NetXMS Reviews

The main use case is to monitor for service availability, as we are a service provider. We manage different types of businesses through SMP management. 

We use NetXMS to gain visibility of our network. We leverage both NetXMS alerts and visualization features. 

In short, we use it to monitor a single network, identify any incidents, and manage various scenarios.

NetXMS has enhanced our network monitoring tasks.

Earlier with what we had, we had a solution from a local vendor, which was license-based based on number. So, initially, we got the license for 100 users, then 200. So scaling was difficult because it was very cost-effective. So then we explored the open-source solution. 

Now we have more than 3000+ devices, we are not paying anything to any vendor. So there is everything in NetXMS. And all those features which are there in other commercial products are available using NetXMS. So it's quite cost-effective.

There are other features we haven't explored yet, like the ability to integrate with other systems. However, we haven't implemented it since we also have our own local monitoring system. Currently, we're focusing on expanding our operations within our own in-house maintenance and data monitoring solution.

Moreover, NetXMS alerting system helps us prevent or quickly resolve an issue. We have a large network spanning over 1000 kilometers. NetXMS provides visibility and sends alerts. 

Typically, most monitoring systems monitor every 60 seconds, but NetXMS allows us to adjust this. For critical links, we can set it to check every second. For our high-priority financial customers, we monitor every second. 

So, every three seconds, we receive another email and a Telegram alert. This helps us meet our SLAs (Service Level Agreements) with our high-priority customers.

It's hard to pick just one, but I find the interface to be very user-friendly. Anyone can use it, and the auto-discovery is good as well. 

I also like the custom maps feature. We can create different map views, like seeing only specific PoPs (Points of Presence) like the aggregation PoPs. Setting up custom maps is very easy and straightforward.

One of the features I find valuable is the custom monitoring functionality. It allows us to pull specific OIDs, which are technical terms in the IT world, especially for SMBs. This means we can retrieve specific values from devices and use those values to create our own custom alerts and events. 

This was particularly helpful for us because we have a fiber optic network across the city. We needed to monitor the power levels of our devices on every uplink port. NetXMS's custom feature helped us achieve this, something even paid applications sometimes lack.

Based on my experience, there should be options for using the latest communication methods, like social media integration. Telegram is already integrated, but SMS and other alert options would be beneficial.

So, integrating social media notifications into NetXMS would be a good thing.

As a large company, we integrate different systems together. We'd like to see some improved functionalities for enhanced integration. 

For example, our incident management system isn't currently integrated with NetXMS. Ideally, we'd like the alerts generated in the monitoring system to automatically create tickets in our ticketing system, similar to how some other systems function.

NetXMS doesn't offer this functionality itself because they are not an incident management or ticketing system vendor. They allow integration with other vendors, but our ticketing system isn't currently supported. So they recommend using it with any other application of our choice.

We've been using it for approximately five years now. We keep the software up to date. So, the latest version we use is 4.5.

I would rate the stability an eight out of ten.  

From a scalability perspective, we use a virtual machine in our company. The virtual machine itself isn't related to NetXMS, but to the platform we use for hosting APM (Application Performance Management). NetXMS scales very well on virtual machines and supports all major hypervisors.

In terms of scaling, we have multiple clients, and we used to provide them with multiple instances. However, this is not a built-in NetXMS analytics feature, but rather a function of our virtualized platform. 

We haven't actually scaled the NetXMS solution itself, as a single server has been sufficient to handle up to 3,000 devices.

I haven't tested the scalability in the distributed model because we haven't done any scaling of NetXMS within our network. We've only used our virtualization platform to scale the solution. 

Since NetXMS itself is supported on virtual machines, I would give it a nine out of ten. However, this is just my understanding based on documentation, not practical experience.

It's very easy to use because it supports all virtualization platforms. We can have instances and snapshots readily available, and sometimes even templates for NetXMS. 

So, if a new requirement arises, it only takes a couple of minutes to provision a new machine, spin it up, connect our client's equipment, and they're good to go. This ease of use came in handy when we had a geographically separate network in Mumbai that needed visibility. 

They didn't need a dedicated network for a single customer, so we simply set up a single NetXMS instance, requested network access and allowed IP addresses. We were then able to pull their devices and forward them, giving them the visibility they needed. It was a very fast and easy process for them.

We have a mix of routers and switches. So, the endpoint count is much higher for us, but in IT terms, we have around two million subscribers. 

In terms of actual endpoints, we have many, including ONPs (Optical Network Processors) on these routers. However, it is only about the infrastructure up to our access layer network that we monitor. There are other solutions that monitor client-provided equipment (CPE).

We have a five-person NOC (Network Operations Center) team, a five-engineer support team, ten field teams with access, and dedicated teams for different groups, bringing the total to around 50 end users for this solution.

The NOC team uses it 24/7. Other users who might occasionally monitor the system, such as checking if something is restored, would log in as needed. It depends on the situation. 

If there's a network incident, they would log in to investigate. Otherwise, the NOC team monitors it 24/7 and has it displayed on a big screen.

There's no technical support. They only have community support, which can take time to receive responses, sometimes two days or even 24 hours.

It's not guaranteed because it's community-based. They're not paid, so responses depend on when someone knowledgeable sees the post and decides to respond. 

This can take time, which is the same with any open-source product relying solely on community support. However, I've never experienced a situation where nobody responded. It's a widely used platform with many large organizations using it, so the community support is actually quite commendable.

Positive

The previous solution required purchasing licenses for every 100 devices, which made the cost quite high.

We considered other options like Webex, which is also open-source, but its deployment was a bit complex. We had one administrator working on the project, and he chose NetXMS because it was more user-friendly.

The setup was very easy. I would rate my experience with the initial setup a nine out of ten, with ten being easy to setup. 

There was just one minor issue. Sometimes, the NetXMS maps wouldn't save because the backend wasn't responding. In those cases, we were able to restore the maps from our regular backups. 

However, if someone doesn't take regular backups, they might lose their maps or any changes they've made. This instability isn't very frequent, but it does happen occasionally. 

We encountered this issue a couple of times, but we were able to restore the maps from our backups. Therefore, it wasn't a major issue for us. 

Compared to the cost of other solutions, it's a minor inconvenience. I've also worked with SolarWinds, and I faced multiple issues with them that required contacting support for resolution. 

Every software solution might have some bugs, and NetXMS is no different. It has occasional issues, but they seem comparable to other solutions.

We did it in-house. One person is enough. As long as they have access to the online documentation, anyone can follow and install it. 

Any system administrator who manages your databases and systems can install it easily. However, sizing the system for your needs, such as how much space it will take for 5,000 to 10,000 devices, should be done by a professional. 

But the actual installation process is very straightforward and follows the instructions in the documentation.

The deployment doesn't take much time. The actual deployment takes less than an hour. It's very easy and straightforward. You don't have to do much except configure your devices to send alerts to NetXMS.

Discovery is very fast, but creating maps and deciding how many devices to visualize on a particular map takes more time.

However, the installation itself is very easy and can be done in under an hour if you're installing it on a virtual machine (VM).

Maintenance depends on several factors. It depends on whether you have a distributed architecture and what your service level agreement (SLA) is. 

If you need 24/7 monitoring, then you'll definitely need a team for 24/7 maintenance. With 24/7 monitoring, you would need at least three people. So, it really depends on your SLA. 

If you don't have a 24/7 requirement, then one person is enough for maintenance. It's important to remember that NetXMS is a monitoring system, and if it goes down, you lose visibility, but your services are still running. So it's not a service-affecting thing, but you lose visibility.

So, you would just need to restore the backup, which can be done during office hours. If something goes wrong during office hours, you can fix it, so one person is enough. But if you want 24/7 uptime and don't want any downtime, then you'll definitely need a team of engineers to fix it.

Every company has its own policies and tolerance levels, but some companies will definitely need a team if they have low tolerance.

Since it's open-source, there are obviously no licensing fees.

There are additional operational costs, like the cost of hosting it somewhere.

Since it's on-premises, the cost isn't too high. We just need one virtual machine for it. 

If we need multiple instances, the cost wouldn't be much because we own our data center and infrastructure, so it's all part of that existing cost.

In our organization, we predominantly utilize open-source and community-based solutions. So, we don't currently use commercial products.

Therefore, we have been working with NetXMS. It's an open-source solution we use extensively.

I would suggest using any hypervisor. We use Citrix Xen, which is also open-source or any other device with enough CPU and memory. Specific requirements aren't necessary; we just need processing power and memory.

Overall, I'd rate it a ten out of ten. It's free, and it gives us everything we need. It provides detailed information and is as suitable as a commercial product, which is good.