Network monitoring tools

[Zucarita9000]

Ok, so I've just finished our network for our new office: couple of servers, ups units, half a dozen switches, ap's, routers, gigabit backbone, NAS, the works.

The network has about 35 wired clients and a around 12 wireless, 4 network printers, and a few more devices. I'm in need of some sort of network monitoring tool, with a nice dashboard that'll give me information about every device in the network (using SNMP). The thing is, there are so many out there that is almost impossible to know which one is actually any good.

So, if you know about a good, reliable and simple to use software package, tell me about it. Thanks!

 

[jlazzaro]

Nagios

 

[cmetz]

Nagios - great if you're a hacker (in the positive sense) and/or if you automate a lot of the provisioning so you can automate the monitoring configs. Not very well documented and a PITA to get up and running, but once you get the hang of it, it gets the job done well
OpenNMS - haven't used it but trustworthy sources tell me it does the same job but is easier to set up than Nagios

 

[Stan]

Nagios is like smashing your head against a wall. If you have money to spend, get something like Whats Up Gold, GFI's Server Monitor, etc.

 

[OverWorkedTech]

Spend a little dough and check out IPmonitor. We have been happy with it. I agree, Nagios is great, But it is a pain to get it setup.

 

[jlazzaro]

hence, its free. im sorry, but whats up gold is the devil ;x

 

[Zucarita9000]

Whatsup Gold looks nice... why do you say it's the devil?