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IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) vs Security Onion comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 9, 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

IBM SevOne Network Performa...
Ranking in Log Management
44th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
54
Ranking in other categories
Network Monitoring Software (37th), Server Monitoring (18th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (43rd), Cloud Monitoring Software (29th)
Security Onion
Ranking in Log Management
18th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
5.5
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
AWS Marketplace (5th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Log Management category, the mindshare of IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) is 0.3%, down from 0.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Security Onion is 5.7%, up from 2.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Log Management
 

Featured Reviews

Grzegorz Nowak - PeerSpot reviewer
Improves infrastructure planning by helping us analyze network traffic
We use SevOne to collect and report on network flows SevOne improves infrastructure planning by helping us analyze network traffic. We can look at bandwidth for specific endpoints on the customer's network and analyze traffic to identify issues. For example, maybe some connectors are unavailable.…
Jörg Kippe - PeerSpot reviewer
A mature and affordable solution that is easy to install and easy to update
The product takes time to learn, it's not that easy. In the beginning we had a lot of questions. If you want to use such a tool in an real (industrial) environment, you have to ask how to get the network data. Can we do a full packet capture? Can we provide agents to our end systems? There are no simple solutions to these questions. It's a general problem when running such systems in an industrial environment.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The out of the box reports and workflows are pretty good and they meet our requirements well."
"Data Insight reporting tool is the most valuable feature. They came up with it a couple of years ago. The most pleasing factor is the dark theme. You don't have a white background. It has templates that you can create for all kinds of reports that you can hit on the fly. It's much better printing of the reports. If you want to send PDFs to people, the reports are actually decent. Whereas for years, the old architecture of the PDFs was rubbish and even our customers said, "We have to manipulate your PDFs because they all have bad margin breaks. SevOne fixed that a couple of years ago with the new Data Insight. It's fantastic."
"One of the most valuable features is the graphs, which you can build instantly. I have used some open-source platforms in the past, but they are not as good. With SevOne, the sampling in the graph can be every few seconds, not just every few minutes, and that's really helpful. It's really fast."
"I like SevOne's network flow reporting."
"The feature that I have found most valuable is the scale-up and scale-down. The scale-up is an operation where the CPU boosts-up and then the memory will boost-up. That works awesomely."
"In 90% of the cases, new devices are plug-and-play, so when a new version comes out then SevOne has support for it out of the box."
"The modules and the performance management reports that come with data insights are two of the most valuable features. I also find the reports for Wi-Fi, Netflow, LAN, and WAN for monitoring to be very good."
"It also gives us the closest thing to real-time insight into network performance that we have, with just a 10-second delay. It's very important for us to know the health of the infrastructure very quickly."
"The most valuable feature of Security Onion for security monitoring is its ability to find infected ports."
"We use Security Onion for internal vulnerability assessment."
"Security Onion is the most mature solution in the market."
 

Cons

"The reporting of NMS is good, but it could be better."
"In terms of having a complete view of our network performance, I would rate it a nine out of 10. The reason for not giving it a 10 is that there is no packet capture associated with SevOne, but we do have other tools in place to do that."
"I would like to see live maps as an added feature. Also, build modules on AI and EML to provide better data insights that would proactively tell us what we should be looking after."
"When I started using it, I tried adding one of the BroadWorks application servers into SevOne... it created thousands and thousands of objects from that one application server and we immediately ran out of license... It would help, when new objects are discovered, if there were a way to categorize those objects and to pick the part of the object you need..."
"Telemetry is hot these days, and IBM can improve SevOne's support for telemetry correction. Reporting is another feature that could be better. It provides the bare minimum functionality, which is good enough for most engineers, but the management isn't advanced. The new portal provides a much lighter view and better visualization, but the management is not so good."
"Would benefit with the addition of AI modules for proactive data insights."
"We previously have had discussions on some reporting enhancements. So, we raised a feature request, which was delivered from SevOne."
"SevOne could improve its flexibility because it isn't fully customizable and its out-of-the-box configuration doesn't cover all use cases."
"The initial setup of the solution is a little bit difficult."
"Security Onion's user interface could be improved."
"The product is not easy to learn."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing has not evolved with the market, which is one of the reasons we are moving to a new product."
"Many tools price things based on the number of KPIs that you're collecting around a device. In many cases, there could be hundreds of metrics that you need to collect. SevOne provides device-level pricing. That gives us the flexibility to turn on, and expand on, the metrics that we're collecting around those devices, without taking a financial hit."
"Although I don't have exact details in terms of cost, my experience has been that SevOne is willing to make a deal with the customer."
"There are different options available for licensing, with the per-device option being more expensive but more flexible."
"Prices per license are not huge, but they exist."
"For the value that you get from SevOne, it's worth the price. There are a lot of cheaper alternatives on the market, and even free options. But they require more staff, more resources, and engineers with more advanced knowledge of monitoring. That's what makes SevOne worth the price."
"Choose a SevOne partner who can provide SevOne as a service and can deliver professional services and maintenance."
"It is inexpensive compared to other monitoring tools."
"Security Onion is an open-source solution."
"It is an open-source solution."
"Security Onion is a free solution."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
17%
Manufacturing Company
16%
Computer Software Company
14%
Legal Firm
6%
Computer Software Company
12%
University
11%
Government
11%
Comms Service Provider
11%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about SevOne Network Data Platform?
I like the tool’s scalability and real-time reports. Earlier, we struggled to give real-time reports to clients. I also like the tool’s deployment model where we can deploy it either on-premises or...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SevOne Network Data Platform?
The tool is not expensive. We were able to negotiate with SevOne on pricing.
What needs improvement with SevOne Network Data Platform?
There is room for improvement in the integration with different vendors and the reporting capabilities. It would be beneficial to have out-of-the-box integration with third-party vendors and improv...
What do you like most about Security Onion?
The most valuable feature of Security Onion for security monitoring is its ability to find infected ports.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Security Onion?
Security Onion is an open-source solution. On a scale from one to ten, where ten is expensive and one is cheap, I rate the solution's pricing a six out of ten.
What needs improvement with Security Onion?
The initial setup of the solution is a little bit difficult.
 

Also Known As

SevOne
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

ATOS, Devereux, Spark New Zealand, Access4, Rogers Communication, Lumen (formerly known as CenturyLink)
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) vs. Security Onion and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
848,270 professionals have used our research since 2012.