SolarWinds Security Event Manager Reviews

I basically use it to look at the logs that are coming in, analyze those logs, and get recommendations of where we have problems.

It has in-depth monitoring capabilities and an easy way for setting up dashboards. I can expand in various areas, or I can reduce areas. It supports different types of breakdowns, filters, and rules. 

It is very simple for an out-of-the-box type of product. It doesn't take a lot of time to figure it out, which is unlike some of the solutions that I have looked at. It meets all the aspects.

Under the new system, it is not upgradable the way they say. When you try to do an upgrade, it doesn't really work unless you dump everything and start from scratch. You lose a lot of your nodes. Whenever you set your nodes up and everything else, they don't want to bring those nodes back in, so you have to really go back and restructure all your nodes. I went from version 6.5 to version 6.6 and then to version 6.7. I then went to version 2019, and now it is version 2020. It would be good if we can upgrade without having to delete everything and start from scratch.

They can maybe build more KPIs and other things for the dashboard. Some of the other systems already have built-in KPIs. SolarWinds is starting to catch up, but it is not there yet. They can include some of the business or industry standards for tracking the time, that is, the meantime to detect (MTTD) and the meantime to resolve (MTTR). They can also find a way to build a KPI that measures the number of instances of port scans experienced in a week or a month.

I have been using SolarWinds LEM for a year and a half.

It is stable.

It is scalable. Altogether, we have about five actual users. I got myself as the administrator, and then there are a couple of people who do the monitoring. I have got 2,000 systems listed on it.

In terms of a team, I would say you need at least three people for what I am doing. I am using the key research logs and pulling data from these logs. For one person, it takes a lot of time to do what I am doing right now.

I am very satisfied with their technical support.

I had another system, but I wasn't happy with it and its service and support. We just let it go.

The initial setup is straightforward. The actual initial installation is not a problem. The problems come when you do your upgrades with it.

It took about a week to set it up and get all little things going in the way I wanted to. To make sure that correct data logs are going in, I tweaked some of the rules and filters and the domain across the net with individual systems.

We originally started out with the seller, but when we did the first upgrade, it didn't go the way it should. From that point, I set it up from scratch and did the upgrade. At that time, it was version 6.6.

It is in the appropriate mid-range. It is not as expensive as some of the other solutions. It is also not cheap.

I would recommend SolarWinds LEM. We plan to continue using it. We have already put in the Orion platform system and brought it into play. We are next looking at the server access management. That probably would be the next step to implement.

I would rate SolarWinds LEM a ten out of ten.

The primary use case is for privilege account monitoring. It's monitoring admin accounts for things such as who logged in, where they logged in from, what time they logged in, and from what devices they used Remote desktop, with the privileged accounts.

It's a good tool to do troubleshooting, you can see extensive Info about Kerberos User Auth tickets or Windows Kerberos Machine Auth tickets, which can alert you to say , failing Kerberos Authentications due to incorrect NTP (Network time).

We're able to do a bit more in terms of forensic analysis.

I am able to correlate  the S.A.M. Service Applications Monitoring in SolarWinds ORION Platform.

I can trace back several things including the performance at a certain date and time. 

It's extremely easy to deploy.

The LEM 6.6, if it's a Windows host, you use the 64-bit or 32-bit installer, and  install it. Immediately, you'll start seeing Windows SYSTEM, SECURITY and Application Logs from the host where you deployed the Agent. So, this makes the deployment very easy to install.

On a daily basis, it's good for PKI monitoring.

It's very good for troubleshooting, and data monitoring. It gives you an advanced warning with your backups. If you have no monitoring tool in place, SolarWinds SIEM is a good place to start and very inexpensive.

They need to do better with the Connectors. I had to battle with the IIS Web server Connector that comes built in with this product. No matter how I configured the IIS Web connector, I never saw SW pull in any IIS logs from my hosts , where Agent was installed.?

They have over 500 connectors, but in my experience only handful work. Also there's no PowerShell Logging connectors, if you want to pull in PowerShell Logging logs from your hosts into the SIEM.

SolarWinds LEM is a product that I have been using for approximately a year and a half.

Very stable. It seems backend database is PostgreSQL and needs no maintanence.

Not very scalable in my opinion. That's why I'm investigating new SIEM replacement.

good. can be hit or miss sometimes, but sometime you get some good tech support over there.

With this company, there was no real SIEM and no real use cases before I deployed it. Because of that, I can develop the use cases the educate the management on what they need in terms of SIS security monitoring.

Very easy setup.

in-house.

very good.

Easy setup, very cheap and licensing cost is very fair and easy to understand

There was no time. Just read several reports from Gartner, IT Central etc. I did try ManageEngine , but it was a product which was already in Test phase implemented by my predeccesor

n/a

Our installation is on-premises at the moment. We are a consultant group so we implement multiple solutions for different customers using a variety of different products. Some clients are in the Cloud, some on a WAN network and some are on-premises. SolarWinds LEM is one of the products we use for certain purposes and often recommend.  

I'm very technical. I work as a network and security technical architect. At the same time, I also own the company, so I'm the director. I still remain very technically involved with the solutions and the architecture for solutions, based on networks and security. SolarWinds is one of the products that I use, amongst many others to fit the needs of our customers which includes their budget, size, and industry.  

I like the graphical user interface because it is very user-friendly. I like the fact that SolarWinds is a hybrid solution so you can use it across many platforms.  

I think the product can use some improvement on the reporting side. The reporting could be easier and more robust. I also think the NetFlow Analyzer component can be improved substantially in the way it is integrated with SolarWinds and with Orion. In my opinion, you are not able to drill down enough into traffic flows. It can be a lot more granular and that will make it a lot more useful in comparison to how it is incorporated at the moment.  

I think that incorporating a security management platform would also be good. This would be a solution like a dashboard or control panel where you can just snap-in modules. A global dashboard where you can snap in all the different types of solutions or the different types of services and products that you will leverage would be a great step forward in ease-of-use by making integration easier.  

I've been using SolarWinds LEM since its inception, so that would be for close to 10 years.  

This product is quite stable and I don't have any issues with it on that level. I think one other thing that could be improved is that the Syslog Server should be integrated as a system startup service. Right now you have to bring it up and take it down manually. This isn't entirely a stability issue but it might be an improvement. It would be valuable especially in the security environment.  

I think that the scalability of the solution is good enough. I don't think there are any issues with that.  

I have not actually had to use technical support very much. I can not even count more than five instances in the span of 10 years where I had to call in with an issue. As I have not really had the need to actually go that route much, it is hard to give constructive feedback in that regard. But it may say something positive about the quality of the product.  

The initial setup is pretty straight forward. In the standalone small business solution, we are using Microsoft SQL Express which is already integrated with the solution. I think they could make it easier to move from the Express version to the SQL Server version to give the user more flexibility.  

As far as pricing, we always want it to be less expensive or more cost-effective as a consumer, especially when you take into consideration that SolarWinds has got a very broad spectrum of services that can be integrated easily but need to be licensed separately. I think they can come up with a way of putting bundles together which would encourage customers to use a wider array of their products and it could be a better way of increasing sales. People would show a lot more interest in a package deal instead of having to buy the products separately. Bundling might reduce instances where customers look at other solutions for comparisons. For example, I've got some clients that use the Web Help Desk solution, and some users that use the NetFlow Analyzer and SolarWinds. If these solutions could be bundled together in a more cost-effective package when they are purchased together, I'm sure that SolarWinds would realize a lot more sales of peripheral products and increase their total market share.  

The renewals are currently priced so attractively that they are much cheaper and more cost-effective than when you buy a solution brand new. This helps retain clients over time. My comments on cost mainly refer to the initial purchase of solutions where you are deploying a product and purchasing it for the first-time.  

On a scale from one to ten where one is the worst and ten is the best, I would rate SolarWinds LEM as somewhere between eight and ten, so let's say nine. To make it a ten they would have to make improvements in pricing, reporting, and product integration. These facets of the solution are not so bad now but they can be improved.  

The advice I would give people considering network event management would be to go with the product that appeals to me the most. The advice that I would like to give would be to go with NPM (Network Performance Monitor) which is a different, more sophisticated SolarWinds product. As far as I'm concerned, that is a product that can challenge any competing product out there on the market. If anyone is looking to do any type of network performance monitoring at a high level, I would definitely recommend Network Performance Monitor Orion — the Orion version of the product of SolarWinds is the one to go for. As far as NetFlow Analyzer, I like it and it fits some company's needs very well, but I've used better products. That is why I mention making improvements in its feature set.  

From a security perspective, which is a lot of work that I do, the Syslog Server needs to be completely integrated as a system service. That is one of my biggest wishes for the improvement of the LEM product at the moment because the product itself is a good product. The only trouble is that when server engineers work on the servers and they perform some type of updates to get the operating systems back on par, or need to do something with security updates and so on, the servers get stopped. When the servers are rebooted, the Syslog Server does not automatically restart. That is a major problem, especially from an auditing perspective.  

The tool would see all the events and be able to judge on its own which event was not a big deal. It also gives you insights, email alerts and app directory changes. 

The solution helps me to go back in time and search for different events. For example, if you wanted to know who activated an account; you could go back in time and find out.

The product should  improve the ease with which you can create event alerts. They are not as hard now but you need to have an easier way.

I have been using the product for ten years. 

It's good. I haven't had an issue ever with stability. 

I think the solution scales well.

The solution is easy to deploy. 

We have had ROI with the use of the tool. 

I would rate the solution an eight out of ten. It's a good tool for what it costs.

SolarWinds Security Event Manager is used for retrieving events and suspicious activities.

We are only studying the solution.

SolarWinds Security Event Manager has been generally working well.

I have been using SolarWinds Security Event Manager for a couple of months.

SolarWinds Security Event Manager is stable.

The scalability of SolarWinds Security Event Manager is good.

We might increase our usage of the solution in the future.

I have contacted the support from SolarWinds Security Event Manager and they are good.

The deployment of the solution took a couple of weeks.

The company had to use a third party for the implementation of the solution.

I have seen an ROI by using this solution.

The price of SolarWinds Security Event Manager is reasonable.

We have more than one person who does the maintenance of the solution.

I rate SolarWinds Security Event Manager a seven out of ten.

We are using SolarWinds Security Event Manager for event analysis.

The most valuable feature of SolarWinds Security Event Manager is the analysis and the knowledge about the incidence that we trace.

I have been using SolarWinds Security Event Manager for approximately six years.

The performance and stability of SolarWinds Security Event Manager are good.

The scalability of SolarWinds Security Event Manager is good. 

We have approximately 500 users using this solution in my organization.

We used the support from SolarWinds Security Event Manager and they are knowledgeable but challenging to get in contact with them.

The vendor did the setup of SolarWinds Security Event Manager.

We used an integrator for the implementation of SolarWinds Security Event Manager.

I would recommend SolarWinds Security Event Manager to others.

I rate SolarWinds Security Event Manager a seven out of ten.

Our primary use case is analyzing log files from any kind of source which is IT related. We use the product in our company on a daily basis and also integrate it for others. There are four people in our company using this software, and it's part of their daily routine to check everything. We are consultans and a reseller of the solution. 

The most valuable feature of the solution is intuitivity of navigation; it's easy to build rules and actions which are based on the logs and event types we collect with the software.

Some things on the roadmap could be improved but I understand they're working on those issues. The main area that would mean a big improvement for me would be for the product to include multiple dashboards. I would love to see a multi-page dashboard where you could see information side-by-side; to slice through the dashboard to see specific topics. For example, one network dashboard, one active directory dashboard, one VMware dashboard, etc.

That feature is something they could include in the next release - the ability for a report to flip to different technologies. And it would be nice if there were some pretty configured templates for the dashboard so that you don't have to fill all the data in. For example, a template for active directory or KPIs, or a template for VMware KPIs.

We've been using the solution for about one year.

It's a very stable solution. 

Scalability is a plus with this software. 

Technical support is good, they've even helped us during the night because they're in a different time zone.

The setup process and determining all the log files from all the different systems is quite easy. However, to get all the information out of the log files and create rules and access based on the log files, means that it's sensible to hire consultants. The simple setup of the virtual machine takes about two hours and after that it really depends on the number of log files and the number of devices. You're looking at about half a day and you have pretty much installed everything. 

The setup cost is not as expensive as Splunk or many other competitors. Cost is dependent on the size of the company.

I would advise people to make themselves familiar with the SolarWinds work community which has all the users' comments and where you can get the newest topics about everything connected to the software. It makes sense to peek around there. There is also SolarWinds SCM online training which is a big help when getting started with the software.

The product fills all our requirements but there is always room for improvement and so I would rate this product a nine out of 10. 

We work with and resell all of the SolarWinds products, and SolarWinds LEM is one of the solutions that I have experience with.

This solution is used in conjunction with others to find the root cause of problems when a user is not able to access an application.

This tool is simple to use.

The reporting and alerting capabilities are really nice.

The Heat Map is a very good feature that is related to Wi-Fi and helps to monitor access points.

It takes a long time to perform a root cause analysis.

I would like to have a more customizable dashboard.

I have been working with SolarWinds LEM for four years.

We have had no issues with stability.

This is a scalable solution. We have deployed it both in Windows and Linux environments.

I have contacted SolarWinds technical support six or seven times and I think that the support is very good. The only problem is that when the system goes down, the diagnostics might take a long time.

For example, in a large environment, we had a situation where the application was down for one or two days. Normally, at most, it will take three or four hours for a large environment. In a small environment, the time that it will be unavailable due to diagnostics is about an hour and a half.

The initial setup is totally straightforward. It takes a maximum of two hours to deploy.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.