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Lenovo XClarity Controller vs SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Aug 6, 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

Lenovo XClarity Controller
Ranking in Server Monitoring
9th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SolarWinds Server and Appli...
Ranking in Server Monitoring
8th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
4.5
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (22nd), Active Directory Management (9th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Server Monitoring category, the mindshare of Lenovo XClarity Controller is 3.3%, down from 3.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is 3.2%, up from 2.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Server Monitoring Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor3.2%
Lenovo XClarity Controller3.3%
Other93.5%
Server Monitoring
 

Featured Reviews

Muhammad_Salman - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Finance Executive at Texitech
Simplifies RAID computation and technical support resolves issues effectively
The Lenovo configuration tool helps us with the computation of the RAID Controller and the installation of the operating system. If we encounter any sort of issue, we can troubleshoot the problem with the assistance of the Lenovo technical team. Sometimes, we do not receive complaints from the controller. We also receive software issue resolutions by managing the process with the assistance of the Lenovo technical team.
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

"The product's most valuable feature is its ability to provide insights into server status and alerts."
"The remote management capability was also good."
"The Lenovo configuration tool helps us with the computation of the RAID Controller and the installation of the operating system."
"I would rate Lenovo XClarity Controller ten out of ten."
"The most valuable feature of Lenovo XClarity is the ease of use because of the interface browser that is highly compatible and it has mobile web management."
"Features like monitoring and infrastructure dependency mapping are valuable to us."
"The solution can be deployed quickly."
"The most valuable feature is the Access Rights Manager."
"The solution is great for monitoring. If something is going wrong, we can immediately find the root cause."
"The component and cable monitoring are good. SolarWinds is more intuitive and user-friendly than AppDynamics. The AppDynamics console is more complex because it's a more feature-rich solution, so it's not easy for somebody to pick it up."
"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."
"AppInsight. Provides a simple way to get very in-depth monitoring configured for our most popular applications. Exchange, SQL, and SharePoint."
"SolarWinds is a very stable platform compared to others on the market."
 

Cons

"Lenovo XClarity can improve the dashboard integration. For example, graphs could be better. Additionally, more integration with other vendors is needed. For example, VMware has integration with a lot of vendors."
"It worked very slowly. It was not well on performance."
"Sometimes we do not receive the complaint from the Controller. However, software issues are managed and processed with the help of the Lenovo technical team, and they sort them out."
"Sometimes we do not receive the complaint from the Controller."
"They could enable notifications on emails and phones regarding control panel information."
"SAM's software-defined network monitoring capability is also low and could be improved."
"The current script monitoring feature has limitations, especially when dealing with custom scripts."
"Application-based monitoring, such as monitoring within servers like Apache and IIS, has room for improvement."
"For each poller, SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor can only monitor up to ten thousand components, which restricts scalability."
"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."
"The product does not explain why a problem occurred."
"The major concern in the product revolves around application performance monitoring since end-to-end application monitoring is not possible with the tool."
"Reporting is the only thing with which we currently have challenges. They have this in two ways. There is the report writer, which is the backend, and we also have web reports, which are on the console. So, they have removed the report writer for the backend reports, and we are making use of the web console, but most of the users are not finding it very interesting to use the frontend reports. I would like them to bring back the report writer. That's the key area within it to improve on the reporting. If they can bring back the report writer, then most users will actually be comfortable. I have some customers who are trying to export their report to an Excel format, but it is not possible because they said any report that has been done from the web console cannot be exported to Excel, but most of the customers need to export their reports to Excel. That's one area they need to work on."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"The product might cost you $30,000 USD to buy, but scaling this solution requires the purchase of additional polling engines at $20,000 USD each."
"The product is expensive."
"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."
"I have always said SolarWinds is very “proud” of their products, meaning they are expensive. I cannot afford to purchase all the licenses I need for all the SolarWinds products."
"The tool is available for my company at a good price point."
"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."
"When compared to other licensed models in the market, it stands out as one of the more cost-effective options."
"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."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
22%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Educational Organization
8%
Educational Organization
11%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
9%
Computer Software Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business17
Midsize Enterprise8
Large Enterprise21
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Lenovo XClarity Controller?
The product's most valuable feature is its ability to provide insights into server status and alerts.
What needs improvement with Lenovo XClarity Controller?
Sometimes we do not receive the complaint from the Controller. However, software issues are managed and processed with the help of the Lenovo technical team, and they sort them out.
What is your primary use case for Lenovo XClarity Controller?
The customer has given me this configuration and is asking for the price of the server along with this configuration. They did not mention what kind of requirement they have. They just shared this ...
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

XClarity Controller, Lenovo XCC
SolarWinds SAM
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Andr. L. Riis AS, NetSuite
Find out what your peers are saying about Lenovo XClarity Controller vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor and other solutions. Updated: January 2026.
881,821 professionals have used our research since 2012.