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Cisco Secure Network Analytics vs DX Performance Management comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 10, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Cisco Secure Network Analytics
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
22nd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
60
Ranking in other categories
Network Traffic Analysis (NTA) (3rd), Network Detection and Response (NDR) (5th), Cisco Security Portfolio (7th)
DX Performance Management
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
57th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
32
Ranking in other categories
Infrastructure Capacity Planning (2nd), DX NetOps (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Network Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of Cisco Secure Network Analytics is 1.2%, down from 1.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of DX Performance Management is 0.2%, down from 0.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Monitoring Software
 

Featured Reviews

Sudhakar T - PeerSpot reviewer
Strong network security analytics with excellent encrypted traffic analysis features
Improvements are needed on the application layer for complete security analysis. The solution should have the ability to analyze security events not only at the network layer but also at the application and OS layers. There's a need for a more comprehensive licensing model where all necessary licenses are included by default.
Sandip Kheni - PeerSpot reviewer
The vertical database loads faster than any other product available
We experience disconnections between the solutions own components. In the last five years, there have been many intermittent connection issues with the four components and we still don't know the reasons. The solution has issues when loading groups that have been created in the application interfaces. It would be nice to have a mobile application. In the current industry and technical word, the mobile phone is the only thing that is always in your hands. Other Broadcom products have mobile applications but the solution doesn't offer one. It would be great to view device parameters and view or download graphs from a mobile device.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"From a security standpoint, it is just seeing pockets as well. Visibility is very key for us."
"Using this solution has helped us to detect and identify viruses or malicious activity in the network early on."
"This product alleviates the day-to-day headaches for us, in regards to metrics."
"The most valuable feature we got out of Stealthwatch is to be able to, while troubleshooting, go deep into one of our interfaces and verify what the bandwidth is and if there's any activity there that's causing problems."
"Overall, the implementation is very good."
"Great network monitoring, looking at anomaly detection and evaluation."
"Provides easily identifiable anomalies that you can't see with signature detections."
"Stealthwatch has greatly improved our network visibility, in terms of bandwidth, malware, and PCI violations."
"The tool helps us understand network performance."
"​The ability to quickly do drag and drop customized reports for dashboards.​"
"There is another component of the tool called Network Flow Analysis. It gives us the ability to troubleshoot issues which do not appear right away."
"The solution's performance itself is very good because it is a vertical database that loads very fast in comparison to other products."
"The integration to the other products that we use: NFA, we use ADA, we use Spectrum; and CAPM integrates all those into a single pane of glass."
"The ability to very quickly and graphically navigate around, being able to zoom in to a timeframe, apply it to all the other panels... are all very intuitive."
"It can be easily integrated with other systems and is powerful enough to collect data from a large number of devices."
"The integration with NetFlow, the NFA solution, so that we can have our flow forensics paired with the SNMP polling performance metrics on the same page."
 

Cons

"It's not great as a standalone solution."
"Its granularity for RBAC roles-based access control needs improvement."
"It's a good solid solution but integration with Network Access Control products with Cisco ISE would be good."
"The expensive nature of the tool is an area of concern where improvements are required."
"The initial setup was complex."
"They should include Citrix VDIs in the next release."
"We need to be able to filter out internal IPs as non-threats."
"We've had problems with element licensing costs so scalability is a concern."
"This tool gathers so much data, which makes it hard to convert over. To upgrade it, you really need the solution backed up. That is the issue that we are facing right now."
"This may be available by now but for server space, when it comes to the disk file system, I'd like to see that graphically represented, or the trend, rather than what I'm seeing now."
"This solution is not very scalable."
"Some of the individual report views, the way some of the columns sort, there's room for improvement in giving us more flexibility in being able to sort reports based, for example, on what columns the metrics fall under."
"It needs role-based administration."
"Install is done as root, which is a security no-no, and the database IO requirements were not stated correctly, which lead to a year of instability."
"It seems like we escalate more than I would like to. If anything, they should look at how the tier support goes in place."
"There are some areas in the technology right now, like with VMs, where we are lacking with our abilities to get inside the VM to monitor traffic within the machine."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The tool is not cheaply priced."
"The solution is expensive. It costs several hundred thousand dollars per year (depending on how many flows you are collecting)."
"This is an expensive product. We have quit paying for support because we don't want to have to upgrade it and keep paying for it."
"​Licensing is done by flows per second, not including outside (in traffic)."
"NetFlow is very expensive."
"The licensing costs are outrageous."
"Licensing is done by flows per second, not including outside>in traffic."
"Today, we are part of the big Cisco ELA, and it is a la carte. We can get orders for whatever we want. At the end of the day, we have to pay for it in one big expense, but that is fine. We are okay with that."
"We purchase a license to use the solution every three years and we have multiple contracts. They have been increasing the price annually. We have a baseline for three years and then we need to pay the difference from the baseline, and we are in the process of negotiating a new price for all the licenses we need. The price overall is affordable."
"We were looking at other vendors in the marketplace for NetFlow, and CA just beat everybody else in price, cost, and the size to implement. ​"
"The tool's pricing is based on the number of network devices."
"They should provide more scalable licensing for the product."
"Do your homework and know how many devices you will be managing out of the gate. Be sure to project what your growth will be each year."
"I like the licensing model because it's device-based."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
29%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Government
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
30%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Educational Organization
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Cisco Stealthwatch?
The most valuable feature of Cisco Secure Network Analytics is the Threat Intelligence integration.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco Stealthwatch?
The organization experienced challenges with licensing as Cisco has multiple licensing factors, and there are concerns about the price. Cisco solutions are considered to be very expensive.
What needs improvement with Cisco Stealthwatch?
Improvements are needed on the application layer for complete security analysis. The solution should have the ability to analyze security events not only at the network layer but also at the applic...
What do you like most about DX Performance Management?
The tool helps us understand network performance.
What needs improvement with DX Performance Management?
Spectrum's topology view sometimes does not rebuild automatically when a device is shut down and reconnected. It requires manual discovery and rebuilding of the topology, which I hope can be improved.
 

Also Known As

Cisco Stealthwatch, Cisco Stealthwatch Enterprise, Lancope StealthWatch
CA Performance Management
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Edge Web Hosting, Telenor Norway, Ivy Tech Community College of Indiana, Webster Financial Corporation, Westinghouse Electric, VMware, TIAA-CREF
Jack Henry & Assoc, Target, CenturyLink, Bell Canada, BrightHouse Networks, Telus, Unisys, Verizon, Southern California Edison, GEICO, Fidelity Investments, Wells Fargo, American Family Insurance Group, Deutsche Telekom AG 
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Secure Network Analytics vs. DX Performance Management and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
845,040 professionals have used our research since 2012.