Comparative Analysis of

Free IT Monitoring
Platforms
Review of SolarWinds, CA Technologies, and
Nagios IT monitoring platforms

The new CA Nimsoft Monitor Snap solution offers users broad

access to monitor and manage up to 30 devices for free. The
following analysis compares Snap to similar free or trial IT
monitoring platform versions: SolarWinds’ free trial versions
of four IT monitoring modules as well as Nagios XI.

Apprize360 Intelligence, INC.

October 15, 2013

A Special Report Commissioned by CA Technologies

Overview and Summary

CA’s Nimsoft Monitor is a premier IT monitoring solution that

Key Study Findings
has deep monitoring functionality in a single, unified
architecture. CA now offers a free version of Nimsoft Monitor,  Snap is free: no time limitations on
appropriately named CA Nimsoft Monitor Snap, or Snap for usage
short. What is unique about this offering is that it is not a trial  Snap is a single, unified solution: not
version. CA offers customers usage of Snap for up to 30 several point products integrated
devices. This includes monitoring of servers, applications, together with a common GUI
databases, websites, and network and storage devices with
 Snap supports unlimited monitoring
unlimited monitoring frequency. There is no automated
of 30 devices
discontinuation of the platform 30 or 60 days post-installation.
Snap makes it easy for a company to evaluate the Nimsoft
monitoring technology without a set time limitation. Or, if you have 30 devices or less, you can use Snap
as your primary monitoring tool without a paid license.

Snap offers users the following:

 Free usage
 Monitor up to 30 devices, with unlimited monitors per device
 Server, application, network, database, storage & website monitoring
 No limit to the frequency device monitoring
 Easy-to-deploy installation, configuration and a “directed user experience” (i.e. Snap Tips, how-
to videos, etc.)
 Email notifications
 Intuitive dashboards, reports & alarm views
 Community support

To better understand how Snap stacks up to other free IT monitoring platforms, Apprize360 Intelligence
reviewed the installation and configuration processes of the following six platforms:
 CA Nimsoft Monitor Snap
 SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor (NPM)
 SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor (SAM)
 SolarWinds Virtualization Manager
 SolarWinds Storage Manager
 Nagios XI

The comparative analysis was performed using a Dell PowerEdge T620 Server with 768GB of memory
across 24 DIMM slots and 64 TB of disk space. For Snap and the four SolarWinds platforms, the
operating system used was Microsoft Server 2012. For Nagios XI, we used the same server partitioned to
run Linux Red Hat Enterprise. In all cases, configuration and discovery was completed on a network with
30 devices. Downloads occurred using 40 MBPS Internet speeds.

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Snap Configuration & Installation Process

Snap’s installation process is fundamentally different from the other

products reviewed. True to its name, Snap is a “snap” to install and
configure. CA made sure that everything, from the product download to the
installation process of Snap, is seamless and easy to perform. CA used the
InstallAnywhere platform for Snap installation, which makes the installation
and execution of Snap quick and easy. During the installation process, Snap
displays on-screen hints to prepare you for configuration and device
discovery. Nagios and SolarWinds utilize a flat transfer of a ZIP file, which
requires separate execution and manual file extraction. While no download
or installation errors occurred with any of the platforms, the Snap download
and installation process was by far the easiest to use of all the platforms assessed.

After the initial installation, configuration

of Snap continues to be true to its name.
Out of the 6 platforms reviewed, Snap was
by far the easiest and quickest to
configure. The out-of-the-box automated
discovery process took only a few minutes
to identify and log all 30 devices. After the
automated discovery process was
completed, Snap immediately began
monitoring devices for performance,
highlighting any network latency and
individual device performance issues. It is one of the most intuitive and easy-to-use interfaces
we have ever experienced for an IT management platform.

The Snap Unified Service Manager dashboard gives you a complete view of your environment,
allowing you to drill-down into specific areas of concern or interest. Within the dashboard, you
can also identify device performance issues by geography, overall performance, and the latest
alarms. The single dashboard provides a full unified view of your infrastructure and is easy to
access throughout if you want to proactively review network performance. However, if you
want to take a more reactive approach, the Snap alarms allow you to set specific thresholds for
device and network performance. Snap will alert you through an alarm or email notification of
any performance related alarms.

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 Reporting is one the most
significant strengths of Snap.
Reporting is completely
interactive, allowing you to drag-
and-drop specific devices onto
the reporting screen for
immediate graphing. Reporting
can be initiated by a specific
device (or group of devices) or
the quality of services (QoS). The
advanced filtering capabilities
enable granular reporting down
to the specific probe level.

Comparative Benchmark Results

Apprize360’s assessment discovered several differences in the installation and configuration

processes as well as in overall operations between the six platforms researched. Snap led with
overall ease-of-installation, configuration, and operations as well as speed of download and
installation. Snap, compared to SolarWinds and Nagios, is not a time limited trial. SolarWinds
only allows you 30 days free use of their respective platforms while Nagios has a 60-day trial
period.

The full quantitative results can be found in Appendix A of this document beginning on page 8.

Snap vs. SolarWinds

All four assessed SolarWinds platforms use the same download and installation methods.
SolarWinds requires users to download a ZIP file containing an auto-extractable application that
requires manual activation. Unlike Snap, there is no guided installation wizard to help the user
through the installation process. In addition, the SolarWinds platforms require several different
steps to complete the installation. It took 43 minutes to download, install, configure, and
discover devices with Snap. However, it took more than double the time to complete the same
installation process with the Solarwinds platforms. Solarwinds Virtualization Manager and
Solarwinds NPM both took the longest to deploy, requiring two hours before active network
monitoring could begin.

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 Solarwinds
CA Nimsoft Solarwinds Solarwinds Solarwinds
Virtualization
Monitor Snap NPM Storage Mgr SAM
Mgr
Download 11 min 10 min 9 min 15 min 9 min
Installation 22 min 65 min 45 min 75 min 45 min
Configure 5 min 30 min 45 min 45 min 40 min
Discovery 5 min 15 min 15 min 25 min 20 min
Total Time
43 minutes 120 minutes 114 minutes 120 minutes 114 min
to Monitor

After the file is downloaded and the installation process ends, configuration of the various
SolarWinds platforms differs slightly due to their individual purposes. One issue that was
quickly apparent is that SolarWinds requires four separate platforms to meet the functionality
found in the single instance of Snap. Having to deploy four separate platforms is not a very
compelling value proposition. Rather than having to load, navigate, and analyze data from four
separate platforms – none of which in the trial versions are integrated together for dashboard
analysis or reporting purposes – Snap offers a single, unified dashboard. It is this type of easy-
to-use navigation that gives Snap a marked advantage over SolarWinds.

While SolarWinds does offer a very robust support community (called “Thwack”), the Snap
community, called Snap Central - while currently small - is growing quickly. However, for
immediate assistance, you can use Snap’s embedded video support to learn best practices for
installing, configuring, and monitoring with Snap with HD videos that are 1-2 minutes in length.

Snap vs. Nagios XI

Nagios XI is an open-source network monitoring platform that runs on Linux servers. Similar to
SolarWinds, Nagios offers a free 60-day trial period with a fully functional license to Nagios XI.
After 60 days, the user must then decide to pay the license fee to keep XI functional. Nagios XI
is licensed on a per-monitoring server basis. License pricing is determined by the number of
hosts (nodes) the user intends to monitor. There are no restrictions on the number of services
that can be monitored with XI. Pricing starts at $1,995 for up to 100 hosts and includes email
support for 5 incidents.

While Nagios XI is a relatively inexpensive solution, you have to be an experienced IT

administrator to deploy and manage XI. Downloading Nagios XI was a multi-step process that
lacked the guided process that Snap offered. After installation, the configuration process was
highly technical, requiring manual development of discovery queries and manual alert
generation without on-screen guidance. It took a total of 3 hours (180 minutes) to download,

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install, configure, and discover devices with Nagios XI compared to 43 minutes total with Snap
for the same routine.

Snap Nagios XI
Download 11 min 15 min
Installation 22 min 20 min
Configure 5 min 120 min
Discovery 5 min 25 min
Total Time to
43 minutes 180 minutes
Monitor

Reporting is another area where Nagios XI is inferior to Snap. Report generation in Nagios
requires the use of a report writer to generate reports on specific devices, alerts, and
performance analysis. It is a multiple screen, multi-step process that takes time to set up and
then generate the report. Nagios XI reports are heavily focused on node availability. Users can
run a “report summary” of specific host availability as well as run nine pre-canned available
reports, including a summary, event log, notification log, and bandwidth usage report.

Nagios’ dashboards are another area where Snap has a comparative advantage. The main
dashboard does provide information on the overall network performance state and alerts on
performance issues. However, Nagios has no single, unified dashboard to understand network
health on one screen. Instead, Nagios utilizes multiple dashboards that are categorized by the
specific host or service group.

Summary and Conclusions

CA Nimsoft Monitor Snap is an easy-to-use and quick-to-deploy IT monitoring solution. Of the

six solutions assessed, the Snap installation and configuration process was the easiest and
quickest to get monitoring.

There are several things that make Snap unique:

 Monitoring functionality is hosted in a single, unified platform. It takes four SolarWinds
products to equal the functionality in a single Snap platform.
 Snap is free. Unlike the other vendors’ offerings, there is no 30 or 60-day time
limitation.
 Snap’s guided installation and configuration process was a breeze, allowing for the
correct decisions to be made once at the time during initial configuration.
 Snap’s drag-and-drop reporting made deep device reporting easy and quick to perform.
 Of all 6 platforms analyzed, Snap’s discovery process was the quickest to identify
devices and begin active monitoring.

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 Table: Total Time to Monitor
CA Nimsoft Solarwinds
Solarwinds Solarwinds Solarwinds
Monitor Virtualization Nagios XI
NPM Storage Mgr SAM
Snap Mgr
Download 11 min 10 min 9 min 15 min 9 min 15 min
Installation 22 min 65 min 45 min 75 min 45 min 20 min
Configure 5 min 30 min 45 min 45 min 40 min 120 min
Discovery 5 min 15 min 15 min 25 min 20 min 25 min
Total Time
43 minutes 120 minutes 114 minutes 120 minutes 114 min 180 minutes
to Monitor

Graph: Total Time to Monitor

200
180
160
140
Minutes

120
100
80
60
40
20
0
Snap SW NPM SW Storage SW VM SW SAM Nagios XI

Download Install Configure Discovery

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 Appendix A: Comparative Benchmarking Results
Topics Description CA Nimsoft Monitor Snap SolarWinds NPM SolarWinds SAM
Score Notes Score Notes Score Notes
Method of Delivery 5 Unlimited for life 3 30 day trial 3 30 day trial
Availability Trial Limitations 3 Limited to 30 devices 5 Full version, no limitation 5 Full version, no limitations
Download time 4 11 min 4 10 min 4 9 min
Installation Time 5 22 min 3 65 min 3 45 min
Download Size 4 1.8 GB 5 540 MB 5 314 MB
Installation Level of Installation
5 EASY; Wizard-based 3 Multiple steps 3 Multiple Steps
Difficulty
Total number of
5 Zero 5 Zero 5 Zero
installation errors
Total Time to
5 5 min 4 30 minutes 4 40 min
Configuration Configure
Ease of configuration 5 EASY; Wizard-based 4 “Intelligent” alert configuration 4 Manual, time consuming
MEDIUM; Prior IT mgt experience MEDIUM; Prior experience
Overall Ease of Use 5 EASY 4 4
needed with IT mgt needed
Ease of reporting
performance of 5 EASY 4 MEDIUM 4 MEDIUM
Ease of Use components
Network Discovery 5 5 MIN 4 15 Min 3 20 min
Performance
5 HIGH VISIBILITY 5 HIGH VISIBILITY 5 HIGH VISIBILITY
Visualization
Overall performance 5 HIGHEST PERFORMANCE 5 HIGH PERFORMANCE 5 HIGH PERFORMANCE
Performance Dashboard
5 HIGHEST PERFORMANCE 5 HIGH PERFORMANCE 5 HIGH PERFORMANCE
performance
Performance issue
5 IMMEDIATE 5 IMMEDIATE 5 IMMEDIATE
Diagnosis & identification
Resolution Guided workflow for
5 STRONG 2 PARTIAL (In Comparison) 2 PARTIAL (In Comparison)
problem discovery
Integration Level of unification 5 Single, unified platform 1 4 separate platforms 1 4 separate platforms
Quantity of Reports 5 HIGH NUMBER OF REPORTS 4 Several pre-canned reports 4 Tabular reports
Reporting Dashboards 5 SINGLE DASHBOARD 5 OOTB Dashboards 5 Static dashboards
Self Guided Guided support during
5 STRONG Wizards 3 Limited Installation Guidance 3 Limited guidance
Support installation
Support Large & active “Thwack” support Large & active “Thwack”
Support Community 3 Fast growing support community 5 5
Community community support community
Total time required for
Fastest time to monitor at 43
Total Time To register, download, 120 (two hours) minutes from 114 minutes from register to
5 minutes (170% faster than 3 4
Monitor configure, discover, &
Solarwinds)
register to monitoring monitoring
begin monitoring
TOTAL Score 95% 109 Out of 115 79% 91 out of 115 79% 91 out of 115

Table Legend: 1= Least, 5=Highest

 Topics Description CA Nimsoft Monitor Snap SolarWinds Virtualization Mgr SolarWinds Storage Mgr
Score Notes Score Notes Score Notes
Method of Delivery 5 Unlimited for life 3 30 day trial 3 30 day trial
Availability Trial Limitations 3 Limited to 30 devices 5 Full version, no limitations 5 Full version, no limitations
Download time 5 11 min 4 15 min 5 9 min
Installation Time 5 22 min 3 75 min 4 45 min
Download Size 4 1.8 GB 4 1.42 GB VMware/ 1.4 GB Hyper-V 5 314 MB windows
Installation Level of Installation
5 EASY; Wizard-based 3 Multiple Steps 4
Multiple Steps but straight
Difficulty forward
Total number of
5 Zero 5 Zero 5 Zero
installation errors
Total Time to
5 5 min 4 45 min 4 45 min
Configuration Configure
Ease of configuration 5 EASY; Wizard-based 4 Highly Manual, time consuming 4 Manual, time consuming
MEDIUM; Prior experience
Overall Ease of Use 5 EASY 4 Multiple screens with dashboards 4
with IT mgt needed
Ease of reporting Data is there, overwhelming &
5 EASY 4 4 MEDIUM
Ease of Use performance difficult to scale back
Network Discovery 5 5 min 4 25 min 4 15 min
Performance
5 HIGH VISIBILITY 4 Can force view into graphic format 5 HIGH VISIBILITY
Visualization
Overall performance 5 HIGHEST PERFORMANCE 5 HIGH PERFORMANCE 5 HIGH PERFORMANCE
Performance Dashboard
5 HIGHEST PERFORMANCE 5 HIGH PERFORMANCE 5 HIGH PERFORMANCE
performance
Performance issue Took 5 min before data storage
5 IMMEDIATE 4 5 IMMEDIATE
Diagnosis & identification capacity was alerted
Resolution Guided workflow for
5 STRONG 5
Provides recommendations to
2 PARTIAL (In Comparison)
problem discovery remediate alert
Integration Level of unification 5 Single, unified platform 1 4 separate platforms 1 4 separate platforms
Quantity of Reports 5 HIGH NUMBER OF REPORTS 4 Canned reports; lots of data 3 Tabular reports
Reporting Dashboards 5 SINGLE DASHBOARD 4
Includes Benchmarks; Too much
3 Static dashboards
data on one screen
Self Guided Guided support during
5 STRONG Wizards 3 Limited guidance 3 Limited guidance
Support installation
Support Large & extremely active “Thwack” Large & extremely active
Support Community 3 Fast growing support community 5 5
Community support community “Thwack” support community
Total time required for
Fastest time to monitor at 43
Total Time To register, download, 114 minutes from register to
5 minutes (170% faster than 3 160 minutes (2 hours & 40 minutes) 4
Monitor configure, discover, &
Solarwinds)
monitoring
begin monitoring
TOTAL Score 95% 110 Out of 115 78% 90 out of 115 80% 92 out of 115

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 Topics Description CA Nimsoft Monitor Snap Nagios XI
Score Notes Score Notes
Method of Delivery 5 Unlimited for life 4 60 day trial
Availability Trial Limitations 3 Limited to 30 devices 5 Full version, no limitations
Download time 5 11 min 5 15 min
Installation Time 5 22 min 5 20 min
Download Size 4 1.8 GB 5 634 MB MSFT VM | Source Installer=36mb
Installation Level of Installation
5 EASY; Wizard-based 3 Multiple Steps
Difficulty
Total number of
5 Zero 5 Zero
installation errors
Total Time to
5 5 min 3 120 minutes
Configure
Configuration Requires manual query development; manual alert
Ease of configuration 5 EASY; Wizard-based 3
generation without guidance
Overall Ease of Use 5 EASY 4 Fairly easy to use
Ease of reporting
Requires a report writer, multiple steps, slow report
performance of 5 EASY 3
generation
Ease of Use components
Network Discovery 5 5 MIN 4 25 min
Performance
5 HIGH VISIBILITY 3 LIMITED VISIBILITY of all Components
Visualization
Overall performance 5 HIGHEST PERFORMANCE 4 RESPONSIVE
Performance Overall dashboard
5 HIGHEST PERFORMANCE 4 Limited dashboard but responsive
performance
Performance issue
5 IMMEDIATE 2 Slow to identify; Example took 10 min for alerting
Diagnosis & identification
Resolution Guided workflow for
5 STRONG 2 LIMITED
problem discovery
Integration Level of unification 5 Single, unified platform 2 Requires additional modules (Fusion, XI, & Core)
Quantity of Reports 5 HIGH NUMBER OF REPORTS 2 Uses report writing engine for all reports
Reporting Dashboards 5 SINGLE DASHBOARD 3 Limited dashboard to include system behavior
Self Guided Guided support during
5 STRONG Wizards 3 Limited guidance
Support installation
Support
Support Community 3 Fast growing support community 5 Strong & active support community
Community
Total time required for
Total Time To register, download, Fastest time to monitor at 43 minutes
5 2 180 minutes (3 hours) from register to monitoring
Monitor configure, discover, & (318% faster than Nagios)
begin monitoring
TOTAL Score 95% 110 Out of 115 70% 81 out of 115

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A Special Report by Apprize360 Intelligence for CA Technologies
All Rights Reserved. Copyright 2013.

Apprize360 Intelligence, INC.

www.apprize360.com
San Francisco, CA
Info@apprize360.com