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Subhajit Nag - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Process Associate at Tata Consultancy Services
Real User
Tech stack visualization tool used to monitor response time in CPU and usage
Pros and Cons
  • "I find troubleshooting is quicker because we can drill down into the end points and see which endpoints are getting critical. Visibility-wise, the micro details are easy to find."
  • "This solution is expensive."

What is our primary use case?

We use this solution to monitor the response time in CPU and usage and for URL monitoring.

What is most valuable?

I find troubleshooting is quicker because we can drill down into the end points and see which endpoints are getting critical. Visibility-wise, the micro details are easy to find. 

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using this solution for four years. 

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

This is a stable solution. 

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AppDynamics
December 2024
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What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

This is a scalable solution. 

How are customer service and support?

Support for this solution is good but communication could be improved.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

I have previously used SolarWinds. Compared to that, I find AppDynamics better.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is straightforward. 

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

This solution is expensive.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
reviewer1285725 - PeerSpot reviewer
Consultant at a financial services firm with self employed
Real User
It has broad coverage of APM, EUM, and infrastructure but it's behind the curve on cloud technology
Pros and Cons
  • "We're a large organization, so we appreciate AppDynamics' wide coverage. It may not work in all areas, but it has broad coverage. We can use the same dataset for different use case aspects. That is the beauty of AppDynamics. You can coordinate APM, EUM, and infrastructure through one dataset."
  • "AppDynamics lacks integration with cloud technology. It probably isn't a good fit for emerging enterprises because it's an on-premise solution, and many newer companies are moving to the cloud. AppDynamics' on-premise technology works reasonably well, but it doesn't have cloud features."

What is our primary use case?

We use AppDynamics for monitoring application performance, end-users, and infrastructure. The product has analytics covering all these areas. 

What is most valuable?

We're a large organization, so we appreciate AppDynamics' wide coverage. It may not work great in all areas, but it has broad coverage. We use the same dataset for different use case aspects. That is the beauty of AppDynamics. You can coordinate APM, EUM, and infrastructure through one dataset. 

What needs improvement?

AppDynamics not so great with cloud technology. AppDynamics works very well with the on-premise technologies, but it is behind the curve in the emerging cloud features. 

The cloud is one area where I think AppD is not that great.

Basic monitoring is the main thing, but nowadays, everybody talks about observability. I'm not sure how well AppD fits into the so-called observability trend. The track-and-trace mechanism works very well with on-premises technologies but not so great with the cloud.

Cloud monitoring is becoming more critical. Competitors can pose a big challenge. AppDynamics is a top product, but they need to maintain the same trend in the cloud area, where it's not that great.

For how long have I used the solution?

We have been using AppDynamics for four to five years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

AppDynamics works reasonably good.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

AppDynamics is scalable.

How was the initial setup?

We use the SaaS model, which is the most common way to deploy AppDynamics. Infrastructure setup was not an issue as we chose the SaaS model. We don't have any concerns in terms of infrastructure. 

We only needed to deploy the agent, which was relatively straightforward. I wouldn't say it was effortless, but it wasn't complicated, either. We made a package to automate the deployment, which worked pretty well for us.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

I don't know the details about the pricing.

What other advice do I have?

I rate AppDynamics eight out of 10. 

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Public Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
AppDynamics
December 2024
Learn what your peers think about AppDynamics. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: December 2024.
823,875 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Regional Director at iSecureMind Integrated Solutions
Reseller
Top 5
Provides real-time analytics and helps with operational decision-making
Pros and Cons
  • "The solution saves time and cost."
  • "The infrastructure is not as good as other solutions."

What is most valuable?

I am satisfied with the product. The most beneficial features are the ones that give us full visibility for the API integration. The real-time analytics is good. It enhances our operational decision-making. Before using the tool, we had issues between the network and application teams. The solution saves time and cost.

What needs improvement?

The infrastructure is not as good as other solutions. AppDynamics is designed for application performance. Some solutions also cover infrastructure and server performance. AppDynamics specializes only in application performance. The product is not easy to use.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using the solution for eight months.

How are customer service and support?

The technical support is amazing.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

How was the initial setup?

The tool is not easy to deploy. It needs some experience. It is not difficult, but it is not easy. The time taken for deployment depends on the applications and the size of the environment.

What was our ROI?

It takes one year to get a return on investment.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The product is a bit expensive compared to other tools.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

AppDynamics has the needed features, but it is not as good as NETSCOUT.

What other advice do I have?

I am a partner and reseller. I will recommend the tool to other businesses that manage complex applications. It aids a little bit in AI-driven initiatives. Overall, I rate the product an eight and a half out of ten.

Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Reseller
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Chandan-Kumar - PeerSpot reviewer
Director for the End-User Performance at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Top 5
Good tracing capabilities and helpful technical support but needs better analytics
Pros and Cons
  • "Technical support is helpful."
  • "If it can be able to intelligently provide all the things we need to look at, from a data point of view, that would be very useful."

What is our primary use case?

We're a bank. We do use the predictive tools for the different products of the bank and the application which the bank utilizes.

How has it helped my organization?

AppD improves the productivity of Application Engineers, development teams, and other integrated items. Slowness or leak issue is a nut for the team now. Also, the team resolves or understands the network and query path every easy and resolves efficiently.

Our application uptime, increased by 10%, and overall productivity up by 30%.

Ticket or issue down by 12% over five years of use and experience.

Open to be applied and test any area and suite.

What is most valuable?

The tracing is the most important aspect of the solution. The way it traces the information within the particular application or within the particular infrastructure is great. That actually helps. Apart from that, all of the data that's in the production APM is good.  

Technical support is helpful.

The solution scales well.

The stability is good. 

What needs improvement?

We do have a combination of areas that need improvement. We do have the integration, such as end-user integration and experience that could be better. It is not just from the response point of view; it is more from the error and error detection point of view. This is due to the fact that these are all the banking applications as used by the banking staff, not by the end-user directly. Based on the banking staff feedback, based on the staff security or maybe dealing with the capital market, there needs to be some improvement.

They do provide the input growth on a daily basis in terms of what is coming in and how we receive the applications and how many we have. We've now started looking for a particular product that can make sure that it should connect with files and statements inside the product. 

The IO ratio, which we are looking for in terms of a report, is one of the concerns. We do monitor those details from AppDynamics, however, reporting and monitoring could be better.

There needs to be more analytics. That is what we are missing from the tool point of view. We need more information geared more towards helping us in making better decisions. When you do the coding that's for a banking situation or maybe in the incidents or capital market, it becomes very important that how much time I'm investing inside the transaction. A transaction which needs to be carried out for either confirming the payments or maybe either releasing the payments - these kinds of things. What I have seen with the use, as of now, is a bit of a lag when we are running on the global cloud or the public clouds, like Azure or the Google platform. 

Right now, we are fighting between three different stakeholders. With the networks, we have a different chat, with the vendors we have a different chat, and with the application team, we have a different chat. This approach doesn't provide a holistic view. Everyone has their own excuses and everyone has their own reasoning and conditions. 

If it can be able to intelligently provide all the things we need to look at, from a data point of view, that would be very useful.

For how long have I used the solution?

I would say that I have between seven and eight years of experience, hands-on. However, later on in the time frame, over the last four or five years, I have not has as much hands-on experience with the tool. I'm more involved in various solution discussions and strategy building with the platform on top of the tool.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

I would say it's very steady and for now, it's very reliable as well. It's stable. We don't have issues with bugs or crashes. 

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The solution is very scalable so far in any testing scenario. It performs very well and gives us the expected output which we are looking to improve. 

We are using the solution for more than 600 small and big applications. We have around 78,000 people, including the back-end staff and the development team, that use the solution.

How are customer service and support?

Overall, technical support has been very good. We're very satisfied with their level of support. So far, it's been very good for the bank.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We have used HPE BSM (now called MF APM). 

Due to these factors, we switch:

1. Costly

2. Implementation complexity

3. Multiple products and Integration

4. Not end-user friendly. 

How was the initial setup?

I was not involved in the initial implementation. Nowadays, the way we approach the teams, sometimes it's very easy when it's an application with a known language like Python or maybe with Ruby or a kind of Java application. In terms of gateways inside the product, sometimes it is very tough, and sometimes it is very easy to get deployed. We're not using any out-of-the-box security. 

What about the implementation team?

We have used model Train for the trainers and enforced all employees with operational training.

What was our ROI?

We achieve a great number, in terms of applications user availability increase by 30%. In treading, and agents, needs a smooth performance before the market starts. AppD provide a depth to measure any performances challenges, leak issue or even a chain linked issue story.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The pricing is a mixed bag. In some areas they are reasonably priced, however, in others, it's a bit expensive. 

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We look for ease of implementation, diagnostics information shared, and controls to the team for working.

What other advice do I have?

We're just an end-user of the product.

We're using the latest version of the solution. 

The deployment model depends on the solution or the size of the product which we are using, as the banks do have private and public clouds. In public clouds, we don't have much of the production instances. It's mainly the development. The free cloud and the cloud environment are completely on a private or in-house, on-premises solution with different ecosystems.

If a proper study has been done, and the solution makes sense for the company, I would recommend the solution. 

I would like to rate the solution at a seven out of ten. That consideration is mainly due to the fact that it covers a large portfolio of the product. It does have support for many other ERP tools. A lot of open customization is available and the product support team can help to customize the product. I've found this tool very useful and helpful on that.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Hybrid Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
it_user560460 - PeerSpot reviewer
Capability Development Manager - Monitoring at a energy/utilities company with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Identification of performance bottlenecks, even in pre-production environments.

What is most valuable?

Part of it is the ease of adoption. We were a big CA house beforehand. We had a massive implementation of CA APM, but nobody uses it. We ditched CA in favor of AppDynamics. We compared New Relic and AppDynamics. AppDynamics is, in my opinion, far superior.

The ease of adoption has already picked up in my company. Bear in mind, we're probably about nine months into the project; it's probably more widely used than CA was after three years. So, that is, for me, the prime benefit. We are actually getting people to use the tool and get value out of it; it's not just shelf ware.

How has it helped my organization?

As any APM tool should, it provides root cause analysis. It enables you to reduce your mean time to resolution. It enables you to identify performance bottlenecks, even in pre-production environments. It generally helps provide better applications, better code, to customers; things we weren't really getting out of CA. The 2 or 3 teams who were using it got some of that value, but the rest of the organization just didn't. Now, we've got teams who had never picked up an APM product already getting value out of it, literally in a matter of days after installation.

I think it's because of the ease of use. It provides useful information straight away, quite deliberately so. It's much easier to navigate, it's much easier to understand the data that's being returned to you, and I think that really helped teams and individuals not be afraid of it.

What needs improvement?

Part of it is support for more modern languages. Node is lagging behind. And I think clarity on exactly where they intend to go, as well, because the relationship with other vendors like Splunk is a little bit grey at the moment. I'm curious as to where they're going with that and whether they intend to work as partners with them, or actually impose on their space.

To get a higher rating, they'd have to fix the Node issues, they'd have to fix some framework issues; it doesn’t work very well with Vertex 3, for instance. Tweaks like that. In any case, nothing's ever perfect.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

We haven’t really had any stability or scalability issues. We're using the SaaS offering rather than on-premise, which obviously takes away a lot of that headache. The SaaS operations team are pretty good. The SaaS Operations team isn't somebody you directly interact with, but through the account management team and through the support teams.

How is customer service and technical support?

I’m very happy with the technical support. There have been a couple of incidents – there are always a couple of incidents – but actually they've been very responsive, they've been very easy to work with, and happy to take feedback, both positive and negative.

How was the initial setup?

I did the original CA APM installation four years ago; and then was involved in the RFP process, the initial commercial negotiations with AppD, and therefore the initial set up, as well, for the first few applications.

AppDynamics initial setup was very easy. There are some niggles. Some of the modern languages are less easy to use. Node is a bit of a sticking point with us at the moment, but installing it on a JVM, for instance, is absolutely a piece of cake.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

As I’ve mentioned, we've looked at New Relic. Previously, a few years ago, we looked at Dynatrace. We've had a relationship with CA for 10 years, something like that.

We definitely wanted to move away from the CA legacy. Of the three main tools that are modern and out there for APM, you’ve got New Relic, Dynatrace and AppDynamics. Dynatrace isn't really in the same space, in my opinion; that's much more pre-production, code-level stuff. Between New Relic and AppDynamics, it was quite close. There are still teams in my organization who prefer New Relic, but as a whole solution, as a whole suite, I think AppDynamics gives you more flexibility, more in-depth visibility, and I think it has a brighter future.

What other advice do I have?

Think about what it is you're doing beforehand. Plan it a little bit. One of the slightly strange problems that some of the early teams ran into was fundamentally misunderstanding the application tier and node hierarchy in AppDynamics. You ended up with some very strangely named applications. Read that one paragraph on each of those. Work out what it is you're doing, and then it all springs to life. Also, talk to other teams who've done it.

We also use AppDynamics database monitoring. We use the machine agents. I think that's pretty much everything we've got. I’m generally happy with them. Every tool has its limitations and you want more.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
it_user118995 - PeerSpot reviewer
User Experience Solution Director at a manufacturing company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
We evaluated dynaTrace and New Relic but chose AppDynamics for features such as self discovery and on premise usage

What is most valuable?

I think the ability to quickly correlate and introspect into what's going on inside a Java container is the most valuable feature for us. We haven't fully leveraged it yet for monitoring and altering which was one of the main reason we wanted AppDynamics. These features are hooked up but we haven't seen a lot of action in production yet. We currently use it more for the pre-production performance troubleshooting and debugging. So far its been the majority of our usage.

How has it helped my organization?

In production we haven't had any serious issues which caused us to lean on it heavily but in pre-production we had a few big performance degradation problems. AppDynamics was crucial for us pinpointing root cause and fixing it. We probably wouldn't have been able to go live as swiftly as we did without AppDynamics.

What needs improvement?

I think the only feedback from my team has been that it's not an HTML based UI right now, so it's limited on mobile devices. An HTML 4 or 5 based interface would be great.

For how long have I used the solution?

Part of why we chose AppDynamics was because we felt that they were above all other products. We have been using it in trial mode or pre-production mode for quite a while - almost a year now, and we've been using it heavily since January. We've been using it in production since the end of April.

What was my experience with deployment of the solution?

Deployment was fairly easy. Our team learned how to use AppDynamics fairly quick. We're now proficient in it.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

We haven't seen AppDynamics crash or have any problems so far.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

We're currently running relatively low numbers, under 40 DBMS in production and pre-production and we haven't really scaled yet. So far AppDynamics has been great with what we have.

How are customer service and technical support?

Customer Service: Customer service has been good. We've actually been less capable of keeping up with them then they have been with us. They've been great about reaching out and following up.Technical Support: Technical support has been just as great as their customer service. We've been able to get what we need when we need it.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

This was our departments first jump in with an APM solution. Some of us have some experience with New Relic (from when we were in other departments which have 100's or 1000's of licenses). We started from scratch with an RFP and met everybody- we met many vendors and finally evaluated AppDynamics, dynaTrace and New Relic.

How was the initial setup?

We didn't have any issues with the initial setup. The first time when we did our POC, AppDynamics came in and sat with us for a day and set it all up. This gave us a lot of experience with it. They came back later to help us set up the final version but at that point we were already trained.

What was our ROI?

We haven't quantitatively measured it yet. Qualitatively, for the helpful times that we've used it, we like it.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

Day to day costs- vm's we pay for to run it and license costs. A little bit of administrative overhead but once it gets set up it's good to go.

What other advice do I have?

The model that we used to do the POC and prototype to test it out first helped to get us familiar with the tool, familiar with it and trained on it. AppDynamics suggested it and said they could come in and help - we accepted!
Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor.
PeerSpot user
it_user516924 - PeerSpot reviewer
it_user516924Production Operations Systems Admininistrator III at a computer software company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Vendor

There should be very little left in terms of non-HTML 5 interface when viewing the controller.

Indu Sri Jasti - PeerSpot reviewer
System Administrator at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Top 10
Stable platform with efficient integration capabilities
Pros and Cons
  • "It is a wonderful monitoring tool that manages various aspects such as system resources (CPU, RAM), mobile performance, and infrastructure monitoring."
  • "There could log management features included in the product."

What is our primary use case?

We use the platform for infrastructure monitoring purposes.

What needs improvement?

There could log management features included in the product.

For how long have I used the solution?

We have been using AppDynamics for one month.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

AppDynamics is a stable product. It doesn't have a lot of bugs. We can fix the bugs at a code level whenever we encounter them with our expertise. It provides an ease of installation as well.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

I rate the platform's scalability an eight out of ten.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

Dynatrace works better compared to AppDynamics. While using AppDynamics, we have to install different external agents for managing, customizing, and monitoring logs. In comparison, we must install only one agent to carry out the processes while using Dynatrace.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup process is easy once learned. At the moment, I am a new AppDynamics user and am exploring more ways to make the process easier.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The product is more expensive than Datadog but lower than Dynatrace.

What other advice do I have?

It is a wonderful monitoring tool that manages various aspects such as system resources (CPU, RAM), mobile performance, and infrastructure monitoring. It provides ease of use, alerting capabilities, integration support, and scalability. Thus, it is already maintained. It doesn't provide log management services; we have to install different types of agents for business processes. It is not a cloud-native platform like AWS, GCP, etc. I rate AppDynamics an eight out of ten.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Senior Computer Performance Specialist at a government with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
We can go into multiple tiers and monitor the transactions from the end-user point of view.

What is most valuable?

The business transaction tier of management is the most valuable feature; the fact that we can go into multiple tiers and monitor the transactions from the end-user point of view. That's very important to what we're doing.

How has it helped my organization?

It brings everything to the forefront. It helps the application staff plus the executive staff understand what's going on with the end-user performance because, obviously, that's one of the most important issues today.

What needs improvement?

I’d like to see something more towards a merger between the dev and the production. This is where big data comes in; the portion that's in there, moving things from installation and dev, moving them, managing them and transitioning between dev to production for new applications.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

I haven't seen any problems with stability with any of the AppDynamics products that we're utilizing.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Right now, it's scaled for what we have to do in terms of what we have to add. I think we've already allowed it, in the planning, for adequate scaling. Obviously, you have to put these guys on, various agents, but we've allowed for that.

How are customer service and technical support?

The professional services that we actually use, we did need their assistance in standing up this product. They were very helpful. They're still behind us even after they left the facility. They check in and log in to make sure that we're on track with what we need to do. Any problems that we did face, they addressed.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We were previously using something else and that company didn't stay current with the times.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

Before choosing this product, we did evaluate other options.

What other advice do I have?

Take a test drive of the demo.

I’ve given it a high rating because of the initial dashboards that are being built and the way that they can be built. I haven't seen anything like that. Especially with the flow management that's literally there in real time.

For right now, we are not using any other AppDynamics products. We are only using AppDynamics APM, but the new one they introduced at a recent conference, Business iQ, that seems very appealing too.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
it_user487374 - PeerSpot reviewer
it_user487374VP Product Management at PeerSpot
Real User

What was the product that didn't meet your needs, and why? Can you share what other options you consider and why you didn't choose them?

Buyer's Guide
Download our free AppDynamics Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.
Updated: December 2024
Buyer's Guide
Download our free AppDynamics Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.