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Broadcom DX Application Performance Management vs SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 24, 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

Broadcom DX Application Per...
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
35th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
162
Ranking in other categories
Container Monitoring (8th)
SolarWinds Server and Appli...
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
22nd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
4.5
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Server Monitoring (8th), Active Directory Management (9th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2026, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of Broadcom DX Application Performance Management is 0.8%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is 1.3%, down from 1.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor1.3%
Broadcom DX Application Performance Management0.8%
Other97.9%
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
 

Featured Reviews

EG
Director of Technical Part at NOS SGPS
Dashboards facilitate prompt alerts but discovery feature needs enhancement
I would recommend Broadcom DX Application Performance Management if a customer doesn't have any existing performance solution. However, ten years ago, the solution was better, and now there are many competitive options. My overall rating would be between six and seven. The product rating I would give is 6.5 out of 10.
NikhilKalwint - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Specialist at ServiceIO
Monitoring over a thousand systems has improved decision making and operational visibility
From an advantage perspective, SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is comparatively cheaper from a commercial point of view. It is easy to install and configure, very user-friendly, and quick to get up and running, allowing you to see the early value adds in your organization. It is compatible with most technologies for monitoring with very few chances of incompatibility. Configuration also allows us to monitor all the technical parameters we are looking for, making it a very good experience for us. The alerting feature in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is a main advantage, as it alerts based on threshold breaches and can raise tickets to the ticketing system, send SMS, and email notifications, allowing engineers to work on those tickets to resolve issues and avoid further impact. The visibility into server health is a beneficial feature that I am utilizing. We widely use various application performance metrics in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor such as database monitoring and server monitoring, which are quite good enough for any monitoring solution. We utilize the customizable dashboards in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"For me, the most valuable feature is being able to check memory patterns. We check them when we do load testing or soak testing to see if there are any memory leaks."
"The mean time to resolve has reduced dramatically since we started using CA APM Introscope."
"With CA APM, we can see the performance regarding the transactions of our applications and analyse the availability and quality of our environment to provide the best experience for our clients."
"The traditional Introscope portion of the product is the most valuable, as it provides good visibility to the JVM and Java application."
"The initial setup is straightforward."
"Introscope helps our application team proactively identify and resolve problems fast."
"It is the very best solution and will surely enhance anyone’s application performance and resource utilization."
"It is best APM solution in the market, as per my knowledge."
"Identifying the problem statement is easy."
"It is simple to implement and can provide fairly decent Windows-based monitoring, beyond simple SNMP. It is great for monitoring newbies and smaller shops."
"One of the most valuable features are the reports. They're pretty good. Also, the ease of installation and customization for the client is another feature that we value. SolarWinds has a lot of features but these are the ones I like the most. We also like that the KPIs have the ability to be preset."
"The solution has good alerts. Notifications are sent via email to technicians. You can filter the kinds of alerts you want to receive as well. It's excellent."
"The most valuable feature is the Access Rights Manager."
"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."
"The most valuable feature of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is the network devices' performance monitor is the best."
"SolarWinds allows network administrators to easily monitor the network by customizing the pages to see what exactly is needed, in addition to the deep statistics shown for nodes and interfaces like response time, packet loss, interface CRC, interface errors, as well as the rich graphs for all network elements."
 

Cons

"The stability could be more reliable."
"The solution is technically scalable, but it is very expensive for our business especially in the way that CA calculates the price, that is based on the number of processors."
"Automatic report generation needs work."
"In terms of scalability, because APM is tightly coupled, it doesn't have the scalability as a built-in feature."
"It should be easier to install or set everything up. ​"
"The upgrade was complex. The documentation could have been a little bit better, but other than that, it was okay.​"
"We have had stability issues."
"We can't implement the TIM in our environment because we have issues with a virtualized environment."
"I believe that some of the trends, environmental maps, and items like those found in Orion would be very beneficial."
"The stability, flexibility, and ease of use could be improved."
"MS Azure Service and user experience monitoring is an area in which the SolarWinds tools are lacking; without a doubt, this is the Achilles heel of the Orion monitoring tools, and I am currently reviewing other vendors for Azure service monitoring tools."
"The setup was complex. We had local support to assist us."
"One area that could benefit from improvement is its performance"
"SAM AppInsight for SQL: The ability to ignore fragmentation of specific indexes."
"The tool’s report feature created issues for us. We needed to gain skills to use that feature. The tool’s customization is not easy since you have to reconfigure the whole system."
"I would like to see support for non-Windows or non-Microsoft domains, especially Apache and other non-Windows servers."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Pricing and licensing are not issues."
"The license for Broadcom DX Application Performance Management is annual. The licensing model could improve because there is not any limit to deploying the agent, there should be some limits on it."
"On pricing, CA is very competitive. I think that's going to help in the long run."
"Depends on the size of the product you need."
"There is some research needed to determine licensing costs, based on the number of DataPower instances for the Nastel agent, for example."
"The pricing structure should be based on memory or CPU usage rather than the number of agents, as it makes the solution more expensive for us."
"Broadcom is a better and cheaper option from the financial perspective. It also depends on the DLP plug."
"The licensing costs are expensive."
"SAM is not per server so the pricing model can be deceiving. If you have an enterprise environment, you will quickly exceed your licensing quickly. You should know this before going in."
"I think SolarWinds' pricing is very decent compared to other competitors in the market."
"The tool is available for my company at a good price point."
"Price can always be lower. It is neither on the expensive side nor on the cheap side. We have worked with them for a lot of years, so we get a discount due to the size of the installation."
"Pricing and licensing is fair for what you get. It does have a great bang-for-the-buck appeal."
"I would advise potential buyers to wait until the end of the quarter, end of year, or other time to place orders. There are actually great deals to be had at those times if your budget cycle can match up."
"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."
"When compared to other licensed models in the market, it stands out as one of the more cost-effective options."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Marketing Services Firm
14%
Performing Arts
11%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Educational Organization
12%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business26
Midsize Enterprise24
Large Enterprise124
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business17
Midsize Enterprise8
Large Enterprise21
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Broadcom DX Application Performance Management?
The initial pricing is reasonable and competitive compared to other solutions. The challenge arises during annual renewals, as the price increase can be significant, around twenty percent or more, ...
What needs improvement with Broadcom DX Application Performance Management?
The first area for improvement is the discovery feature, which should be enhanced to collect comprehensive information from applications and services. This includes using agents or scripts to gathe...
What is your primary use case for Broadcom DX Application Performance Management?
Our primary use case involves having a large dashboard with significant information for alerts, alarms, and metrics to summarize the state of critical businesses and applications. When an issue ari...
What needs improvement with SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor?
There is definitely room for improvement besides simplifying its setup. As a non-technical person, I believe the dashboards could be improved. Everything we use appears on video walls, and we need ...
 

Also Known As

DX APM, CA APM, CA NetQoS Performance Center, Wily Introscope, CA Wily APM, CA App Experience Analytics, CA AXA
SolarWinds SAM
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Lexmark, Intermountain Healthcare, National Australia Bank, BBVA Compass Bank, Innovapost, Dansk Supermarked Group, U.S. Cellular, Orange, Cetip
Andr. L. Riis AS, NetSuite
Find out what your peers are saying about Broadcom DX Application Performance Management vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor and other solutions. Updated: March 2026.
884,976 professionals have used our research since 2012.