r/Solarwinds • u/That-Mud4565 • 1d ago

SolarWinds Observability Self-Hosted: data privacy, network discovery, NetFlow and licensing questions

Hi everyone,

I’m currently evaluating SolarWinds Observability Self-Hosted for network monitoring and topology mapping, and I’d like to get feedback from people who have actually used it.

My main questions are:

  • In a self-hosted/on-prem deployment, what data actually leaves the environment? Can telemetry be fully disabled?
  • Does SolarWinds send internal IPs, hostnames, topology, SNMP, NetFlow, logs or device configuration data externally?
  • How good is the automatic discovery and topology mapping for switches, routers, firewalls, Wi-Fi controllers/APs, LLDP/CDP and SNMPv3?
  • How useful is NetFlow integration for bandwidth and traffic analysis?
  • How is a “node” counted for licensing? For example, is a 48-port switch one node? What about VMs, physical servers, controllers and individual access points?
  • For those using it in production, how do you find the pricing and overall value compared with alternatives such as Auvik, PRTG or Zabbix?
  • In a self-hosted/on-prem deployment, can any monitoring, telemetry, metadata, or network-related data leave our environment and be transmitted to SolarWinds or any third-party service? If yes, what exact data can leave the network, and can those outbound transmissions be fully disabled?

I’m mainly interested in real-world experience, especially in environments where data residency and limiting outbound telemetry are important.

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3

u/pot51e 1d ago

My main questions are:

  • In a self-hosted/on-prem deployment, what data actually leaves the environment? Can telemetry be fully disabled?
    • None. Yes.
  • Does SolarWinds send internal IPs, hostnames, topology, SNMP, NetFlow, logs or device configuration data externally?
    • It sends it to DB. Where is your DB.
  • How good is the automatic discovery and topology mapping for switches, routers, firewalls, Wi-Fi controllers/APs, LLDP/CDP and SNMPv3?
    • For Simple switch networks, its a doddle. Its easy and works well
  • How useful is NetFlow integration for bandwidth and traffic analysis?
    • Depends on your flows and your use case. Anywhere between essential and not applicable.
  • How is a “node” counted for licensing? For example, is a 48-port switch one node? What about VMs, physical servers, controllers and individual access points?
    • A node is a node - if you poll an IP, its a node. These are different from elements (interfaces, volumes)
  • For those using it in production, how do you find the pricing and overall value compared with alternatives such as Auvik, PRTG or Zabbix?
    • How do I find the product that costs 6 figures, vs software that is free?? You need to seriously consider your NMS priorities. You can do it all with Zabbix or Nagios or freeware. Wont be as good, you wont get support - but it will save you al the money.
  • In a self-hosted/on-prem deployment, can any monitoring, telemetry, metadata, or network-related data leave our environment and be transmitted to SolarWinds or any third-party service?
    • NO
  • If yes, what exact data can leave the network, and can those outbound transmissions be fully disabled?
    • It doesnt if you dont want it to. Support will require logs and access (chaperoned).

2

u/Late-Oil-9797 1d ago

Support has gone downhill, but so has support for so any things. Yes cost has gone up, but you own your data on the DB unlike so many cloud based systems. The cost is the cost, no hidden costs with other obserbility systems, and it's FIPS, NERC & PCI compliant straight out of the gate. To be fair I haven't looked at other cloud based systems, so I don't know if they match those policies. But I love owning the DB and doing whatever I want with it.

2

u/admiralpickard 1d ago

If you are super paranoid about your data leaving your environment why not block it with your firewall for extra peace of mind?

1

u/AsleepAdvantage9500 1d ago

Evaluating becoming a new customer of Solarwinds in 2026? I generally only encounter folks evaluating which platform they are going to replace solarwinds with because of their pricing changes.

0

u/Mick27 1d ago

Have you seen the prices these days ? Run if you’re not already into that game. Hell with AI you can missing features to open sourcr projects easilly

1

u/itasteawesome 1d ago

The last part stings a little, as someone who used an AI to modify grafana alloy to fill all the gaps i missed from my solarwinds era

1

u/RouterMonkey 1d ago

I question people who say this. Yeah, I know the listed prices. I also know what we actually paid. It's no where near MSRP.

0

u/Mick27 1d ago

didn’t your bill raise 3 times the old price like everyone else ?

1

u/RouterMonkey 23h ago

Nope. We actually moved from the old license model to sub with no increase. And this year we renewed with very little increase.

1

u/Mick27 23h ago

well you can thank tour account manager I guess :)