AdRem NetCrunch 10.4
A fast, affordable network monitoring suite that can keep an eye on a huge range of devices and services
SCORE PRICE NetCrunch Suite, 250 nodes, £4,844 (exc VAT) from adremsoft.com
The latest version of NetCrunch may be only a point update, but AdRem certainly hasn’t skimped on new features. The software’s “monitoring packs” group together common sets of performance monitors, and version 10.4 adds no fewer than 32 new ones to the mix, bringing the total number of monitoring components to 187.
They’re significant additions, too. The new monitors give NetCrunch the ability to keep watch over security devices from Cisco, Fortinet, Juniper and SonicWall, plus NAS appliances from Buffalo, Netgear, Qnap and Synology. Server monitoring sees big improvements too, thanks to added packs for Dell EMC iDRAC, Fujitsu iRMC, HPE iLO and Lenovo IMM remote management controllers.
One aspect of NetCrunch that’s always impressed us is how quickly it gets to work monitoring your network. After installing the latest version on a Windows Server 2016 host, we followed the discovery wizard and were looking at a complete breakdown of our lab network in just 15 minutes.
It’s no quick and dirty audit, either. NetCrunch found and correctly identified all our Windows Server 2012 R2 and 2016 servers, Windows 7 and 10 workstations, VMware ESXi hosts, printers and HPE network switches. It picked up our MacBooks too, correctly noting they were running macOS High Sierra, and even alerted us that one of them was running dangerously low on available memory.
To find other issues on your network, the Top Charts tab is the place to go, revealing systems with the highest CPU, memory and storage usage, plus those with the most pending alerts and any that have high levels of network traffic. If the default displays don’t cover the issues you’re concerned about, you can add your own dynamic charts, performance counters and device filters.
Or, if it’s a complete overview of your network you’re looking for, NetCrunch’s “Atlas” view lists all your network devices, conveniently colour-coded so you can see at a glance which ones have problems or are unresponsive. The Smart Pages feature automatically updates your view based on the content selected in the left-hand pane: selecting a network segment brings up a Layer 2 map with real-time views of network traffic passing between each node.
If you want to single out an individual system, the console also provides full search facilities, making it easy to find a device of interest. We were quickly able to pull up details about each of our Windows, Mac and Linux systems, and NetCrunch was even able to provide full performance statistics for our ESXi servers, with
“NetCrunch was even able to provide full performance statistics for our ESXi servers, with resource details for every VM”
graphs on datastore usage and status and resource details for every VM. Note, though, that Hyper-V support isn’t so comprehensive: NetCrunch will give you details of host CPU utilisation and Hyper-V Windows Management services, but it can’t provide any information about the VMs themselves.
Regular readers will know we’re fans of server management tools, and for us NetCrunch’s new monitoring pack for HPE’s iLO platform is another godsend, bringing alerts such as fan and power supply failures right into the NetCrunch console. The software can even access HPE’s internal sensors, and show details on fan speeds, internal temperatures and overall power usage.
NetCrunch isn’t just for passive reporting, either. You can set up actions to carry out commands in response to certain triggers, including sending an alert email, launching a script, restarting Windows services and even rebooting an entire system.
For large support departments the free GrafCrunch web server is a final plus point, as this can drive a big, highly visible display of whatever metrics you want to keep an eye on. We used it to show real-time graphs of CPU, disk, memory and network usage for our critical Windows servers, and we’re pleased to note that the latest version fully supports Microsoft Edge.
AdRem’s NetCrunch has long been one of our favourite network monitoring tools, and the new features make it more versatile than ever. Its node-based licensing scheme keeps things affordable for SMBs, deployment is a swift 15-minute task, and the highly visual management console means you never need to worry about missing a network problem again. REQUIREMENTS Windows Server 2008 R2 upwards Options: yearly maintenance, 33% of initial price