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Microsoft Active Directory vs SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 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

Microsoft Active Directory
Ranking in Active Directory Management
6th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
42
Ranking in other categories
Single Sign-On (SSO) (7th)
SolarWinds Server and Appli...
Ranking in Active Directory Management
12th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
5.0
Number of Reviews
42
Ranking in other categories
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (16th), Server Monitoring (9th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Active Directory Management category, the mindshare of Microsoft Active Directory is 4.8%, up from 2.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is 1.0%, down from 1.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Active Directory Management
 

Featured Reviews

Srikanth Subramanian - PeerSpot reviewer
Centralized access control and identity management simplify user management
Even better group management would be beneficial. Creating and searching through groups can be challenging, especially if I need to export data. Exporting and verifying group memberships require command line scripts, which isn't simple. The current Active Directory UI is limited in report generation, necessitating script knowledge to generate various reports.
Subhajit Nag - PeerSpot reviewer
The component and cable monitoring features are good, but the interface is slow
SolarWinds' interface is slow, and this is a global concern. Every SolarWinds user complains about the sluggishness. The response is slow. If you browse from one page to another, you have to wait. Our company is a massive user with plenty of licenses, so the performance issues could be due to the load per license. Ten thousand components can be mapped under one license. So SolarWinds needs to take care of the speed problem. It cannot be this slow. That is a huge complaint. Otherwise, the tool is good. It should also be easier to upgrade SolarWinds. AppDynamics is harder to deploy but easier to upgrade. So AppDynamics takes a lot of time and effort to install, but you can upgrade it in minutes. SolarWinds is the opposite. It's easy to deploy, but upgrades take forever. To date, nobody can complete it on time, so the production environment is sitting idle. The upgrade time matters because you only install the solution once, but you'll need to upgrade the solution repeatedly over the life of the product. A complex installation isn't an issue, but I mind if the upgrade takes too long because it's already in production.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Audit, authentication and authorization are the best features."
"The solution is user-friendly, and I like using Microsoft products. I think there is no other choice for Active Directory. Microsoft Windows Server Active Directory is the best."
"Active Directory is more flexible and feature-rich than Apache."
"The scalability of the solution is high...The initial setup of the solution is easy, and I would rate it an eight or nine out of ten on a scale of one to ten, where one being difficult and ten being easy."
"The Solution's most important feature is that it can merge with a cloud-based active directory via Azure AD Connect."
"The user interface of the product is very easy to use."
"It is easy to handle, and it gives a hundred percent results with the group policies."
"The ability for a single sign-on for applications."
"We use the solution as a central monitoring tool. We use it to monitor every transaction that has a relation to the organization’s infrastructure."
"The solution can be deployed quickly."
"SolarWinds SAM has provided us with dynamic thresholds based on historical trends and requirements. The threshold gets configured automatically, so it's no longer necessary to configure it manually every time."
"It's good at monitoring system-specific things like ports, services."
"Monitoring of processes and services is the most valuable feature. It is not necessarily just the server alone in terms of the CPU or the memory. We can go in-depth into services and processes."
"I'd rate technical support at eight out of ten. They are helpful and fast."
"The product integrates with Remedy."
"SSL Certificate Monitoring and Expiry Alerting"
 

Cons

"There are no reporting features."
"We may occasionally experience difficulty integrating some solutions with Microsoft Active Directory, but I am unsure whether the issue lies with Microsoft Active Directory or the other solution."
"Microsoft Active Directory fails to provide MFA. MFA, which is also known as multi-factor authentication on top of the password and username, is what I would like to see in the product's future releases."
"The technical support team does not give prompt responses."
"There has been a change in the layout of the user information. Previously, I had to go to properties to view the information, but now it is displayed directly below the search results. It takes some time to get used to."
"The cloud service of Microsoft Active Directory is an area with certain shortcomings that need improvement."
"The solution's price could be better."
"The product's premium support services could be less expensive."
"There is one feature that is a report writer. And they are currently trying to take it out from being a stand-alone application and integrating to the web. This doesn't give us the flexibility and it doesn't expand what we can get when it comes to reporting. So, putting it on the web is going to make it difficult to get some information. Leaving it where it is now will help us a lot."
"The technical support was better in previous years. With the launch of the premium support service, the normal support has declined."
"It lacks a user experience for measuring things like the end-to-end time for which a user waits for a specific response in the system. In the application layer, it has some very basic stuff. You have to build your own with manuscripts and things like that."
"Downside of the tools is the web console are hung or crash. It need to improve the performance."
"When you implement SolarWinds on a larger scale my customers complain about the speed."
"Solarwinds should come up the same monitoring system for other certificate expiration alert apart from SSL."
"It needs time-based functions for monitoring. Some things need to be polled on a specific schedule or only during a specific window."
"One area that could benefit from improvement is its performance"
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Active Directory is built-in into Microsoft Windows 10. I'm not an administrator and would not be involved in purchasing decisions for new versions of the software. I have only used the client portion of it, I do not know if there is a cost to using the solution."
"My company makes payments every quarter towards the licensing costs of the product."
"The solution is based on a licensing model."
"The license is perpetual and the cost is minimal. If you purchase Microsoft Windows then Microsoft Active Directory comes with the package."
"The price of Microsoft Active Directory could improve. We pay annually for the solution."
"Its price is reasonable."
"Active Directory is an expensive solution, primarily due to Microsoft's licensing model. This licensing approach includes paying for server licenses as well as for each computer that connects to it. However, when working with the Azure cloud, there is no cost for the server. This is profitable and one of the main reasons why Azure Cloud and other cloud-based solutions are being used more."
"On a scale from one to ten, where one is cheap and ten is expensive, I rate the solution's pricing a four out of ten."
"When planning for the number of licenses to purchase, make sure you understand all of the elements within an application required to really understand performance well. In our case, we quickly came to the conclusion that an unlimited license for SAM was the way to go."
"The licenses start from USD 3000.00 and go up to USD 20,000.00 for the year. It's a perpetual license. Nothing is free in SolarWinds, anything that you need is an additional cost."
"Pricing is inexpensive, starting at 2440 euros. For that, you get the ability to monitor a couple of nodes and one year of maintenance and support."
"The product is expensive."
"I would rate the pricing for this solution a three out of five."
"The solution's price is reasonable. Though it's on the higher side, the tool is worth the money."
"I like the pricing for this SolarWinds product."
"We are on an annual license to use the solution. The price of the solution is expensive. The price is based on a bunch of factors, such as the number of engines and elements."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
18%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Educational Organization
7%
Educational Organization
45%
Computer Software Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
6%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Microsoft Active Directory?
The solution is easy to install and has good reliability.
What needs improvement with Microsoft Active Directory?
Technology is evolving. AI is offering solutions. However, short-term fixes are like band-aids.
What is your primary use case for Microsoft Active Directory?
I utilize it in almost every scenario. I use the Hazer database and meet daily needs across every industry, every time.
What needs improvement with SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor?
There are no specific features or functionality I would like to see improved or enhanced in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor at this time. I have not encountered any missing features or fu...
 

Also Known As

No data available
SolarWinds SAM
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Andr. L. Riis AS, NetSuite
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Active Directory vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
845,406 professionals have used our research since 2012.