Network infrastructure monitoring is a crucial part of modern IT business. You need a flawlessly functioning network to deliver services and products to the end users. As the size and complexity of a network grows, so do the stakes. Any issue in a large enough network will cause multiple repercussions, and network administrators fight an uphill battle trying to troubleshoot them. With the right sort of monitoring tool, you can ensure a better experience for both the users and the admins.
Things you should keep in mind
Multiple factors have to be taken into consideration when choosing a network infrastructure monitoring tool.
➤ How large is your network?
➤ What is the infrastructure composed of?
➤ What is the scope of your monitoring?
How large is your network?
Networks can range from a couple of devices connected to each other to hundreds and thousands of servers sprawling over several buildings. The size of the network determines the scale of the monitoring job. On a large network, everything’s tougher: IP address allocation, granting access to employees, compliance and service level agreements, and so on. A comprehensive monitoring tool can handle such functionalities in any size of network.
What is the infrastructure composed of?
Network infrastructure has different types of components. The type of monitoring and the tools required rely mainly on the composition of the infrastructure. In a typical network, you have:
Physical infrastructure: Your physical infrastructure includes all the physical devices and network components. This includes the desktops, servers, routers, Ethernet cables, and so on. These components have to be monitored for their performance aspects such as CPU utilization, memory, and availability.
Virtual infrastructure: Virtual infrastructure includes all the virtual components of your infrastructure. Virtual components run in a host OS and are parts of cloud computing and distributed architecture. Virtual devices include virtual servers, virtual routers, and databases switches.
Application infrastructure: These are your array of applications which are key to the user experience. You must monitor critical aspects such as response time, availability, and some critical processes and services.
What is the scope of your monitoring?
This is a particularly important question you have to ask yourself when choosing a network infrastructure monitoring tool. If you don’t plan properly before choosing and assigning a monitoring tool, you might end up losing valuable processing power, paying more licensing fees, and employing more technicians. Having the right tool might just save a massive chunk of your revenue.
Most network monitoring tools are tailor-made for certain aspects of infrastructure monitoring, so for more complete monitoring, you’d have to use multiple tools. This may lead to the problems mentioned above, cross-platform incompatibility, and having to correlate multiple reports.
There is a convenient solution: a holistic network infrastructure monitoring tool. Such a tool is used for most monitoring applications and includes add-ons and integrations, allowing you to choose what you want to monitor.
OpManager Plus, the one-stop solution for all network infrastructure monitoring woes
OpManager Plus is a six-in-one holistic network infrastructure monitoring tool that brings a suite of network monitoring tools under one unified, easy to access platform. OpManager Plus allows you to use a single tool for all your monitoring concerns, saving you time and money. OpManager Plus’s arsenal of monitoring tools includes:
Monitoring of physical and virtual devices: OpManager Plus can monitor devices using various metrics such as ping, packet loss, and response time. It also monitors CPU performance, memory utilization, disk space, CPU temperature, interface performance, files, folders, services, processes, URLs, logs, and more. There are dedicated sections for viewing virtual host and guest devices and monitoring their performance aspects.
Application performance monitoring: Keep track of business critical applications. perform functionalities such as application performance monitoring, synthetic transaction monitoring, checking response time, performance based off parameters such as geography, ISP, device type, and more. It also has dynamic automatic discovery and dependency maps which change to the environment.
Flow-based network traffic and bandwidth monitoring: Perform advanced traffic and bandwidth monitoring. Monitor traffic patterns, analyze bandwidth usage, track network anomalies, and perform traffic shaping.
Network configuration and change management: OpManager Plus equips users to configure backup scheduling, perform real-time change management and compliance auditing, address firmware vulnerabilities, and utilize other configuration functionalities.
Firewall, proxy server and VPN management: Deal with logs and configuration settings. Analyze usage of firewall rules and fine-tune them, do change management, intrusion prevention, user activity monitoring, network forensics, and more.
IP address and switch port management: Allocation and management of IP addresses and switches is a major part of network infrastructure management. OpManager Plus offers over 20 tools which help you allocate and keep track of IP addresses, detect rogue devices, keep an eye on bandwidth usage, and more. It also has switch port mapping which gives you a concise idea about the availability and status of your switches.
Benefits of using OpManager Plus
Advanced discovery process and discovery rule engine: OpManager Plus can discover thousands of devices in matter of minutes. Discovery rule engine lets you further automate discovery processes. You can configure rules to add monitors to certain discovered devices or add the devices to a business view.
Detailed reports and notification profiles: OpManager Plus has an array of pre-defined reports that can be applied to your network infrastructure with ease. Notification profiles can be configured to push certain alarms to your SMS and mail servers. You can also set alarm escalation rules to be notified of unacknowledged and ignored alarms.
Integrations with ISTM and REST API: OpManager Plus can integrate with popular IT service management tools such as Service Desk Plus, ServiceNow, and Jira Service Management. OpManager Plus also supports REST API which allows it to send monitoring data to any other tool that also supports REST API.
Better network visualization: OpManager Plus helps you visualize and posses a deeper understanding of your network infrastructure with its maps, business views, rack views, 3D floor views, and Layer2 maps.
Scalability: OpManager Plus is available as different versions based on the size of your network and the number of devices. The enterprise version of OpManager can support up to 10,000 devices and 50,000 interfaces. Scale up your monitoring capabilities, along with your network, with OpManager Plus.
OpManager Plus supports over 10,000 device types, 450 vendors, and 150 applications. Its powerful add-ons and integrations allow you to monitor all aspects of your network infrastructure. With its advanced features and tools, OpManager Plus vastly simplifies one of the toughest tasks in modern IT business. Download OpManager Plus to keep an eye on your precious network infrastructure.
