support works because our team opens a ticket with them to ask questions and provide technical support to our company's customers.

The solution is deployed on an on-premises model because customers don't want to send their data to the cloud. When dealing with big data, there is no possibility of sending it to the cloud.

Monitoring systems with a tool is not done with the intention of calculating ROI because the tool helps find problems that you may find after a year or two. I recommend not calculating the return on investment for the monitoring systems.

There is a need to make yearly payments towards the licensing charges attached to the product. The product may come across as a cheap tool for some, while it may seem costly for others.

My manager can explain the use cases attached to the product. I am a unit leader in my company, and I don't sell the product directly to our partners or customers. In my company, I manage certain processes and a team while building, developing, and providing them with a direction for the market.

NETSCOUT nGeniusONE is a good solution for network performance monitoring since it is not cloud-based. My company sells NETSCOUT nGeniusONE in eight to ten countries.

I think the solution is not good for capacity planning, but it is better to help find problems in applications because not every infrastructure is good at managing working applications. I think it is a solution meant for applications. The tool is useful for solving problems attached to applications.

The tool's real-time network monitoring capability was used when the product was more reactive. In our company, if we use real-time monitoring, then we need to deal with raw traffic. In our company, if we don't see any problem in the real-time systems, we have the possibility to rely on the tool since it acts like a time machine for us, which can allow us to get back to the areas of problem and solve them.

I recommend the product to those who plan to use it. For many users, it can be a good monitoring system that can be scaled up in the future. I think it is a good product to start with when working systems in an environment.

NETSCOUT nGeniusONE is another tool used to manage raw traffic, and I find it to integrate well into our customers' network. I am not using it actively on the system. I use the tool for network packet brokers.

I rate the tool a ten out of ten.

The main strengths of nGeniusONE are its simplicity and the availability of its service. I learned how to use it without any training, and I have been using it for two to three years without any problems.

nGeniusONE could be improved by reducing the number of bare metal servers required to run it. Currently, you need a separate bare metal server for each of the following: Xfinity, ISNG, nGeniusONE, and CFS. It would be more cost-effective and less complex if all of these functionalities could be combined into a single bare metal server.

nGeniusONE is not promoted enough because it has a lot of competitors, such as Huawei and Cisco. The larger companies tend to rely on their own well-known server or server solutions.

So, this product is not promoted enough. 

There are problems with integration as well. In most of our projects, we put that in our scope and limitations. It will not allow admin third-party apps.

In future releases, if they could switch up to the cloud services, that would be better.

I have been using it for several years. nGeniusONE is a very underrated product. It is not as well-known as some of the other traffic visibility solutions, but it is very useful, and I would recommend it.

I am satisfied with the performance of nGeniusONE.

It is a scalable product.

The customer service and support are good. 

Positive

The initial setup of nGeniusONE can be complex depending on the customer's network, location, and size. However, NETSCOUT provides its own standard setup procedures to help simplify the process.

It could improve it more by being more efficient and using less bare metal servers.

Make sure you know the basics. Make sure you read up on the user guide. There are some settings that you just gotta look it up. It is easy to figure out. 

Overall, I would rate the solution a seven out of ten. 

I use the solution in my company to analyze international traffic.

Operations used the solution to gain visibility over bandwidth. Earlier, for workloads, we used to play quality videos in the delivery network.

The tools are part of managed environments, but when the capabilities of the routers need to be increased, we use NETSCOUT to manage things at an international level.

The tool's user interface is okay.

It would be great if the tool could provide alerts during attacks in Spanish. In the next release, if the traffic analysis could send our company an alert before an attack starts, it would be even better. Before an attack starts, seeing the traffic behavior and activities would be great. The tool should also share alerts since it is an area where the product has certain shortcomings.

I have experience with NETSCOUT nGeniusPULSE. I am a customer of the tool.

It is a stable solution. There was a time when NETSCOUT could be deployed and be used with another tool, Gigamon, to monitor a certain portion of the traffic. NETSCOUT can manage it all.

It is a scalable solution, and we use switches in our company to divide the traffic and do the monitoring.

The solution's technical support team consists of good engineers and technicians.

I rate NETSCOUT's customer service a ten out of ten.

Positive

I have used tools from F5 Networks. NETSCOUT nGeniusPULSE is only used for monitoring purposes.

The product's initial setup phase was okay, and a technical engineer completed it by staying with our company for a few days.

I see an ROI from the tool's use since it provides efficiency in operations and visibility, especially when we lack visibility of our network traffic.

The tool's price is okay. On a scale of one to ten, I rate it as a five, where one means it is not expensive, and ten means it is the most expensive.

The tool has real-time monitoring capabilities, which help us optimize our operations. It is also helpful for dealing with clients and sending reports.

I will recommend the tool to others based on its services and products.

I rate the tool a ten out of ten.

The main use cases are primarily customer experience management for telecom operators. I've been working with telecom operators, mainly in the commercial enterprise sector for the telecom side. 

It's very valuable for a telecom operator for customer experience management to see the network end-to-end to the unit. KPIs reports for network enhancement, network optimization, and the end-user customer experience.

The most valuable feature is that it is in line with the traffic. It already captures the raw traffic itself and then filters it, giving us the correct image. Some other companies may just extract what they think is valuable from the traffic itself. nGeniusONE is in line. So from the probes themselves from NETSCOUT probes, it gets the real data, real chunks of data, and then we have the correct vision about our network.

Maybe the optics cost could be improved. It's not about the product itself, but the optics cost from other companies is very high, which affects the business. When you buy a $1 million product, you shouldn't be expected to pay $500,000 for support. So, support, operation, and professional services are very expensive. It's the main weakness.  

There were some issues that have been addressed now. There's the new JTP correlation and the Smart User Plan feature, and they've already implemented them.

I have been working with this solution for five years now. 

NETSCOUT nGeniusONE is very stable.

It's very scalable and very easy to scale.

The tech support is very competent but not very flexible. I don't know if it's maybe the American mentality versus the Northeastern Indian mentality. Sometimes, if our support is finished on October 1st, they will not support us by 2nd October by any means. So it's about high cost and less flexibility, but the competence itself is very high.

Positive

I worked with PoleStar. It's also another competitive product.

PoleStar tells you what you want to hear. NETSCOUT gives you the truth, whether it's good or bad. 

Polestar will give you what you want to hear. It's not that reliable. Also, NETSCOUT has its own hardware ports, while Polestar uses a lot of third-party products.

The initial setup is not overly complex. We have a good training program, and the setup process is fairly straightforward. From the perspective of the telecom environment, it's even easier in the enterprise environment.

For both cloud and on-prem deployments, we typically start by setting up the environment. We receive the devices, connect them, and then install the initial software and perform the initial configuration. However, the more complex and advanced configuration tasks are typically handled by NETSCOUT's cloud professional services team.

Typically, one or two people per site are sufficient for deployment. It's a bit of a snowball effect. The first site may take a couple of weeks to deploy, while subsequent sites may only take a couple of days.

It's fairly standard maintenance. It may involve changing power supplies or cards, but nothing fancy or complicated.

It's fairly expensive, and the licensing is very hard. So the competition here will be Huawei. Huawei's SmartCare solution gives a better ROI, return with the cost, not with the return itself. The cost is much, much less, so it's very flat.

If you can afford the system, the support, and the professional service, which can be quite expensive, I would recommend it anytime for any application for any sector, industry sector.

Overall, I would rate the solution an eight out of ten. 

We use the product to monitor infrastructure devices and troubleshoot application behavior if there is any issue.

The solution helps me understand the issues and troubleshoot.

If the connection doesn’t work, the product provides us with a code, for example, 5000. Then, we have to search the internet to understand what this number means. It would be better if the product gave us a code and its meaning while identifying issues.

The solution needs enhancements. We need to reconfigure the tool if we have a connection with dissimilar ports. The tool should ideally capture all traffic. However, it is unable to analyze unknown ports. I have to reconfigure and refine the tool to monitor the connection. This process is a waste of time.

I have been using the solution for six months.

I rate the stability a six or seven out of ten. The product crashed a few times within six months of implementation.

The solution is scalable. It works the same when we add more components. I rate the scalability a ten out of ten. Almost 50 employees are using the solution in our organization.

We need regular support from the vendor. The support is good.

Positive

The solution is not easy to install.

It took us three to four hours to deploy the tool. We needed only one engineer to deploy it.

The product is too expensive compared to other products.

We also use SolarWinds. We are trying the tool because our organization needs multiple monitoring solutions. Overall, I rate the solution a seven out of ten.