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DX Spectrum vs SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

DX Spectrum
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
116
Ranking in other categories
Network Management Applications (6th), Network Monitoring Software (22nd), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (22nd), Network Troubleshooting (7th), DX NetOps (1st)
SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic ...
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
38
Ranking in other categories
Network Traffic Analysis (NTA) (5th)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Network Management solutions, they serve different purposes. DX Spectrum is designed for DX NetOps and holds a mindshare of 28.6%, down 44.3% compared to last year.
SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer, on the other hand, focuses on Network Traffic Analysis (NTA), holds 7.7% mindshare, down 10.3% since last year.
DX NetOps
Network Traffic Analysis (NTA)
 

Featured Reviews

DickBaker - PeerSpot reviewer
An all-inclusive monitoring solution that adapts to emerging technologies
The product helps to correlate events.  The solution's most valuable features are its integration with Broadcom tools and scalability. DX Spectrum needs better documentation on its complex features.  I have been using the product since 2005.  I rate DX Spectrum's stability an eight point five…
Dr. SureshHungenahally - PeerSpot reviewer
Used for capacity planning and handles a variety of protocols with easy setup
We conduct network traffic analysis for a couple of key reasons. First, we look for traffic anomalies, such as unexpected increases or decreases in network traffic within specific segments. This helps us determine if the network needs to be re-architected. We also analyze peak bandwidth and bandwidth consumption across various network segments, which is crucial if someone is planning to transition to software-defined networks. The network traffic analyzer tool allows us to simulate scenarios and compare before-and-after results. Additionally, it supports traffic sources like NetFlow and SFlow, and we regularly check the quality of service using NetFlow. The tool handles a variety of protocols, such as NetFlow version 5 and version 9, JFlow, and SFlow, making it independent of the underlying technology.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Scalability is a highly rated feature of this solution. It is better than some of the other tools that I've used in terms of scalability. We scaled it to tens of thousands of devices."
"​The stability of the product is key. It never breaks, really. The stability and reliability of the Spectrum product have been top-notch.​"
"The most valuable feature is the ability to put health checks in place not only for the infrastructure but for some of the services that are on top of the infrastructure."
"Spectrum is very useful for us, because the product lets us monitor and control all the various components of our infrastructure that support our business from an IT perspective."
"All networks (or network equipment) are monitored through CA Spectrum."
"This product provides good visibility into applications at the backend."
"We can plan changes and replacement of end-of-life products in our environment very well because it's very accurate."
"The capability of handling and monitoring with SNMP and working with the SNMP traps is much better than other products."
"The solution's most valuable feature is its traffic analysis."
"The performance analysis is a valuable feature. With the performance analyzer, we can see the realtime monitoring, the realtime performance, and historical performance on specific components like virtualization storage, CPU, servers and network equipment."
"The software management tools are very useful for our customers."
"NTA's most valuable feature is traffic analysis and visibility."
"I like that it is able to monitor multiple devices and it's vendor-agnostic."
"What my organization likes best about SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is its easy deployment. It's also well-integrated in terms of monitoring because my organization also uses a SolarWinds solution for monitoring. You can connect SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer directly to that monitoring tool to get information. My organization also finds the default graphs that appear before the configuration in SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer very useful."
"It helps us know when a branch is down because it has a graphic presentation of all the locations a node represents."
"The most valuable feature is the alarm that is set up to trigger based on bandwidth utilization."
 

Cons

"DX Spectrum needs better documentation on its complex features."
"For us, the implementation was quite complex but it's because of the large number of different environments we're dealing with."
"Make it easier to certify devices."
"Its visualization can be improved. It doesn't have a very advanced GUI. It is very basic and simple, but it does work."
"DX Spectrum needs to incorporate faster support."
"It needs better integration with other CA products."
"I would suggest improving the web GUI to improve the device monitor configuration and to improve or to integrate the new tool for reporting."
"Our consultant was four months on-site doing Spectrum setup and working through issues."
"Technical support needs improvement."
"This solution would benefit from having more security-based communications between the actual devices and the software itself."
"An area for improvement in SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is application visibility because some applications aren't being recognized correctly. You can see applications such as Facebook and YouTube, but SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer needs to have more visibility into more applications. Currently, SolarWinds fails to detect more powerful applications, such as Zoom and Teams. If SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer can recognize every application and be able to report on each in terms of bandwidth, then that would be good. This is what I'd like to see in the next release of the solution."
"It can be complex to set up and configure."
"I would like to see more artificial intelligence capabilities."
"It is a scalable solution, but it is costly to scale. Therefore, I would rate scalability at eight out of ten."
"SolarWinds' technical support is ok, but it could be faster and more knowledgeable."
"The solution needs better log management and log coordination with tools."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of the solution is reasonable."
"The cost of some of these products are a little cost prohibitive, which is unfortunate. We have to find lower cost solutions for some of the things that we have to pull in. For the most part, CA has capabilities in pretty much everything that you would need. You just have to figure out where are you going to spend the most money for what you have to actually get done. You can do all these things but, which ones do you have to do? And that's hard to choose sometimes because you want to do them all."
"Spectrum is expensive."
"It is expensive compared to other tools in the market."
"In general, the license cost will be about 30% of the total TCO for this tool (hardware/support team, OS costs, and OS management)."
"DX Spectrum's pricing depends on the license number. It is affordable."
"Since the acquisition by Broadcom, we have not had such a good experience with licensing and pricing. Since they were bought by Broadcom, every sales contract is getting complicated. It's very complicated, and it's much more expensive than before. It's not a good pricing strategy from Broadcom."
"The price is good enough to expect an ideal solution. It's expensive."
"The licensing for this solution is based on the number of nodes."
"Pricing for SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is very high. I have a customer that needs the solution but doesn't have the budget for SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer because the problem is that you can't use the solution only. You have to buy requirements such as the SolarWinds NPM first, and some companies don't have the budget for all the required components and modules. SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer can cost up to $10,000, and some customers don't have that budget. Another product has all the modules that SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer has, with a very low price, that can be a replacement, which is ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer. PRTG is another solution that can replace SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer."
"The pricing is really good."
"For our environment, we pay approximately $25,000 USD yearly."
"I don't have information on the licensing cost for SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer because it's bundled with another SolarWinds solution. My organization has seven different models and pays for the license yearly. My organization also had to deploy additional pollers, but the cost wasn't very expensive, though I can't give the exact numbers."
"SolarWinds' pricing structure is the primary reason why some customers opt for another solution such as ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer. In NTA, you are charged per port, meaning that if you have a 24-port switch you will be charged for 24 individual nodes. ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer, on the other hand, charges per switch, such that if you add a switch, the entire switch will count as one single node."
"The pricing is reasonable."
"While the pricing is fair, it could be better."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
18%
Manufacturing Company
14%
Computer Software Company
13%
Government
7%
Educational Organization
71%
Computer Software Company
4%
Financial Services Firm
3%
Government
2%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about DX Spectrum?
The solution's most valuable features are its integration with Broadcom tools and scalability.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for DX Spectrum?
We are a customer of Broadcom, we use a group license that covers various CA products, including DX Spectrum. The company purchases the licenses they need from this group license, and we do not hav...
What needs improvement with DX Spectrum?
Support from Broadcom could be better. Sometimes we wait a very long time for a solution to level three problems. Challenges and Limitations The only other challenge is the price, which is the main...
What is the best network monitoring software for large enterprises?
I have worked from 1973 with all kind of systems in large enterprises across the world. And have experience with all kind of software in monitoring from infra to end to end, it depends on the funct...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer?
The product is expensive. I rate the product’s pricing as one out of ten, where one is expensive, and ten is cheap.
What needs improvement with SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer?
SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer could improve its flexibility and integration with AI to provide analytics beyond just showing up/down statuses and traffic volumes.
 

Also Known As

CA Spectrum
Netflow Traffic Analyzer
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

National Informatics Centre India, Banese, Olympus, AlphaServe Technologies, Sicredi
Oceaneering International, Asia Pacific Network Information Centre, 335th Signal Command, Immofori
Find out what your peers are saying about DX Spectrum vs. SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer and other solutions. Updated: February 2023.
831,158 professionals have used our research since 2012.