Auvik Network Management (ANM) Reviews

We have a medium-sized business. We have two data centers and two small physical offices. Our main goal is to monitor the traffic between the data centers to get an idea of the traffic, and our current firewalls don't offer that as a solution.

The main selling point was the traffic insights feature, which better explains our network traffic. Auvik has many different features, but we primarily want it for traffic insights. It has monitoring and network discovery. Network discovery is useful, but we already have a monitoring solution. The network map is easy to use.

The onboarding could be a bit better for Auvik. We've had a few issues out of the gate because we already had an existing Auvik setup that was invalidated. Given that we're a new customer, it's taken a while to get support for these issues. It's taken a couple of days, but I would have thought that as new customers, we'd get priority support until the solution is running. 

I would like it if you could filter out workstations. We've got Windows workstations and servers, but we only care about the servers. It would be nice if we could filter out devices based on the operating systems, so we don't have to see the workstations, but you can't. 

We used the Auvik trial for about three weeks and then purchased the full product after a couple of months. We're now a week into using it.

I rate Auvik nine out of 10 for stability. I haven't had any downtime. 

I rate Auvik nine out of 10 for scalability. It has the potential to scale because you can add collectors or create new sites as needed. 

I rate Auvik support seven out of 10. The people I've spoken to have been pleasant, but it's taking a while to deal with our outstanding issues. 

Neutral

We also use PRTG for our network monitoring. We invested a lot of money in PRTG, so we can't replace it all yet. We adopted Auvik for its traffic insights. 

It should be straightforward, but some things don't work, and the guides aren't necessarily correct either. We've used it for a week now and don't have much in there because there are a few teething issues that I've opened tickets for. 

The price is what I expect for a product like Auvik. It's reasonably priced. 

I rate Auvik eight out of 10. 

We initially implemented Auvik Network Management because we lacked network visibility. During the trial, the traffic analysis feature unexpectedly revealed malicious connections. This pop-out function within Auvik allowed us to break down traffic and identify TeamViewer sessions by destination, ultimately helping us pinpoint the source. This unexpected benefit, along with its core alerting functionality, convinced our executives of Auvik's value.

While the network map offers near real-time, full visibility into our network, it's limited to managed switches. This means the current drawback lies solely with outdated infrastructure, and the most effective solution is an upgrade.

The interface is intuitive and user-friendly.

After deploying Auvik Network Management within a week, I gained complete visibility into our network traffic. Alarmingly, it revealed a significant amount of unauthorized software and social media usage, with Facebook alone accounting for a quarter of our traffic within just a day. This immediate insight allowed us to take swift action and shut down the problematic activity, demonstrating the clear value of Auvik from the beginning.

In my experience with entry-level technicians at our co-op, Auvik Network Management has been a valuable tool. It simplifies network mapping and understanding for beginners and even helps me proactively manage tickets. With Auvik, I can identify potential issues before they escalate into major alerts, or use existing alerts to create tickets for faster resolution.

Auvik Network Management helps us spend less time on maintenance and setup of the solution and less time on the issue resolution.

Auvik Network Management was a time-saver, but more importantly, it provided greater network visibility which ultimately improved security. Instead of spending time sifting through logs for issues, Auvik's features freed me up to implement solutions and proactively enhance network security.

The most valuable features are the traffic analysis and the network mapping.

The network map is great overall, but it loses track of devices when their IP addresses change. This means we have to manually remove them and let them re-add, or use static IPs. Every month, a bunch of devices change IPs and end up in a random category, disrupting the map's organization. That's my only complaint - otherwise, it's user-friendly and functional.

I previously evaluated one of Auvik's products, but it felt incomplete as a standalone SaaS offering. Ideally, Auvik would bundle this product with its other solutions for a more comprehensive network management experience.

Auvik Network Management needs to improve its operational technology coverage. 

I have been using Auvik Network Management for one year.

Auvik's stability is good overall, with frequent maintenance windows that haven't caused major disruptions for me. While these windows could potentially interfere during a security event, they are thankfully short and reasonable.

Auvik Network Management handled my network well. It discovered devices across multiple VPNs and even unconfigured switches with default settings. This scalability was impressive, as it automatically connected to various sites with limited access, saving me time and effort.

I contacted technical support as soon as I noticed the issue with Auvik not being able to automatically remap devices that changed their IP. 

Positive

While I previously used Cisco Firepower for its rule-based functionality, it wasn't a true replacement for Auvik Network Management. Firepower seemed redundant for my needs since Auvik already provided the network visibility I required.

Auvik Network Management's deployment impressed with its ease of use. Installing the collectors, entering credentials, and letting it discover devices was a breeze. While building a complete network map took a couple of days due to complexities like potential network loops, it began providing valuable insights immediately.

The deployment took two hours.

I took advantage of Auvik's three-hour technical support to configure alerts and receive a high-level overview of their Network Management platform, but I handled the actual deployment myself.

Auvik Network Management's pricing was surprisingly reasonable. Even my C-suite executives, who initially anticipated a much higher cost, found it to be quite fair.

Cisco Visibility provided better coverage for the operational technology side of my network compared to Auvik Network Management. However, Cisco's high cost was a drawback, while Auvik offered a more affordable option with the added benefit of traffic analysis and alerts.

I would rate Auvik Network Management ten out of ten.

Our entire IT infrastructure, including all servers and pretty much everything else, is managed by Auvik. The only area I'd like to improve is Operational Technology monitoring. Since our CNC machines run small Windows deployments, Auvik doesn't monitor them as effectively as an OT-specific solution would.

The only maintenance I need involves manually clearing out IP addresses instead of letting Auvik automatically refine and remap them, which can be frustrating. This can cause a device's IP to change several times, leaving outdated entries in a grayed-out section. It's a minor inconvenience but would improve the overall user experience.

Due to our focus on privacy, our company wasn't sold on Auvik's standalone SaaS solution, feeling it was excessive for our needs. While it excelled at shadow IT discovery and endpoint monitoring, it lacked vulnerability scanning and remediation capabilities. Integrating these features into their existing product would be far more valuable, allowing for automatic updates and patching alongside IT asset monitoring. While Auvik's SaaS product is okay, it wasn't the right fit for us.

Don't miss out on configuring Auvik's alerts! The default settings are overly broad, notifying you about everything from critical issues to minor inconveniences like low printer toner. Take advantage of Auvik's customization options to ensure you only receive alerts for important events.

Auvik is a tool that discovers all the networking assets within our clients' sites. Many other tools do this, but we like how Auvik integrates into our existing infrastructure. The primary use case is discovering all our networking devices, managing them, and setting up alerts. We use Auvik with a combination of other tools. It's integrated with our ticket management system where most tickets are escalated. 

We deployed Auvik at a new client yesterday evening, and we can see almost everything within the network now. We've had access to the firewall. After a bit more configuration, we can see the network map populate.

Auvik's network maps and diagrams are solid. Once everything is fully dialed in and the network devices are properly speaking to Auvik, you have a perfect network diagram. 

The solution is easy to use.  Learning Auvik only requires you to play some games on your machine, but there is no steep learning curve. There has never been a time when I didn't understand something about the technology. I don't think the learning curve would be high for someone without a technical background. It's so intuitive you don't need to dive deeply into various menus to find what you want. 

Auvik gives you a real-time picture of your network. I've never designed a network map that captures every data point, but Auvik does that. A network map gets cumbersome for end users because you see everything. You might see 25 to 100 nodes connected to an access point. If you are having issues with the network map, you can zoom in on the area you want to focus on.

To get the details about applications in Traffic Insights, you need to dive into the applications as a general category. You can see the users using the application, but I cannot pull each component into the report. Let's say I'm going to an end-user or a client. When I print a report, it comes out with 10 pages about the usage, resources, etc. 

I want to see details about the resources I use, and I can't do that. We have this data in a graphical format, and we can get the data provided in Traffic Insights by using other components within Auvik. I want a detailed report that we could present to the client. I was told at one point that we could produce this through integration with another solution. We tried that, and it didn't work. We did a service ticket again and spoke to the relevant persons, but there were false positives. 

They should pull the Traffic Insights feature until they're finished developing it. I cannot generate a report. It's all about monitoring, not configuring or backing up anything. It's just about monitoring, so I can't pull the report. Traffic Insights should be able to do that. 

The network map could be more customizable. You can decide whether you want a comprehensive map or only want to see the core network features. It all depends on the shape the end-users want for the network map. It's not the traditional shape that we're used to in IT. They could introduce something where the map can adapt to new shapes.

I have used Auvik for two years at two organizations. 

I rate Auvik support eight out of 10. They're great. Auvik responds to feature requests. A while ago, there was a useful feature missing, and Auvik jumped on it. 

Positive

The onboarding went smoothly. Some of Auvik's team helped us. It was very quick. The core solution was deployed within a month. 

Auvik offers a solid value because it only bills for the core components like switches, firewalls, etc. It isn't billing for every discoverable device. The cost is manageable. Many critical devices are covered but not billed. I would consider all of the clients' assets critical. We don't have a tiered system. 

I rate Auvik eight out of 10. 

We're an MSP using Auvik to monitor our customers' networks for outages and other issues. Our clients are mostly large enterprises in the UK. 

Auvik has improved our monitoring of contracts for service outside of normal business hours. If anything goes offline after hours, we can alert our engineers immediately, so they can get it working as fast as possible.  

The solution has helped our junior technicians solve more tickets. They can log in at our office and see what's happening and then contact the customer about it. It saves us a lot of time because it can tell us the status. Sometimes, we'll finish troubleshooting halfway, and the device will return online. Without a solution like Auvik, we might not notice it's online, so we will waste time trying to fix it. I don't have a precise figure, but I would estimate that Auvik reduces our resolution time by about 30 percent. 

Auvik allows you to set maintenance windows and notify users when something is offline. Auvik's interface is easy to use, but maybe that's because I've gotten used to it. The layout is clear. At the same time, there are so many features that it's complicated. The dashboards give us a real-time overview of the networks. It's simple and easy to use as you give it access to your network.

Setting up the maintenance windows can be a bit complicated. 

We have used Auvik for three years.

I rate Auvik nine out of 10 for stability. It's definitely stable. We barely need to touch it. It goes offline every now and then, but that doesn't happen often. 

I rate Auvik 10 out of 10 for scalability. 

We don't rely on Auvik's support. There's a lot of documentation available, but we seldom need to use it because it's easy to use and the interface is intuitive enough to figure a lot of it out. 

We previously used Meraki's monitoring solution, but it doesn't send alerts the same way Auvik does. Auvik is better for that.

Setting up Auvik is pretty straightforward. I can build and deploy Auvik alone in one day. It requires some updates and configuration changes but no significant maintenance. 

I rate Auvik Network Management nine out of 10. I recommend Auvik for network visibility and any type of network monitoring. 

Auvik is our primary network management tool. We utilize it to ensure all systems and remote sites are seamlessly connected to our central office. While its core function is network management, we leverage its capabilities for deep-dive technical analysis when needed.

In our setup, Auvik itself is deployed in the cloud. I'm not sure if they have a hybrid or on-premises option available. However, we do require a collector, which is a virtual server we own. This server stores data that Auvik accesses for network management and discovery. If the collector goes down, Auvik won't be able to report any information to the cloud. Although I manage everything through the cloud interface, I never need to log into the collector itself.

The UI can be easily navigated by new users. 

Auvik offers a network map for improved visibility. However, I'm unsure if our current setup allows us to take full advantage of this feature. While I can access the map, it sometimes displays inaccurate connections, with devices either incorrectly shown as connected or missing entirely. While my initial suspicion is a fault on our end, I believe the overall concept of the map is good and has potential.

Using the network map is easy. Auvik has a helpful key that explains what each line represents and what different devices look like on the map.

The network map provides full visibility without the need for other tools.

Auvik helps decrease our Mean Time to Resolution and allows us to spend less time on setup and issue resolution.

I like how Auvik gives us a quick overview of the overall situation. With a glance at the main page, we can see the most utilized sites, the overall bandwidth usage, and even identify the top bandwidth consumers. The color-coded map with green for online and red for offline sites is an intuitive way to get a high-level picture at a glance.

I requested that Auvik implement an alarm system to notify me immediately of any disruptions or anomalies. While email alerts are currently in place, I believe audible notifications would be more effective in attracting my attention.

I appreciate the notification that they're addressing the recent service outage. While I understand being kept informed, multiple emails for every impacted device seem excessive. It would be ideal if notifications were consolidated into a single update once the issue is resolved. Hopefully, they'll have it fixed soon.

I have been using Auvik for one and a half years.

Overall, I'd rate Auvik's stability a solid nine out of ten. While occasional downtime is inevitable, they're smart about scheduling it for minimal impact - typically early Saturday mornings when most users are offline. Of course, like any technology, unforeseen issues can arise, but these are rare and Auvik keeps users well-informed throughout any downtime occurrences. Infrequent hiccups aside, Auvik has proven remarkably reliable.

Auvik is very flexible and can scale to anything we have.

The technical support has been able to resolve all our issues promptly.

Positive

Previously, I used SolarWinds, which worked reasonably well. However, after experiencing a security breach, I decided to move on due to concerns about continued vulnerabilities. Although SolarWinds may have taken corrective measures since then, I opted for Auvik. My primary driver for this change was the map functionality. While SolarWinds displayed individual sites and color-coded lines depicting connectivity, highlighting downed circuits with red, Auvik's map features are tied to external providers like Leaflet or OpenStreetMap. This limits customization, preventing me from using my background image and manually connecting elements. While longitude and latitude coordinates are available, I find this approach less intuitive for my needs and potentially confusing for the general user base. Additionally, SolarWinds' technical support proved unhelpful after the breach, refusing to assist with resolving issues related to device recognition. This lack of support contrasted starkly with Auvik's customer service, which readily helped me ensure all my devices communicated seamlessly with the platform. The responsive customer service led me to switch to Auvik.

The initial deployment with Auvik's support was straightforward. They provided clear guidance and assistance to get our systems up and running. While we assumed ownership gradually after mastering the basics, Auvik stayed readily available for ongoing support. Whenever we encountered hurdles during implementation, their tech team promptly cleared the roadblocks. To finalize the process, Auvik conducted a comprehensive review, ensuring everything functions flawlessly. The smooth deployment took a month with moderate effort, and it could have been significantly faster if needed. Me and my system admin completed the deployment.

The implementation was completed in-house with the help of an Auvik technician.

The initial offer was high, but I was able to negotiate it down. The final price is quite competitive compared to other options. Auvik offers a robust feature set that can be further expanded with add-ons. I'm particularly interested in their inventory asset program, which appeals to me because it conveniently bundles all the software we need. While I'm leaning towards adding it eventually, additional funding would be necessary. Furthermore, Auvik offers an optional "Traffic Insights" add-on that provides comprehensive data on all connected devices. It's important to note that these add-ons come at an additional cost on top of the basic Auvik license.

I would rate Auvik a nine out of ten.

Network management can be a bit of a plunge. We dive in, test the waters, and then see if it works for us. We didn't fully grasp the benefits of Auvik until we had it up and running for about six months to truly understand its impact. One thing I've noticed in the past year or two since we adopted Auvik, is that they were initially rough around the edges on some things. But they've stepped up their game since then. Their upcoming release sounds particularly promising, especially for remote desktop functionality. We currently use other software for that, but Auvik's new feature will allow us to do it directly within their platform, which I'm excited about.

We were able to get Auvik up and running and see the value quicker than we did for SolarWinds.

Maintenance is occasionally necessary. If we add or remove devices, adjustments are required to ensure proper system recognition. However, when no changes are made, the system functions autonomously daily.

To avoid initial frustration, it's crucial to ensure proper device accountability and the ability to identify elements like SNMP. Verify everything is running as expected. Auvik's lack of visibility might stem from our recent router replacements and mass equipment installation within the past six months. It's important to remember that if our configuration isn't accurate, Auvik is not at fault. Therefore, having everything properly set up beforehand would be the best approach.

We use Auvik for networking and security-related purposes.

We implemented Auvik because we wanted to have mapping based on different physical locations, especially for remote locations. For us to be able to track the traffic properly in and out of both of those environments.

Auvik is cloud-based with an on-premises collector.

Auvik provides a user-friendly intuitive interface. It makes things a lot easier to see on the front end. The troubleshooting aspect of finding devices within the network is so easy to navigate.

Auvik's network map along with its dashboard provides us with a real-time picture of our network.

Using the network map and dashboard to gain real-time visibility into the network is easy.

The network map dashboard grants us complete visibility, which is of paramount importance to our operations.

Auvik promptly notifies us of downed devices, enabling our help desk support to swiftly troubleshoot and address issues.

Auvik has empowered our entry-level technicians to resolve more tickets independently. This has eliminated some of the lower-priority alerts and freed up the time of our senior technicians within the helpdesk, allowing them to focus on project work.

It has enabled us to reduce our mean time to resolution by at least 20 percent, thanks to the additional information it provides.

Auvik provides complimentary monitoring of our critical devices, which is essential to our organization's operations.

It allows us to spend less time on setup, maintenance, and time resolution. This has enabled our help desk to look at more tickets and resolve more issues.

I find the mapping topology, traffic insights, and reporting to be the most valuable features that Auvik offers.

The pricing always has room for improvement.

I have been using Auvik for five years.

I would rate the stability of Auvik nine out of ten.

I would rate the scalability of Auvik nine out of ten.

The technical support is great.

Positive

We also use SolarWinds but it is not our primary solution. Auvik is by far a better product compared to what SolarWinds can offer.

The initial deployment was straightforward. The process was simple and we had one meeting before being able to deploy Auvik. Four to Five people were involved in the deployment.

We have seen upwards of a 35 percent return on investment with Auvik.

Auvik is a cost-efficient solution for the applications we use it for.

I would rate Auvik nine out of ten.

I have thoroughly reviewed Auvik's offerings and find them to be comprehensive and well-designed.

We have a physical presence in various locations, including computers, endpoints, and users. Auvik is deployed in approximately 30 to 40 of these physical locations. We have 3,200 endpoints and 2,300 users.

Auvik does not require any maintenance.

I would do a proof of concept for people just to see if Auvik does fit their organization. If they're looking for just a networking tool for monitoring, I would recommend Auvik 100 percent.

I have used Auvik for a comprehensive range of monitoring tasks, from managing network infrastructures to overseeing the health of our servers. It has proven invaluable for resource monitoring, and I have even employed it to monitor printers. Throughout my career, Auvik has been my go-to solution for monitoring virtually everything.

We didn't have strong visibility across our network devices. Auvik solved our visibility problem.

Auvik provides an intuitive interface that supports ease of use. The user-friendly interface streamlines the troubleshooting of network issues. What used to take half an hour now takes me a few minutes.

The network map, which is displayed alongside the dashboard, provides a real-time overview of our network with a latency of 20 to 60 minutes.

Using the network map and dashboard to gain real-time visibility into our network is easy.

The network map and dashboard provide us with full visibility which is important for our organization.

Auvik has streamlined our compliance across our devices and helped us identify devices that were previously unknown on our network.

It has empowered our entry-level technicians to resolve more tickets independently.

By empowering our entry-level technicians to resolve more tickets independently, we have alleviated some of the burden on our senior team members.

Auvik has helped decrease our mean time to resolution by ten percent.

It allows us to spend less time on setup and maintenance as well as issue resolution. We've been able to focus on improving our network stability and on larger projects.

The most valuable features are the syslog tool and the nearly invaluable network map.

Auvik's notifications could be better. I think it only notifies once, but if it were to do so more than once, that'd be super helpful for our use cases, or at least it has to be configurable.

I have been using Auvik for three years.

Auvik has been stable for us.

Auvik is easy to scale up.

We have plans to increase the usage in our organization.

The technical support is helpful and extremely responsive. Their knowledge base is good.

Positive

We were using Nagios, but it wasn't cloud-hostable and didn't offer a SaaS version. We needed a solution that could scale across our multiple locations, so we switched to Auvik.

The initial deployment is straightforward. The deployment took one to two hours to complete. We had small agents we installed on our devices. The deployment required two network administrators and one IT support.

The implementation was completed in-house.

We have seen a return on investment through hours saved using Auvik.

The pricing for Auvik is reasonable. While it only charges us for specific network devices, it also gives us features and monitoring for devices outside of that, which is very helpful. While the price is high, we are getting a lot of features for our money.

After evaluating both Domotz and Auvik, we found that Domotz is the more affordable option, but it is also more difficult to set up. Auvik offers a more powerful solution with similar features to Domotz.

I would rate Auvik ten out of ten.

Auvik delivers rapid time to value.

While Auvik provides free monitoring for some of our critical devices, this is not a significant factor in our decision-making process as we can find other solutions that offer the same functionality at no cost.

We have Auvik deployed across multiple locations on 300 endpoints.

Auvik requires little maintenance.

I recommend relying on the support representatives to answer any questions. They are quite knowledgeable and can provide answers promptly.

I have learned that it's very easy to quickly lose track of devices without a strong monitoring system, and that's what Auvik is for us.

We use this solution to monitor our network devices and servers, get alerts if devices go down, and get alerts when they come back up, which is important. Auvik alerts us about abnormal network traffic and certain ports on certain network devices or high utilization and high bandwidth. We're going to use it to monitor our virtual servers and virtual systems that of which our servers run. It gives us good visibility into our network.

We're a resort and have about 800 employees. It is a single network with multiple VLANs. It is relatively straightforward, but we have a lot of remote buildings connected by fiber lengths. Therefore, it's spread out over about 1600 acres of property.

Auvik bridges a lot of gaps for us. We have several remote locations on our campus, and there are network devices that are spread out. They're not manned all the time, so if a tree falls down on a data line or if the power goes out, for instance, a lot of times we wouldn't really know about it until people come on the property or go to that location and let us know. Auvik lets us be more proactive by telling us exactly when something goes down, and we can respond to it as soon as possible rather than waiting for service disruption for a user.

It also bridges the gap as far as backing up our systems and backing up the network switches, which, before Auvik, was a manual process. Now, we don't even have to do it; Auvik does it automatically.

I like the fact that it's easy to set up and learn our network. I've used some other systems where it takes a lot of time and effort to manage the monitoring system, so you get what you put into it. The nice thing about Auvik is that you put the credentials in, put the agent on the network, and it just does its thing. It sets up alerts that you would most likely turn on anyway without even having to do it. If you add another new device to the network, it detects it and sets alerts up for that device. With the other systems that I've used, I had to manually add those devices in and manually set the alerts for new devices. I like that it's an almost set-it-and-forget-it sort of system.

The other feature I really like is the network switch backup. It backs up the configurations of all our devices. We can go back and look at the history of the configurations as well. It's a feature that the other systems I used didn't even have.

There is one portal to access everything that Auvik does, that is, it provides a single integrated platform. I don't have to access it through any other panes of glass. It's important because when the Auvik device is in your network, it uploads all the data to its cloud. That's nice because you can access that portal from anywhere. You can access it from a phone, tablet, or PC.

We previously used multiple applications for managing our networks. It wasn't an all-in-one system, and we'd have to manually do a lot of the tasks that Auvik can do.

It's very easy to use the monitoring and management functions. It's automated and keeps itself up-to-date. If you want to monitor traffic or monitor a specific device on your network, it will already be up-to-date. You just click on it and view it.

The network visualization is very intuitive. It's easy to use and navigate, and if you have any questions, the technical support staff and account manager can answer any questions you might have. I didn't really have to read any manuals or receive any training on Auvik. It's easy to install, configure, and get going.

Auvik helped to reduce repetitive low-priority tasks through automation. It automates the network switch backups, which would take four or five hours a month to do before. It also eliminates the need to tune our monitoring system because it does it itself, which is very nice.

Our IT team is more available for higher-priority tasks, end-user issues, and training because we're spending less time doing menial tasks.

Auvik helps to keep device inventories up-to-date. We have other inventory systems as well, but we can use Auvik to keep track of workstations, servers, printers, and other devices on our network. It even keeps track of printer toner and paper, which saves time.

We have seen a reduction in our meantime to resolution. Auvik helps us to be more proactive and lets us respond to issues faster.

If the out-of-the-box price was about 30% lower, I think it would have allowed us to purchase it sooner. It definitely costs more than some of the competitors that are out there. It's also better, so I understand why it's a little bit more expensive.

I've been using Auvik for less than a month.

Auvik is stable. I haven't had any issues yet with either the collector or the cloud.

We used WhatsUp Gold previously and switched to Auvik because it is easier to use, is more robust, and has better features. It's a more mature, better product.

Auvik is cloud-based but has an on-premises component to it, which feeds the data to its cloud. The good thing about that is that I don't have to do any updates or upgrades to the software. Auvik takes care of that for us. They will update the collector that is on-premises as well as their cloud systems. With the previous on-premises systems that we used, we had to manually upgrade them periodically ourselves. Auvik eliminates that.

The initial setup was straightforward; it was one of the easiest systems to deploy. I implemented it out-of-the-box, and it literally took me about 20 minutes or less to get it going. I downloaded the virtual server, installed it on my virtual system, booted it up, gave it an IP address, let some firewall rules through, and signed up with an account on the Auvik website. At that point, it was talking and running.

The somewhat harder part is adding all the credentials that you need for it to talk to the different systems. Auvik gives you usable, good data within 20 minutes.

After the collector was implemented and once the credentials have been added in for the network devices, within 20 to 30 minutes the network map started to populate. It's amazing how it updates the map pretty much right away.

If I were to compare the time and cost it took to set up and maintain Auvik versus that of the solution we used previously, the cost is higher by 50%. However, the installation was quite a bit faster. It took probably 20% of the time it took me to install and configure the other system, and the maintenance, if any, is definitely less with Auvik.

Maintenance-wise, we make sure that we update credentials if we change passwords and tune alerts a bit to make sure that we're not getting bombarded with emails that we don't really care about. Auvik is straightforward and finds everything on our network for us and keeps us posted.

I worked with my salesperson who knows the system really well, which is very rare in the IT space. I had a few questions, and he worked with me on some configurations. He was able to get me a quote and configure my system.

If you are comparing network monitoring solutions but are concerned about pricing, my advice would be to look at the big picture. You may spend less money on a solution, but you're going to spend more time configuring it and keeping it running properly. You may have to manually do some tasks that aren't featured on the cheaper version of the system. Overall, you'll probably end up spending the same amount of money with labor savings.

Auvik is straightforward. I recommend looking at the time it's going to save you, and take that into consideration when purchasing it or looking at the price. Overall, Auvik does more than a lot of solutions, so it's definitely a good time saver. I would definitely recommend it and rate it at nine on a scale from one to ten.