Looking for a reliable SolarWinds alternative? If you’ve been comparing SolarWinds and WhatsUp Gold, you’re not alone. Many IT teams are evaluating which network monitoring solution offers better performance, flexibility and cost efficiency. In this guide, we’ll walk you through a step-by-step migration from SolarWinds to WhatsUp Gold, highlighting key differences, benefits and best practices to maintain a smooth transition. Whether you’re seeking a robust SolarWinds vs WhatsUp Gold comparison or planning your next move, this article provides everything you need.
Before discovering and monitoring anything in WhatsUp Gold, you must replicate the credential structure from SolarWinds Orion.
💡Pro Tip: WhatsUp Gold’s credential management is centralized and reusable across discovery scans, monitors and actions, no need to re-enter credentials per device.
Once credentials are created within WhatsUp Gold, it’s time to discover your network.
WhatsUp Gold wizard-driven discovery automatically maps devices, assigns device templates and creates a dynamic topology map. Device templates are easily customizable to fit different scenarios. Nodes, called ‘Devices’ in the WhatsUp Gold UI, are stored in two separate locations: the discovered network and the monitored network. WhatsUp Gold allows you to create multiple scheduled discoveries, making it simple to set up ongoing scans of various network segments at different times. After discovery, the administrator can choose to add the device to the monitored network (or have it automatically added), which requires a license. “Unmonitored devices” remain viewable within the topology map and discovered network list, providing additional information if the system responded to one of the credentials added in Step 1, even when unmonitored.
This is where the migration gets a bit more nuanced. Orion’s alerting system is modular and often tied to SAM, NTA, NCM or other addons. The WhatsUp Gold solution handles alerting differently, but powerfully.
Rebuild in WhatsUp Gold: Use Alert Center and Action Policies to recreate these. WhatsUp Gold supports:
The WhatsUp Gold library approach simplifies the creation and management of its alerting mechanisms. Choose from many different built-in types. One type includes PowerShell, which enables you to create custom actions to achieve nearly any alerting or automation goals.
📌Example: If Orion had an alert for interface utilization > 80%, replicate this in WhatsUp Gold using the Interface Utilization performance monitor and an associated alert center threshold and notification policy.
Orion’s PerfStack analysis and other dashboards are powerful, but they often require extensive, time-consuming customization. WhatsUp Gold offers intuitive, custom dashboards providing a vast library of built-in widgets.
Reports can be drag-and-dropped to the desired location, or you can add them directly:
The two main dashboard types, “Home” and “Device Status,” enable you to set up dashboards related to your whole environment or specific devices. All dashboard types are located under Analyze -> Dashboards. The “NOC Viewer” dashboard enables IT teams to easily display a large screen scrolling WhatsUp Gold information, again highly customizable.
After migration, validate that WhatsUp Gold is monitoring everything SolarWinds Orion did, and more.
Here’s a comprehensive translation table to help you map SolarWinds Orion’s terminology and modules to their WhatsUp Gold equivalents:
| SolarWinds Orion Term | WhatsUp Gold Equivalent | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Node | Device | WhatsUp Gold uses device-based licensing |
| Element (Interface, Volume, Node, Universal Device Pollers) | Monitor | WhatsUp Gold offers unlimited monitors per device |
| Server and Application Monitor (SAM) | Application Monitoring | SNMP/WMI-based, no extra module required, WhatsUp Gold Application Monitoring provides additional templates and reporting |
| Network Configuration Manager (NCM) | Configuration Management | WhatsUp Gold’s integrated network configuration backup and management, using your devices' assigned credentials |
| NetFlow Traffic Analyzer (NTA) | Network Traffic Analysis (NTA+) | WhatsUp Gold’s best-in-class network traffic analysis provides actionable insights into NetFlow, sFlow, and other flow data types |
| Log Analyzer/Log Manager | Log Management | WhatsUp Gold can use Log Management for Syslog and Windows Events and provides robust archiving options |
| Orion Maps, Network Atlas, Intelligent maps | Map view on device groups | WhatsUp Gold’s automated, integrated, customizable Layer 2/3 topology maps with drilldowns + overlays |
| Advanced Alert Manager | Alert Center + Action Policies | WhatsUp Gold uses Alert Center for performance threshold-based alerts, and Action Policies for availability-based alerts |
| PerfStack/Orion Dashboard | Home Dashboard, Device Status Dashboard | WhatsUp Gold’s dashboards are customizable per-user, can be shared, can be exported and scheduled, and enable you to easily add as many metrics as you choose |
| Network Sonar Discovery | Discovery Wizard | WhatsUp Gold’s discovery intelligence provides flexibility and automation options vs. SolarWinds |
| Reports | Reports | WhatsUp Gold comes out of the box with many reports which can be viewed or scheduled to be emailed or saved to a file, WhatsUp Gold 360 provides a custom report builder |
| SolarWinds Information Service (SWIS) | REST API | WhatsUp Gold’s API support enables tight integration to your IT ecosystem vs. SolarWinds |
| Node Management > MIB Browser | SNMP MIB Walker, SNMP MIB Manager | WhatsUp Gold’s best-in-class SNMP tools enable you to browse and walk SNMP MIBs and easily create monitors for any SNMP-based value. |
| Maintenance Mode | Scheduled Maintenance | WhatsUp Gold’s maintenance schedules can be applied in bulk to as many devices as you choose |
| Custom Properties | Device Attributes | WhatsUp Gold’s device attributes enable manual and automatic tagging of devices with metadata |
| HTTPS Monitor (SAM) | SSL Certificate Monitor / HTTP Content Monitor | WhatsUp Gold provides these as monitors directly out of the box with no extra module required |
| IPAM (IP Address Manager) | (External Tool Needed) | WhatsUp Gold does not provide native IPAM. Microsoft IPAM is a popular choice with our customers, Netbox is another |
| Virtualization Manager (VMAN) | Virtual Monitoring | WhatsUp Gold can monitor any hypervisor directly out of the box, but we integrate tightly with Hyper-V and VMware APIs with the Virtual Monitoring addon |
| Storage Resource Monitor (SRM) | (Not Available) | For most storage vendors, you can use WhatsUp Gold’s SNMP active + passive out-of-the-box. Additionally, WhatsUp Gold’s REST API monitor enables integration with many store systems. |
| Maintenance Mode | Maintenance mode | Disable monitoring temporarily or on a schedule. WhatsUp Gold’s interface allows bulk applying maintenance schedules to device |
From internal feedback and customer migrations, here’s why IT teams are choosing WhatsUp Gold:
Migrating from SolarWinds Orion or Observability Self-Hosted to WhatsUp Gold isn’t just a technical shift, it’s a strategic upgrade. With the right prep, the transition is smooth, and the benefits are immediate. Whether you’re a seasoned network admin or a lean IT team, WhatsUp Gold offers the flexibility, visibility and simplicity you need.
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