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SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM) vs. Splunk Enterprise

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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)

    Score8 out of 10
    N/ASolarWinds LEM is security information and event management (SIEM) software.N/A

    Splunk Enterprise

    Score8.5 out of 10
    N/ASplunk is software for searching, monitoring, and analyzing machine-generated big data, via a web-style interface. It captures, indexes and correlates real-time data in a searchable repository from which it can generate graphs, reports, alerts, dashboards and visualizations.N/A
    Pricing
    SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)Splunk Enterprise
    Editions & Modules
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)Splunk Enterprise
    Free Trial
    YesYes
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoYes
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional Details——
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)Splunk Enterprise
    Considered Both Products
    SolarWinds
    Chose SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
    SEM is much better value proposition due to being priced by node and not by size of the event database. It's also much easier to configure that Splunk and needs much less infrastructure to run. Out of the box SEM beats Splunk on functionality. We looked at many products and …
    Incentivized
    Chose SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
    We use Splunk to also collect Syslog data across our enterprise. However, it is quite different in the correlation process. Splunk is less user-friendly and requires advanced-level training to manage. Solarwinds SEM is a lot easier to manage and set-up.
    Incentivized
    Chose SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
    The compare well against the others - the pricing models for all but Splunk (free version) are based on EPS/TB consumed... the problem they pose is guesstimating the price tag per month. SolarWinds Security Event Manager gets around that.
    Incentivized
    Chose SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
    It came down to price on this one. SolarWinds gave us a great break on it. For the features that we were looking for, SolarWinds is a great value for our dollar. As far as features go, we were looking for some
    Incentivized
    Chose SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
    easier to use than Splunk, light linux core
    Incentivized
    Chose SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
    • Ease of deployment
    • Good UI
    Incentivized
    Chose SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
    Splunk was a pretty good product but the licensing structure needed a lot of work. They changed the structure three times that I am aware and I still had problems understanding LogRhythm had a lot of issues correlating users to IP addresses, the mappings were frequently wrong …
    Incentivized
    Chose SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
    We found that SolarWinds performed poorly when the Architecture included many large data centers spread across the globe. When evaluating the SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM) solution we quickly realized that we needed a distributed architecture with log aggregation to …
    Incentivized
    Chose SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
    Solarwinds LEM lacks a lot of the features and power of their competitors. It also appears, at least at the outside of the competitors, that it is less user friendly and out of the box ready. We ended up with the Solarwinds solution because of budgetary constraints and …
    Incentivized
    Cisco
    Chose Splunk Enterprise
    Splunk is the industry leading log correlation company. After a presentation and POC, it was clear to go with the best.
    Incentivized
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    88%
    Would buy again
    29 Answers
    93%
    Would buy again
    25 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    96%
    Delivers good value for the price
    27 Answers
    88%
    Delivers good value for the price
    22 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    91%
    Happy with the feature set
    30 Answers
    100%
    Happy with the feature set
    27 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    88%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    15 Answers
    95%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    19 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    89%
    Implementation went as expected
    24 Answers
    92%
    Implementation went as expected
    22 Answers
    Features
    SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)Splunk Enterprise
    Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
    Comparison of Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) features of SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM) and Splunk Enterprise
    Feature
    SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
    8.9
    18 Ratings
    14% above category average
    Splunk Enterprise
    7.1
    56 Ratings
    9% below category average
    Centralized event and log data collection9.018 Ratings9.055 Ratings
    Correlation8.015 Ratings9.054 Ratings
    Event and log normalization/management8.018 Ratings9.555 Ratings
    Deployment flexibility10.018 Ratings7.050 Ratings
    Integration with Identity and Access Management Tools8.013 Ratings6.051 Ratings
    Custom dashboards and workspaces9.017 Ratings5.956 Ratings
    Host and network-based intrusion detection10.03 Ratings4.939 Ratings
    Data integration/API management00 Ratings8.06 Ratings
    Behavioral analytics and baselining00 Ratings5.96 Ratings
    Rules-based and algorithmic detection thresholds00 Ratings7.56 Ratings
    Response orchestration and automation00 Ratings7.05 Ratings
    Reporting and compliance management00 Ratings6.46 Ratings
    Incident indexing/searching00 Ratings6.57 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)Splunk Enterprise
    Small Businesses
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Medium-sized Companies
    IBM Security QRadar SIEM
    Score9 out of 10
    IBM Security QRadar SIEM
    Score9 out of 10
    Enterprises
    Microsoft Sentinel
    Score8.7 out of 10
    SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)
    Score8 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)Splunk Enterprise
    Likelihood to Recommend
    8.0
    (46 ratings)
    7.8
    (73 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    7.3
    (2 ratings)
    10.0
    (17 ratings)
    Usability
    8.0
    (6 ratings)
    8.2
    (6 ratings)
    Availability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    10.0
    (1 ratings)
    Support Rating
    7.5
    (17 ratings)
    8.4
    (17 ratings)
    Online Training
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.0
    (2 ratings)
    Product Scalability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.1
    (1 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM)Splunk Enterprise
    Likelihood to Recommend
    SolarWinds
    Optimal for SolarWinds Security Event Manager needs for smaller companies - it is a very cool product but has some limitations around EPS (which gets chewed up quickly if you're doing it the right way & adding servers/storage/FW & other network devices)... Also pricing model is GREAT (not consumption-based, which is the greatest grift the SIEM industry has created).
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cisco
    It's well suited for what I do, which is network security operations. And that's for anything from troubleshooting incidents, troubleshooting performance, troubleshooting for the purpose of a compliance and auditing. It's not best suited for users who are new in terms of they're new to the product and they have expectations that probably Splunk cannot meet.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    SolarWinds
    • It does a great job of notifying us when accounts have been locked out. We can then find out the device on the network where the login attempt occurred.
    • Searching for incidents is now a lot faster with the implementation of the HTML 5 interface.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cisco
    • It is very useful in creating custom rules for analyzing system logs and display relevant information. The query language is very easy to learn.
    • We can create custom UI to visualize the output of our data. The interface is very flexible. It also allows the sharing of rules among users.
    • There is an open online community to help others. Stackoverflow also has a splunk community. These resources make it more convenient to learn.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    SolarWinds
    • All SolarWinds product suffer from slow response times in management portals. SolarWinds SEM is no exception. While it is much preferred over a "thick client" there is much room for improvement in speed.
    • If you use the email alert features with SolarWinds make sure to prepare you staff and team for the large amount of emails they could receive. Make sure to reduce the number of alerts so your team does not ignore the alerts.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cisco
    • Splunk light limits number of users to 5. Wish there was a flexible license, where one could add more users.
    • Splunk light does not let you add > few realtime alerts. Wish there was a flexible license, where one could add as many realtime alerts as wanted.
    • Better insight into daily ingestion values
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    SolarWinds
    It is pretty likely that we will renew SEM when the time comes up. It is easy to use and maintain so there isn't much of a need to replace this product. It is also a pretty fair price for the capabilities provided by the SEM
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cisco
    We are using Splunk extensively in our projects and we have recently upgraded to Splunk version 6.0 which is quite efficient and giving expected results. We keep track of updates and new features Splunk introduces periodically and try to introduce those features in our day to day activities for improvement in our reporting system and other tasks.
    Read full review
    Usability
    SolarWinds
    If you are familiar with SolarWinds then you can use this product it's as easy as that. If you have never used a SolarWinds product then it will take a minute to get how they do reports and make dashboards but that being said the tool is great and can make things very easy once you get a feel for how it works and get everything setup how you like it.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cisco
    You can literally throw in a single word into Splunk and it will pull back all instances of that word across all of your logs for the time span you select (provided you have permission to see that data). We have several users who have taken a few of the free courses from Splunk that are able to pull data out of it everyday with little help at all.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Reliability and Availability
    SolarWinds
    No answers on this topic
    Cisco
    When properly setup and configured, Splunk is extremely reliable.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Support Rating
    SolarWinds
    The quality of support can vary depending on whom you end up speaking with. I was fortunate enough to work with a support representative who was very familiar with the product. He had even authored some of the support documentation on the website. On the flip side, I had two other experiences where I was simply directed to online training material.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cisco
    Splunk maintains a well resourced support system that has been consistent since we purchased the product. They help out in a timely manner and provide expert level information as needed. We typically open cases online and communicate when possible via e-mail and are able to resolve most issues with that method.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Online Training
    SolarWinds
    No answers on this topic
    Cisco
    The online course was simple clear and described the main capabilities of the solution. There is also an initial module that can be done for free so anyone can familiarize themselves with the functionality of this solution. On the other hand, however, there could be more free online courses. Maybe even with a certificate, this would broaden the group of people who are familiar with the platform while increasing familiarity with the solution itself.
    Read full review
    Implementation Rating
    SolarWinds
    No answers on this topic
    Cisco
    Smooth without too many major issues.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Alternatives Considered
    SolarWinds
    Fortianalzyer can only do logs from FortiGate so usefulness is limited. Elasticsearch was a lot slower than Solarwinds and the filters were a lot harder to set up and use. The connectors for SEM were far more stable.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cisco
    I didn't get to fully evaluate Logstash as our corporation was already using Logstash, but both seemed like viable solutions to the problem that we were having. I wanted to evaluate Logstash some more, both did seem like they would work for the business needs that we had, we went with splunk as many teams were already using it.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Scalability
    SolarWinds
    No answers on this topic
    Cisco
    Splunk can scale in to the petabyte per day range which of course is awesome
    Read full review
    Return on Investment
    SolarWinds
    • For the price, it produced a decent value. It did a lot of the easy stuff well. I can't give any specific data given the objective of the product was to monitor very basic events in the environment.
    • There are free options that can do a better job.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cisco
    • I don't have any numbers to share but Splunk has positively served as a 24/7 monitoring tool that has saved hours of work by self-detecting, saving statistics and alerting problems in the system or from external interfaces as soon as they happen.
    • Splunk dashboards does a solid job in collecting, analyzing data and creating reports that contain an entire day's activity and then automatically sent out to the business.
    • Splunk is very easy to learn and very useful to any program or business application.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots

    SolarWinds Security Event Manager (SEM) Screenshots

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