Review: Monitoring Tool Gets Smart

That makes intelligence about the traffic traveling over the wires (or even over the air) all the more important. Recently, vendors have put together an amalgamation of network monitoring tools, packet sniffers and network probes to create products squarely aimed at observing and managing network traffic. One of the first vendors to combine many of the packet-related tools and network management capabilities into a common interface is Ipswitch, Lexington, Mass., with its line of WhatsUp products.

CRN Test Center engineers took a look at the latest version of the premium line of WhatsUp — WhatsUp Gold v11—which was released Jan. 30. WhatsUp Gold brings many network-management-centric features to the system administrator while still covering the basics of how packets are traveling across the backbone. The product offers in-band monitoring of routers and other network devices and builds trending databases with extensive packet intelligence. WhatsUp Gold also brings a complete management infrastructure to the administrator with the support of SNMP 1/2/3 and WMI devices, which power realtime observation, along with comprehensive reporting.

The product uses a Web-based framework that incorporates technologies such as AJAX and Jscript technology, which bring drag-and-drop ease of use to what would normally be a complex management console.

Test Center engineers found installation of the product quite straightforward, although a dedicated server is needed to guarantee full functionality. Once installed, the product proves easy to use. Administrators simply log in to the browser-based console and instruct the product to do an automatic network discovery. That task queries network-attached devices to build the initial inventory of manageable devices. Administrators can also add devices by hand by using IP addresses.

Network device detection works quite well in WhatsUp Gold v11 and is speedy on fast networks. The initial discovery process provides a list of attached hardware, and then administrators can organize the detected devices into groups and populate a visual map of the devices. Proper discovery of devices proves to be the foundation of the product, and administrators will need to make sure that all devices are accounted for. Otherwise, the ability to monitor the network could be compromised.

Test Center engineers found that the creation of custom dashboards will be of major importance to those managing larger networks. For example, a network administrator can design consoles/dashboards that focus on particular elements of network management, closely aligning the dashboard with a particular IT staffer's area of responsibility.

The product provides end-to-end monitoring of applications and critical network devices. That means administrators can define rules for individual applications, and if those applications become unavailable, alerts will be issued. What's more, many critical services can be monitored and automatically restarted if a problem occurs. That proves to be a valuable feature for sites relying on Microsoft Exchange and Microsoft SQL.

NEXT: The Bottom Line