ConnectWise Automate vs SolarWinds NPM comparison

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2,077 views|1,507 comparisons
85% willing to recommend
SolarWinds Logo
15,197 views|8,289 comparisons
92% willing to recommend
Comparison Buyer's Guide
Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between ConnectWise Automate and SolarWinds NPM based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about NinjaOne, Kaseya, TeamViewer and others in Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM).
To learn more, read our detailed Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM) Report (Updated: April 2024).
771,170 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Featured Review
Quotes From Members
We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use.
Here are some excerpts of what they said:
Pros
"A good automated scripts feature.""It's a very good IT tool for a company that provides IT services. It is very helpful for technicians to work with the tool to see all of the customers in one place and then manage all of the computers in one place.""It allows us to manage all client requests, jobs and invoicing.""Scripting and patch management are really important for us. Patch Manager is something that we use a lot, and we would love to have it continually improved. It is one of the most useful features for us for controlling patches and other things for different clients.""It's definitely improved the help-desk servicing, et cetera.""The most value we get from this solution is that everything is on a patch cycle.""Remote access and detailed monitoring help us support our equipment.""ConnectWise Automate's interface is pretty easy to use. It's pretty intuitive to get around and navigate it. It does what I need, which is usually connecting to the client and customers systems."

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"It covers everything from end to end, from the standpoint of endpoint machines and the routers and switches. The switch port also comes there.""SolarWinds NPM has a colorful UI and many easy-to-use features. It does not need to be configured as much and is also easy to install.""A product that is well-tested and trusted in demanding situations.""The product is lightweight in terms of memory use, requiring only 10 megabytes or less.""We had some interfaces where the SFP Ports were having some problems after a while. We found which of the SFP Ports was having the error and changed it, so the bandwidth become okay.""The most valuable features are language support and technical support.""We don't have any issues with the stability of SolarWinds NPM.""The people in technical support are very good."

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Cons
"They could use some automated alerts particularly when we're talking about an MSP that might shoot over.""Technical support was helpful.""We would love to get feature updates and cumulative updates fixed. I know they aren't really supposed to be pushed with Patch Manager. We've got recommendations from ConnectWise to use the scripted feature update installs, scripted KB updates, etc. Having these in Patch Manager itself would be great.""The fixed client for Automate is slow. The web client is not very intuitive.""I have a problem with the reports available on the solution. I don't understand how to work with the reporting functionality. For example, when I want to give a report for a specific machine, ConnectWise doesn't seem to have this as an option. I'm not sure if I'm missing something, or if the reporting functionality is just poorly conceived.""In Patch Manager, there should be more reportability so that it is easier to see the updates that I have applied to a machine and when the next update will happen. A lot of times, it seems like all the information is kind of thrown all over the place, and you can't really see it all at the same time. There should be a simplified patch data view that allows us to quickly confirm that our various clients are getting patched as they should be.""This is a raw system. Of course, it has some flaws that could be improved. But, it's something that we will have to work with to get to the point where we need this, we request it and they do their best to make it happen.""The wait time for a support ticket to be addressed needs to be reduced. They take a couple of days to get back. It is a little frustrating when we have to wait for a couple of days. A lot of times, the issue is critical for us. If we're reaching out to their support team and submitting a ticket, it is because we need it handled quickly."

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"The console could be more user-friendly. It would be better if SolarWinds updated the user interface.""They have had a rather large security breach in the past. It's cost some companies customers.""An area for improvement would be the use of modular licenses, which are not practical for big clients.""Technical support and releases are not particularly reliable.""It has covered everything, so no improvement is required at their end. The only thing is the price.""It would be nice if SolarWinds added some technical protocols like Modbus. The market needs a simple solution for monitoring a technical device.""SolarWinds needs to be improved such that it is on par with the leading products in the market.""The interface could be made more user-friendly."

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Pricing and Cost Advice
  • "Pricing and licensing are reasonable."
  • "From what I've overheard, it is pretty comparable to other solutions in terms of price."
  • "I believe Automate is available for around $2."
  • "I pay $85 a month per user for a ConnectWise package that contains multiple solutions."
  • More ConnectWise Automate Pricing and Cost Advice →

  • "I’d suggest that people be aware that licensing has tiers."
  • "Excluding the costs of running VMs and physical blade servers, our licensing costs run around US$200,000/year for over 60 polling engines."
  • "I think that the cost has risen, but the functionality and versatility is way above other products."
  • "The licensing model is such that you can purchase only what you need; and then grow into the next level by paying only the difference in price and the associated maintenance costs."
  • "The price points are more than competitive when compared to other vendors."
  • "I believe the original setup cost was around $3500 with an annual cost of around $1200-$1500 to renew the support license. This would bring the average day-to-day cost of around $5-$6 over three years."
  • "You have to license it per year, for the support. You don't really need to have support once you've already set it up. Once you install SolarWinds, you can skip on the licensing. It will still work."
  • "The pricing needs to be improved. It is too high. One full engine costs around $10 000, which is why we don't have high availability right now."
  • More SolarWinds NPM Pricing and Cost Advice →

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    Comparison Review
    Anonymous User
    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 using these, but they require quite some expertise before you can use them. Then there are the ones that are not open source, the enterprise softwares and cost you some money, but on the other hand, they are extremely easy to set-up and learn. You can have them up and running in a matter of minutes. And then there are those which are completely cloud based. They can be free of cost or charge some money depending on the software. The good thing about these is that you don’t have to install any extra software, and it can be managed completely online but then again these have limited features and you cannot exploit them to the full extent as you can do with the open-source and to some extent the enterprise software, so I won’t suggest you to use these, because these are generally not the complete solutions and require other support software to achieve the same. Below I have listed the outstanding pros and cons of the various Network analyzers that you can look into Nagios Pros: Nagios offers an extensive set of collector plug-ins that allows users to gather performance and availability data from a broad range of operating systems, including  Windows and Netware Nagios… Read more →
    Questions from the Community
    Top Answer:The most value we get from this solution is that everything is on a patch cycle.
    Top Answer:I pay $85 a month per user for a ConnectWise package that contains multiple solutions.
    Top Answer:The fixed client for Automate is slow. The web client is not very intuitive. It could use some updating and some thought around the UX. Also, with the scripting, I would like to see something where it… more »
    Top Answer:It actually depends on the exact purpose or kind of devices (network devices, servers, something else). Some tools are better for only network devices while others are better for a cloud monitoring or… more »
    Top Answer:From my point of view, SolarWind is the best tool.
    Top Answer:We are partners with SolarWinds and we sell a lot of Network management to large enterprises also because of scalability, products like Network Performance Monitor & Netflow Traffic Analyzer are… more »
    Ranking
    Views
    2,077
    Comparisons
    1,507
    Reviews
    2
    Average Words per Review
    577
    Rating
    7.0
    Views
    15,197
    Comparisons
    8,289
    Reviews
    29
    Average Words per Review
    485
    Rating
    8.1
    Comparisons
    Also Known As
    LabTech for IT Service Providers, ConnectWise Automate for Corporate IT Departments, ConnectWise Automate for IT Service Providers
    Solarwinds Network Performance Monitor, SolarWinds Network Bandwidth Analyzer
    Learn More
    Overview

    ConnectWise Automate is an IT management tool that helps deliver IT services at the speed of business. Our remote monitoring and management (RMM) platform provides powerful automation to discover & manage devices, monitor for problems, and automate action. Deliver streamlined reactive and proactive managed services, stop putting out fires, and start focusing on what matters most. See why over 5,500 partners worldwide chose ConnectWise Automate by visiting ConnectWise.com or calling 877-522-8323.

    SolarWinds NPM is a network monitoring solution that enables you to detect, diagnose, and resolve network performance issues and outages quickly and efficiently. The solution is a powerful tool that can help you increase service levels, reduce downtime with multi vendor network monitoring, simplify the management of complex network devices, improve operational efficiency, and much more.

    SolarWinds NPM Features

    SolarWinds NPM has many valuable key features. Some of the most useful ones include:

    • Increased scalability
    • Fault, performance, and availability monitoring
    • Dynamic network discovery and mapping
    • Cross-stack network data correlation
    • Customizable topology
    • Dependency-aware intelligent alerts
    • Intelligent maps
    • Automated capacity forecasting, alerting, and reporting
    • Logical and physical network monitoring
    • Monitor Azure vNet gateway visibility

    SolarWinds NPM Benefits

    There are several benefits to implementing SolarWinds NPM. Some of the biggest advantages the solution offers include:

    • Comprehensive monitoring for advanced network devices: With SolarWinds NPM, you can gain insight into the health and performance of your load balancers, Cisco ASA and Palo Alto Networks, firewalls, and Cisco Nexus switches.
    • Hardware health monitoring: SolarWinds NPM makes it easy for you to monitor, alert, and report on key device metrics, including power supply, fan speed, and temperature.
    • Customizable performance and availability reports: With this feature, you can choose from more than 100 templates to schedule and also generate custom network performance reports.

    Reviews from Real Users

    Below are some reviews and helpful feedback written by PeerSpot users currently using the SolarWinds NPM solution.

    PeerSpot user Andrew N., Senior Network Engineer at Element Critical, says, “The "Performance Analyzer" feature is the solution's most valuable aspect. It's able to do the bounded graphs of all the interface stats, from errors to broadcasts and to current traffic. With a click of a button you're able to, in one interface, look at historical data for those items.” He also adds, “From the troubleshooting point of view, just having that peace of mind is great. And, The solution is extremely stable. We haven't had any issues in that regard. We haven't had issues with bugs, glitches, or crashes."

    Daniel S., Systems and Data Warehouse Supervisor at MMSD, mentions, “The alerting and usage tracking is a valuable feature because it alerts us when we're getting near capacity on disk space, network utilization or processor utilization. It helps us manage our capacity and enables us to be proactive.”

    A Senior Vice President and CIO at a financial services firm explains, “As we look to add more servers to our virtual environment and to understand the impact, the solution allows us to dig into the historical charts related to capacity planning. It also gives us visibility of spikes and allows us to track down the reasons for their occurrences. So too, it makes room for potential processes that have gotten hung or runaway and to know when it's time to reboot a server or service.”

    Dinesh N., Digital Innovation at Bobcat Company, states, “The best part of the solution is the sharing display. It gives a general public ID wherein everyone can link to a public display. That's a good feature.”


    Fazal A., Implementation & Support Specialist at 360Factors, comments, “We have configured multiple alerts for our network devices, including routers and switches, so that we are notified if any interface goes down. In the event an interface goes down, we have multiple reports that include availability monitoring, network uptime monitoring, and network downtime monitoring. These reports are on multiple schedules such as the end of the day, end of the last business day of the week, monthly, and quarterly. This gives us the ability to provide reports to our management and let them know the performance of our network.”

    Sample Customers
    I-M Technology, Mainstay Technologies, PC Works Plus, Integrity IT, Kerkhoff Technologies Inc., Marathon Consulting, Christenberry Sales Company, EDTS, Secom Technology, Ready to View, ARRC Technology, DaVinci Digital, JNR Networks, Quinn Technology Solutions, PCIT, Liberty Technology, Capital Computers & Networks, Atlanta Technology Force, Doberman Technologies, First Column Enterprises, CisCom Solutions
    Microsoft, Federal Express, Hewlett-Packard, and MasterCard
    Top Industries
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Educational Organization48%
    Computer Software Company9%
    Financial Services Firm5%
    Real Estate/Law Firm4%
    REVIEWERS
    Computer Software Company12%
    Comms Service Provider12%
    Financial Services Firm11%
    Healthcare Company9%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Educational Organization51%
    Computer Software Company7%
    Government5%
    Manufacturing Company5%
    Company Size
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business71%
    Midsize Enterprise21%
    Large Enterprise7%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business20%
    Midsize Enterprise56%
    Large Enterprise24%
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business33%
    Midsize Enterprise18%
    Large Enterprise49%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business12%
    Midsize Enterprise56%
    Large Enterprise32%
    Buyer's Guide
    Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM)
    April 2024
    Find out what your peers are saying about NinjaOne, Kaseya, TeamViewer and others in Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM). Updated: April 2024.
    771,170 professionals have used our research since 2012.

    ConnectWise Automate is ranked 7th in Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM) with 15 reviews while SolarWinds NPM is ranked 4th in Network Monitoring Software with 147 reviews. ConnectWise Automate is rated 7.4, while SolarWinds NPM is rated 8.2. The top reviewer of ConnectWise Automate writes "Responsive, integrates well with other applications, and the technical support is helpful". On the other hand, the top reviewer of SolarWinds NPM writes "High-level, comprehensive, and proactive monitoring in a user-friendly interface". ConnectWise Automate is most compared with Kaseya VSA, ConnectWise RMM, NinjaOne, Microsoft Configuration Manager and Atera, whereas SolarWinds NPM is most compared with Zabbix, PRTG Network Monitor, ManageEngine OpManager, ThousandEyes and Entuity.

    We monitor all Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM) reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.