ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer Reviews

My main use case for ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer is network traffic monitoring.

The best features of ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer for me are bandwidth monitoring and security analysis.

ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer has improved visibility in my organization. I would say it has improved visibility by about four out of five.

I would like better or easier integrations to extend its usefulness.

I have been familiar with ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer for around two years.

I am satisfied with ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer and have not run into any friction points or frustrations.

Before I started using ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer, we were not using any tool, so this is the first tool.

When we first implemented ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer, it took us about two days to deploy it, and we completed some training during the process.

We have two specific people in the team who manage or monitor it, but otherwise, no one else does.

Depending on the incident, ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer helps me resolve things about 5 to 30 minutes faster.

When evaluating options, we chose ManageEngine due to pricing.

When I open ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer, I start by checking the dashboard for any alerts.

There are no features that came up during implementation that I am not using today, and we are happy with whatever we configured.

ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer does change how my team works together and improves collaboration.

I would advise someone considering ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer that it is a good product, economical, and has a better interface and dashboard to monitor network activity. I give this product a rating of 10.

My main use case for ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer is bandwidth monitoring.

When I open ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer, the first thing I do is check the immediate priority and address any problems. I conduct a quick health check and look for any anomalies on the system, so I check the alerts and the top interfaces dashboard.

The whole team is involved in this workflow.

The impact of ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer on our team's daily operations is immediate, shifting the entire department from a fire-fighting mindset to a proactive management style. The most significant changes fall into three major areas: drastically faster mean time to resolution, the elimination of shadow IT, and better visibility, as well as data-driven capacity planning. It did not just stop outages; it took the mystery out of the network, allowing the whole team to go from guessing what was happening on the wire to knowing exactly where the issue or problem is.

ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer absolutely changed how my team works together; it changed the team culture and daily dynamics. Introducing a tool that acts as a single objective source of truth completely alters how different technical silos interact with each other. Before ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer, whenever an application or server started lagging, my team would start to play the blame game, inevitably kicking off the conversation, with the application or server team insisting it was a network bottleneck, while the network admin team, who is us, would pull up a basic ping test or uptime graph to argue that this line is green, so it is not our issue.

The best features of ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer for me, which I end up using the most, include Cisco NBAR2, Network-Based Application Recognition, along with custom IP and interface grouping, and forensic drill-down with troubleshooting reports.

The single biggest friction point I experience with ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer comes down to database storage management and disk space explosion, as flow data records literally record every single conversation passing throughout the monitored interfaces. The volume of incoming logs is absolutely massive, so if I do not stay on top of the backend settings, the tool can easily choke the server.

ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer is absolutely a powerhouse for traffic forensics, and using it heavily day-to-day definitely highlights a few gaps where I end up thinking I wish it just did that natively, such as native built-in traffic shaping or direct remediation.

If I could change one thing about ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer, it would be transforming the tool from a purely observational platform into an actionable, active remediation tool. When I am sitting inside the ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer dashboard and spot an internal machine maxing out one link, the tool does a flawless job of showing that I have a culprit, but that is where its job ends. To fix it, I have to break my concentration completely, leave ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer, and pull up the SSH terminal to log in to the specific switch or the router CLI and manually apply a rate limit or drop the connection.

I have been familiar with ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer for one year.

Before I landed on ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer, I was handling that monitoring manually using standard SNMP monitoring with some basic tools such as MRTG or PRTG. I think they also used SolarWinds before I came to the team.

When I first implemented ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer, it took less than two hours to get everything up and running, and it was very fast.

My team was somehow familiar with ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer, so no formal training was needed at all because we understand and know the basic networking concepts such as IP addresses, ports, and protocols and how routing interfaces work. The tool was incredibly intuitive to pick up on our own.

When we quantify the impact of ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer, we have saved five to eight hours per week.

I do not know if my team considered any other tools besides ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer; the management team has decided to use it.

The management team mentioned three main factors for preferring ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer: licensing predictability, the out-of-the-box features depth, and the platform flexibility.

For anyone considering ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer with a similar workflow to mine, my advice includes being aggressive with your raw data retention policy, separating your routing from your switching strategy, and taking a VM snapshot before every upgrade. I would rate this product an 8.5 out of 10.

ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer is an essential piece for anyone who wants to monitor their network because network monitoring is a general term that could mean several things. If you want to measure the actual net flow of packets from device to device and properly track and monitor your network, then it's a mandatory requirement. Most of our customers need this by default, and this is a small product which is part of the OpManager suite. We haven't sold ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer by itself; we have sold OpManager of which NetFlow has been a part, and it's one of the essential things that we have to set up in OpManager.

It depends on the size of the network because ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer measures the traffic within network devices of an organization. If it's a large network, spanning multiple buildings across multiple campuses, then we may need more time, maybe a week or two. But, by and large, for most customers that are at a single location, the ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer piece takes just a couple of hours, maybe two or three hours, to configure.

The main purpose of ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer is to measure the flow of packets and the connectivity from one device to the other, establishing the entire chain of connectivity from a firewall level to switches, and then to a particular endpoint. It helps us measure the net flow between these devices. If there's a bottleneck at any device, we're able to spot this very easily based on custom thresholds and alerts. It does that job very well.

Network security and alerting work great in ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer because once you've set up the threshold and if anything happens, we get alerted, allowing us to look into it preemptively before an attack actually happens. There are several indicators leading up to an attack that could suggest that some malicious activity is happening. By getting alerted in real time when some unexpected behavior happens, our teams are able to proactively look into this and resolve issues many times before an attack has time to take place. ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer has a great alerting system that is very reliable. By default, it sends email-based alerts, but it has the capability to integrate with SMS gateways if customers prefer.

Sometimes customers are unaware about their own network. For example, we need SMTP credentials for Layer 2 switches to do automatic discovery of network devices. Sometimes the network management teams are unaware of their SMTP credentials because the teams have been shuffled since the network was deployed. Or sometimes, when we support our government and defense customers, they don't have clearance to share these credentials with us. Some of the features, such as auto discoverability, get hampered if the customer is not aware of their own network or somehow can't share privileges and credentials with our tool for them to work properly.

Not in ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer in particular, but there are other features of the OpManager suite that could afford to be updated. There is something called a CLI, command-line interface, that allows us to configure network devices such as switches. This is old technology. This product suite has CLI-based configurations, but as of last year, most network devices come with Zero Touch Provisioning (ZTP). OpManager does not support this functionality, and we don't really have a timeline on when ZTP functionality will be available.

In ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer, we have to set custom thresholds to get alerted if there is a problem in network connectivity. It would be helpful if we could automate the tool such that we don't have to set thresholds manually, and the tool automatically alerts us when it detects issues. When experts deploy this tool, we already know what thresholds should be normal. But customers in general may not have this skill set. For newer customers who need to adopt this product, an automated method of alerting would definitely be beneficial.

ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer is a scalable solution. All you need is the correct compute, so the software doesn't limit scalability. It's about how quickly you can deploy and increase or decrease your hardware or network. If a customer doubles the number of servers, switches, and firewalls, we just need to update and upload a single spreadsheet to accommodate monitoring of all these environments. The tool itself is very scalable.

ManageEngine has great support. This is an Indian tool with support teams in Chennai. We operate out of Delhi, and it's very easy for us to get hold of ManageEngine. Their default support is through chat and emails, and we find it pretty reliable. We have heard complaints from global communities that it's harder to reach ManageEngine support. They take standard SLAs, stating they'll reply within four to five business hours, which they always do. For customers, speed matters. Vendors have an advantage because if a customer calls us, we are able to solve 99% of their problems in the first contact. As far as OEM-based support goes, ManageEngine is doing a great job.

Positive

We haven't tried many other tools as we've been using ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer, and it hasn't let us down. We haven't had a reason to move away from it, so I don't really have an opinion in terms of comparing it to competitors, other than pricing.

Typically, just one person is enough for most deployments, but for more complex projects, we sometimes use two people from our team. For very rare cases where we get stuck in unique environments, we may rely on the ManageEngine team itself for support. By and large, a single person can set these things up.

The cost varies from industry to industry as the cost of a malicious or security incident varies largely among customers. ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer is definitely among the most cost-effective tools that deliver performance as per global best competitors. The pricing is very affordable compared to companies such as SolarWinds, making it a clear choice for us as it's the most cost-effective solution that is equally reliable compared to the major competitors.

ManageEngine has an AI assistant of their own, which they've had for a couple of years. Their CEO, Mr. Vembu, himself is leading the AI development team. I have not yet used AI features in ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer because it's straightforward to see and understand without the help of AI itself so far. I am very confident of future features that are coming into AI. For example, if issues are detected, they'll automatically be able to create tickets, assign them to the right parties, and help admins follow up.

Maintenance can be divided into two aspects. One is the maintenance of the product itself, which the OEM handles through updates, security fixes, and patches. The second is the services, where we come in. We manage and maintain ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer for our customers by performing health checks every few months. If there are updates or new features, we help our customers implement them and maximize their value from these tools. For some customers, we have on-site resources deployed who rapidly respond to issues. For most customers, we offer remote support and provide support on an ad hoc basis.

I give this solution a rating of 10 out of 10 and absolutely recommend it based on our experience.

I use ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer for detecting the root cause when the database and application run very slow.

I have not yet used the traffic shaping feature of ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer.

ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer has detection capabilities for flow, event, and service flow.

The product has good reporting regarding visualization tools.

It is sufficient for analyzing and detecting root causes through its reporting and alerting capabilities for our network.

We use ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer because it is easy to use and the price is affordable regarding real-time visibility and detailed traffic insights.

ManageEngine's product has some performance issues. It runs very slowly when the system is large and does not support high availability for big flow and high-level operations.

The product needs improvement in supporting high availability for active-passive or active-active configurations when building for a large system.

The price could be improved.

I rate their support seven out of ten.

I would describe its scalability as perfect.

For ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer, we usually use two channels: chat or email, and the support team responds very quickly.

I rate their support seven out of ten.

Positive

Before ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer, we had several monitoring products from SolarWinds, Dynatrace, and other vendors.

ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer is easy to install.

The installation process takes approximately two to three hours.

The installation process is straightforward.

The product was installed by different people.

We typically assign two engineers per customer for the installation.

There is a financial benefit for our customers.

The price is lower compared to alternatives.

We have multiple customers who are using ManageEngine products.

I am familiar with some ManageEngine products such as OpManager, MDM, and endpoint security.

I have been working with ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer for five years.

Some customers are working with ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer on-premises.

We use the on-premises deployment model.

I rate ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer 9 out of 10.