NetAlly EtherScope nXG Reviews

We are a group that tests WiFi routers and interaction between those routers and client devices, such as laptops, etc. We use these NetAlly devices pretty extensively for getting a third-party view of what's going on over the air.

We use it primarily for its WiFi-related features, such as looking at what channels are being used, what other access points are on the air nearby. At times we use it at a customer's location in real-world settings, and at other times we use it in the lab when we're creating our own scenarios.

It helps us confirm what's in the air.

Since we're previous users of this type of product from NetScope and Fluke, I don't have metrics that show where this device has sped up our work, but it is an integral part of how we do our work. One way of saying it is that we have multiple RF chambers and test environments and we've equipped each one of those test locations with it's own NetAlly. We consider it an important enough tool that we have one in every place we're doing a test, so that we have the ability to get a quick view of what's on over the air.

It also provides a faster view of the network than what we could get by using other tools. In terms of our efficiency, our ability to perform tests and debug test environments quickly is enhanced by this device.

Compared to if we didn't have the nXGs at all, and we were troubleshooting a problem that could be identified by the device, it speeds up work by a factor of between two to 10 times. Rather than doing a packet capture and slow analysis, you can just take a look at something and be off and running. It speeds things up greatly.

It has also made our networking staff more productive, although I'm not sure how to quantify that. It's kind of like asking a plumber how long it will take him to do his job if he doesn't have the wrenches he needs.

Compared to any other means of getting a given type information, using this tool provides that information in a fraction of the time. It may be that we would go through an entire week and never use these units. So in that week they wouldn't save us anything at all. But when a problem comes up, the ability to pick it up and get the answer we need in a couple of minutes, versus an hour, makes a big difference at that point in time. You may only need that particular "wrench" 15 times a year, but every time you need it, it really is useful.

One of the key measurements that we use out of the device is the channel utilization measurement, how much traffic is on the air in a given channel. That's the most valuable feature for us. The ability to make a very fast measurement of how much traffic is on the air is a key value. Otherwise we'd have to do a packet capture and do some analysis. It speeds up our testing.

The newer version of NetAlly, the nXG, does a better job than previous models of allowing us to drill into conversations between individual clients and access points and get packet captures.

Its ability to do 802.11ax is also useful.

In addition, the device is easy to use for less skilled staff but with deep diagnostics for our experts on stuff. The graphical approach that it uses makes it very easy to see what's going on over the air and where your potential problems may be. And the graphical interface to pursue a problem is also very easy to use. 

Having said that, we're a fairly highly-specialized group, so I don't know that I have a good answer about less skilled users. What I'm judging by is that everybody in our lab, whether they're WiFi-specific experts or not, can pick it up and use it very easily. But in terms of whether technicians and other other folks could use it, I really don't know since I haven't given it to other users. But the ability to get to the view that you're interested in, and get a number quickly, makes it an easy-to-use test tool, as compared to a spectrum analyzer or a more complex tool. It's definitely an easy to use device, easy to navigate around, and it makes good use of the user interface.

The one thing that it doesn't do well, when it's doing airtime utilization measurements, is that it will classify things as non-802.11, and that isn't correct. What it could do better is make sure that it classifies all traffic that's in the air correctly. That's something that I've complained to them about before. It can infer that you have interference that really isn't there.

Also, the ability to integrate it into automated testing is fairly limited. Part of what we do is automate things whenever we possibly can. The ability to integrate it into automated test environments more readily would be useful.

Finally, while it does support 802.11ax technology, if it were able to give us a bit more information about what's happening in the 802.11ax realm, it would be useful. For example, we can't use this device to determine when something like OFDMA is being used in a conversation between an access point and a client. So more 802.11ax-specific data would be useful.

We have been using this particular device for several months. We bought them last year. We've been users of previous models as well, when it was NetScope, and even back when it was a Fluke device.

The stability is improved over previous versions. It has been fine. No problems with it at all. We got the previous device to "blue screen" a few times but we think that was tied to it's being in the presence of 802.11ax traffic.

If additional features are added that enhance our ability to troubleshoot WiFi problems, then it would get increased use. But we don't know of any such features at this moment in time.

I haven't used NetAlly's customer support in over a year, and that was on the previous model.

They have been very interactive. We've had conversations all the way back to their design engineering teams and that's very valuable: having a company that is active and responsive. We value that.

We originally used the Fluke version of the WiFi analyzer and then we used what I think was called NetScope, the version that was the predecessor of this one. We've been users of this same product line for some time.

The driver for us to switch to the newest version was to pick up the 802.11ax capability.

The learning curve was short. It does behave a little bit differently than the previous version, so we had to unlearn how the previous model worked. But once we understood it, it was easy to remember and use.

I wouldn't say it's completely intuitive. The company provided training for us for certain things and, while it was only an hour's worth of training, it really did help. So you can master it in an hour with a little bit of a tutorial. And to be fair, that tutorial took us through the entire product; all the features beyond WiFi. You could learn to use all the WiFi functions in a half an hour.

We have seen return on our investment. What we thought we were buying was the ability to quickly assess the WiFi environment wherever we needed to. And it does that.

In terms of the cost of the device versus its ability to save you time or solve problems faster, it's a good value.

I don't consider the pricing to be a problem. It's not a cheap device, but it's a very capable device for the money. It's a good value.

My advice would be "use it." Get a demo and try it to see how effective it is at identifying, for WiFi situations, what's going on in the air around you. Try it out, go debug something with it. If you are someone in the business of being in the field, day in and day out, try out all of the interfaces on it. If you're a person who has to debug a variety of different network issues every day — Ethernet, WiFi, fiber — I would definitely encourage you to to try it out. It's very capable. It doesn't do MoCA — that's coax cable — which is important to our market space, but for most network installers, I don't think that would be an issue. If you're a network installer you should definitely have a look at this tool.

I don't know that I've learned the following by using the nXG, but it has certainly helped reinforce it: Being able to attain a third-party look at what your WiFi environment is, is key to troubleshooting problems. Devices themselves that may be a part of your network may not necessarily always be telling you the truth. Your ability to get an independent view of what is going on over the air is key. That's the key takeaway for me. I need a reliable way to get visibility into what's going on over the air so that the analysis and the troubleshooting that are going to be done are appropriate. Visibility of what's really going on from an independent piece of test gear is very critical.

The multi-technology functionality of the device, that it does WiFi and wired Ethernet analysis in one device, is not that important to us. We use the multi-function capability maybe 10 percent of the time. Since most of our focus is on WiFi, while it's convenient to have the ability to test other things, we don't use it that often.

We rarely use the pre-programmed AutoTest feature. We typically have our own test protocol for how we want to conduct a test. I can definitely see how AutoTest could be very useful in the field-deployment arena. But we don't use it all that much. It appears to be effective at being able to find top-level network problems. A good example would be if you are testing a device and the WiFi appears to be working but you aren't getting connectivity to the internet. You might want an independent test of that with another device, and that's where AutoTest could quickly determine if you are really getting out to the internet through your router or not.

Within our group, the maintenance and systems engineering group, there are 11 of us using this solution and we are all test engineers. In terms of maintenance, we just use them. We perform firmware upgrades as they are available, but beyond that there is no other maintenance.

This product is a 10 out of 10. It's a solid little product.

NetAlly EtherScope nXG is an all-round tool we use for front-end troubleshooting, performance tests, and cable testing.

The biggest benefit of NetAlly EtherScope nXG is getting a full discovery on the wide and Wi-Fi side, getting it all under one discovery, and seeing how it all maps out together.

Being able to do a Wi-Fi walk-around survey with a handheld tool is one of the most valuable features of NetAlly EtherScope nXG. The advantages of NetAlly EtherScope nXG are that it is handheld, Android-based, and very up-to-date.

NetAlly EtherScope nXG's reporting and table qualification could be improved. The disadvantages of NetAlly EtherScope nXG are its password life and end reporting.

I have been using NetAlly EtherScope nXG for three years.

NetAlly EtherScope nXG is a very stable product, and we have not faced any issues with it.

Overall, NetAlly EtherScope nXG is a very scalable product, and it's good for what it does straight out of the box. However, if you don't pay support for it, they shut some features down on the product. We have four NetAlly EtherScope nXG users on-premises and sold 46 units.

I've had customers who have dropped units and had issues with some faults that they caused themselves. NetAlly EtherScope nXG's fantastic technical support proactively resolved those issues.

I have previously used the OneTouch from NETSCOUT and the Optiview from Fluke Networks.

The solution is easy to set up, but you need to ensure you register your product. NetAlly EtherScope nXG is deployed on cloud. For NetAlly EtherScope nXG's deployment, you need to claim it onto the cloud tester, and all the test results get pushed to the cloud service for reporting.

NetAlly EtherScope nXG is priced too much and needs to come down by about 15 percent of its current price.

You need to pay an annual maintenance fee for the maintenance provided by the vendor.

I recommend that users go through the online training on YouTube that NetAlly provides to get the product's full potential.

Overall, I rate NetAlly EtherScope nXG a nine out of ten for the additional features you can add because it is an Android device.

The main thing I wanted to do with it was to inject noise into the line but I also used it to see how much noise was on the line. I also used it to measure the cable length and the pairing quality of the cable. 

In addition, I could remote in from my computer, as long as it was on a network, so I didn't have to go back and forth. If I needed it in the lab, I'd place it there and go to my laptop and control it. I could read all the tests and do any tests, all I needed to, which was really good.

It has not improved the way our company functions because we just used it, in a test situation, for one sample problem we were going through. We were looking for a tool that would give us what we needed, which was to look for noise and to create noise. Unless there is a part or function I was not aware of, it only reads noise; it does not create noise.

I really liked the remote login. That way, if I needed to do something inside of a ceiling, I didn't have to sit inside the ceiling. I could just plug it in and leave the instrument in the ceiling and go to my laptop and use it remotely. That was really good. I really liked that.

We do WiFi testing with our AP, but I didn't get a chance to use it because of COVID. However, I did do a quick test. One thing I liked was that it would tell me signal strength, the noise in the nearby ones, and it would even tell me about some hidden ones. That was cool, as most units don't tell you that. Another good thing I really liked was that it would not only tell me the IP address, but it would tell me more info. It would grab the CDP off of the CDP profile and read all the info it could get, so I knew what I was looking at. The WiFi and the wired were really good. While I didn't use very much of the WiFi, what I did use was good.

It has automated tests where it goes through each process. It took a while but I would just let it do its automated testing and I was happy with that. If I'm not mistaken, there were two pre-programmed functions. One of them was to check reports and why traffic was not running. The other one was checking cable noise and cable quality. I used the automated testing for cable noise and cable quality more than I used it for protocol and trafficking. On the side I did use it, it was good. I liked it. It was accurate. I know because I used another tool, a Fluke, and they were really close to each other, so I'm assuming they're both calibrated the same way.

If I could reset it remotely, meaning reboot the unit, that would be helpful. One time, the test would not respond; the script would lock up. I had to go and manually reboot it. If I could have sent a command to reboot and it would have automatically connected to the wireless, that would have made it perfect. That was the only thing that it did not do. If you're sitting remotely, at your desk, and the unit is at a customer's site and you need to reboot, the only way you can do that is to call up the customer and ask them, "Hey, can you go reboot it for me?" and customers usually don't like that.

I used it for between a month and two months. I was the only in our company who was using it. We were testing the product.

Other than the script locking up once in a while, it was pretty stable.

I didn't use technical support for the device. I used the manual that came with it, and that was about it.

EtherScope offered more things than the other ones offered. The other ones only offered cable length, cable quality, but no noise readings. This one gave you more in-depth networking protocols, noise readings, all that good stuff. I haven't seen another one that does as much as this one.

As for the learning curve, once I messed with it a little bit, I got to know how to use it pretty well. It was fairly easy to just plug-and-go, to do the basics. I was able to get up and run a test within 15 minutes. Within a day I was able to use all the functions just fine and was very comfortable using all the functions. And it could also provide deep diagnostics.

I also looked at an Agilent meter reader, which has two handheld units and you connect the cable. It's not as fancy as the EtherScope.

This could save a lot of headaches on troubleshooting networks, connections, and cables. It's got a lot of options and it could definitely save a lot of time if used properly.

I would rate it about an eight out of 10. It's not a 10 because there were a few bugs. It could be improved. Also, I don't know if it has this feature or not, but if I could write my own script to use on that machine, it would definitely be a 10. If it doesn't have that, I would stay with my eight. Most people who are engineers like to automate things, and they would want to write their own script to do their own testing.