Enterprise Network Monitoring Tools

Network monitoring can significantly benefit your organization by improving network performance, and providing better visibility for your IT teams. With enterprise network monitoring you can proactively identify network issues and resolve them before they cause major disruptions, helping to keep your network operating at optimal levels.

Moreover, by offering a complete view of your network, enterprise network monitoring software enables IT teams to prioritize resources for peak network performance, track network usage, and analyze areas where you may need to increase bandwidth. This can help to optimize resource allocation and improve network efficiency.

Lastly, an enterprise monitoring system can help organizations save money by identifying areas underutilizing network resources, allowing IT teams to optimize resource allocation.

When it comes to monitoring your network, SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor (NPM) is the solution you can count on for comprehensive and reliable performance monitoring and  analysis. Here's how it works:

1. First, NPM discovers all devices and applications connected to your network. It uses multiple discovery methods, including SNMP, ICMP, and WMI, to ensure all devices are identified.
2. Once the devices are discovered, NPM starts polling them for performance data, such as CPU and memory usage and network bandwidth utilization. It also monitors network devices like routers, switches, and firewalls to make sure they're working properly and routing traffic efficiently.
3. If any performance thresholds are reached, NPM can be configured to generate alerts to let your IT team know. Whether it's via email or SMS, you'll be notified promptly.
4. When it comes to analyzing network performance data, NPM has you covered with pre-built reports and dashboards. You can track device performance, and application performance over time.

This enterprise network monitoring system can keep tabs on a wide range of devices and technologies, including network routers and switches, firewalls, wireless access points and controllers, virtual machines and servers, storage area networks (SANs), network printers, and other peripherals. It can even monitor applications like Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft SQL Server, and VMware.

Whether you're a small or large enterprise, NPM can scale to meet your needs, with support for up to 1 million network elements.

Yes! SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor (NPM) can monitor wireless networks, including wireless access points and controllers. This enterprise network monitoring software provides details on wireless access points (AP name, IP address, device type, SSID, channels used) and clients connected (client name, SSID, IP Address, MAC Address, Received Signal Strength Indication, time connected, data rate).

NPM supports monitoring wireless clients, allowing IT teams to track the performance of individual devices connected to the wireless network. This can be particularly useful for troubleshooting connectivity issues and optimizing wireless network performance.

To scan and discover devices in your enterprise network with SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor (NPM):

1. Log in to the SolarWinds Platform Web Console. If the Discovery Wizard doesn't start automatically after setup, go to Settings > Network Discovery and click Add New Discovery, then click Start.
2. If this is your first scan, only add a few IP addresses on the Network panel.
3. If the Agents panel appears, it means you’ve selected the Quality of Experience (QoE) when installing NPM. This allows you to monitor packet-level traffic. Select the Check all existing nodes check box, which will ensure all agents are regularly updated.
4. To discover VMware vCenter or ESX hosts on your network, go to the Virtualization panel and check Poll for VMware. Then click Add vCenter or ESX Credential and enter the required information.
5. On the SNMP panel, click Next if all your devices only require the default SNMPv1 and SNMPv2 public and private community strings. Otherwise, click Add Credential and provide the necessary details.
6. To discover WMI or RPC-enabled Windows devices, go to the Windows panel and click Add New Credential. Enter the required information.
7. On the Monitoring Settings panel, we recommend manually setting up monitoring during the first scan. This lets you select which devices to monitor. You can configure the scan to automatically monitor objects it finds when scaling up.
8. On the Discovery Settings panel, click Next and run the discovery immediately with the default frequency.

The scan may take some time to complete, depending on the size of your network and the number of devices being scanned.

Find and troubleshoot failing devices with SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor (NPM) by following these steps:

1. Identify the failing device: The first step is to identify the device or devices that are experiencing issues. Check alerts and notifications or use the dashboard to view the status of all network devices.
2. Analyze performance metrics: Once you have identified the failing device, review its performance metrics in more detail. Down nodes will be marked in red or yellow. After spotting the problem node, click on it to check its response times, packet loss, CPU load, and memory utilization using the corresponding widgets.
3. Generate reports: Once the issue has been identified and resolved, you can use NPM's reporting tools to generate reports on the incident. This can help you to identify any trends or recurring issues on the network, allowing you to take proactive steps to prevent similar issues from occurring in the future.

Absolutely—you can extend the network functionalities of SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor (NPM) to include bandwidth analysis, network configurations, and IP management by adding additional modules or integrating other SolarWinds products.

Here are some of the ways you can enhance NPM's network functionalities:

• Bandwidth analysis: Adding SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer to NPM gives you deeper insight into how your network uses bandwidth. With this module, you can monitor real-time and historical data on network traffic, pinpoint the root cause of slow network performance, and identify bandwidth hogs.
• Network configuration management: By adding SolarWinds Network Configuration Manager to NPM, you can automate network device configuration backups, track changes, and enforce compliance policies. This module provides a central repository of network device configurations, making it easy to manage and monitor configuration changes across your network.
• IP address management: Adding SolarWinds IP Address Manager to NPM simplifies IP address management tasks, including IP address allocation, subnet management, and DNS/DHCP integration. This module provides a centralized database of IP address information, making it easy to manage and monitor your network's IP address usage.

By incorporating these additional modules or integrating other SolarWinds products, you can expand the network functionalities of SolarWinds NPM, providing a comprehensive suite of tools for managing and monitoring your network infrastructure.