How is Orion NPM licensed?
Orion NPM is licensed by the largest number of the three following element types:
- Interfaces: interfaces include switch ports, physical/virtual interfaces, VLANs
- Nodes: nodes include entire devices (routers, switches, servers, APs)
- Volumes: volumes are equal to the logical disks you monitor
Orion NPM license options:
- Up to 100 elements of each type (SL100)
- Up to 250 elements of each type (SL250)
- Up to 500 elements of each type (SL500)
- Up to 2000 elements of each type (SL2000)
- Unlimited elements of each type based on a recommended standard polling rate (SLX)
For example: An Orion NPM SL2000 can monitor up to 2000 interfaces + up to 2000 nodes + up to 2000 volumes.
Data collected for items other than interfaces, nodes, and volumes is effectively free and you can monitor as many as your system can handle. A few examples of other data types that can be monitored include:
- CPU statistics
- Memory statistics
- Wireless radios
- Syslog messages
- Trap messages
- Power supplies
- System fans
- Humidity sensors
- Temperature sensors
- Any other SNMP statistics
Can I buy multiple licenses of Orion NPM (e.g., an SL-100 and an SL-250) and monitor all 350 network elements from the same web console?
No. An Orion NPM license allows you to install a single Orion database, and each database is associated with a single Orion web console.
Can Orion NPM monitor NetFlow?
Which vendors does Orion NPM support?
Orion NPM includes out-of-the-box monitoring for thousands of vendors and operating systems, including Cisco®, Foundry®, Extreme Networks®, Motorola®, ARRIS®, Linux, Solaris®, HP-UX®, AIX®, Windows® 2000, Windows 2003, and Windows XP devices.
How does Orion NPM collect data?
Through ICMP, SNMP, and syslog communication and data collection, Orion NPM continuously monitors network health and performance. No agents install on your mission critical servers; no services take vital resources from critical applications; no security holes open through the installation of unmanaged or outdated code.
Q: Does Orion NPM monitor VMware®?
Yes, Orion NPM monitors VMware ESX Servers and guest virtual machine instances. Orion NPM cannot monitor VMware ESXi in the same way because ESXi does not support SNMP, however you can leverage Orion NPM's trap server to receive ESXi traps.
The SolarWinds NPM SLX license entitles you to monitor an unlimited number of elements, but the throughput is rate-limited. Most customers will be able to monitor about 10,000 elements per polling engine (main or additional) with standard polling intervals. For more technical details, see this KB or speak with an SE.
Can I just use better hardware to poll more?
No, the software enforces a throughput rate. However, if you change the polling interval to poll less often, it is possible to monitor more than 10,000 elements on a single server. For details on how the throughput rate is enforced see this KB.
Why do you do enforce a throughput rate?
The primary reason that we enforce a throughput rate is for better predictability and supportability over a wide range of hardware and customer deployment scenarios. Many customers were experiencing slowdowns as well as missing data because the polling engine could not keep up. This overloading also caused many customers to have webpage timeout issues because of the load on the polling engine. With the new changes customers should experience greater polling numbers and overall improved performance.