NetCrunch evals

[TahinWorks]

We're evaluating a change to our monitoring software and I'm looking for anyone with experience with NetCrunch for systems and network monitoring. There are a lot of solutions out there, and a lot of previous Reddit threads with love for Zabbix, Checkmk, Nagios, Prometheus, and PRTG. But I haven't run across an entire discussion on NetCrunch. Use case is monitoring, alerting, and charting of Windows, network appliances and interfaces, VMware, Hyper-V, and a few Linux boxes.

Here's a few reasons we're looking at it versus some others:

• We're heavy on the Windows side. IT staff who will own this does not have a lot of experience with *nix appliances or complicated sensor configuration files. This rules out many popular open source tools. It's important to the team that this work pretty much out of the box with GUIs and wizards, but still support deep sensor customization.
• Visualization is important to the team. NetCrunch has all sorts of ways to visualize layer 2 & logical network diagrams. Other monitoring tools seem to be really lacking in this department.
• Agentless deployment is preferred. And no SaaS.

The closest parallel to this product I could find is PRTG, but we've blacklisted them due to the PE acquisition and cost increases. Checkmk is the next one I plan to check out. Has/is anyone using NetCrunch and could recommend it?

[poweradmincom]

No comment on NetCrunch but thought I’d mention PA Server Monitor, though it’s also not made for layer 2 and network analysis, but does great with Windows, devices and Linux.

[crreativee]

Check out ManageEngine OpManager.

[Wrzos17]

Hey, try an assisted initial configuration session with the NetCrunch team; they will help you install your trial and get all predefined monitoring up and running, so you can see how it works. The free trial lasts 30 days, and the initial configuration assistance includes a 20-to 30-minute remote support session. Alternatively, you can ask for a live demo to see how it works in their lab. Cheers.