Calculating Network Backbone Bandwidth Requirements
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When you MSP folks go into an environment tasked with upgrading the network to be better, faster, stronger what tools and solutions (besides experience) do you use to determine what products would make the best impact?
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You mean besides the ones they have back end deals with for selling?
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@dashrender said in Calculating Network Backbone Bandwidth Requirements:
You mean besides the ones they have back end deals with for selling?
Uh yeah sure. I was more specifically looking for software monitoring solutions to see how "healthy" the network is.
If that makes sense.
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A better way to ask your question might be - what tools do you use to find the current state of the network? This way we aren't worried about a solution or products, but instead trying to determine if there even is a real issue.
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@dashrender ok. What tools do you use to find the current state of the network?
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Any kind of bandwidth graphing tool coughZabbix*cough that will let you monitor the network switches for bandwidth, packet loss, and ping times.
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@dafyre said in Calculating Network Backbone Bandwidth Requirements:
Any kind of bandwidth graphing tool coughZabbix*cough that will let you monitor the network switches for bandwidth, packet loss, and ping times.
So much effort to get that going again. . . didn't yourself or @JaredBusch write a guide on standing Zabbix up?
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@dustinb3403 said in Calculating Network Backbone Bandwidth Requirements:
@dafyre said in Calculating Network Backbone Bandwidth Requirements:
Any kind of bandwidth graphing tool coughZabbix*cough that will let you monitor the network switches for bandwidth, packet loss, and ping times.
So much effort to get that going again. . . didn't yourself or @JaredBusch write a guide on standing Zabbix up?
@JaredBusch wrote the easy to follow one.
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No tools needed most of the time. Your backbone needs to be upgraded when the existing backbone is saturated to the point of impacting system performance. Human observation and the reporting from your existing switches will tell you that.
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If you only have dumb backbone components, then it is just intuition.
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@scottalanmiller said in Calculating Network Backbone Bandwidth Requirements:
If you only have dumb backbone components, then it is just intuition.
Yeah, this is what I have relied upon mostly.
Had a location that had a broadcast storm whenever the doc was in the office. Turned out the NIC on his PC had failed and was bringing the network to its knees.
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@dustinb3403 said in Calculating Network Backbone Bandwidth Requirements:
@dafyre said in Calculating Network Backbone Bandwidth Requirements:
Any kind of bandwidth graphing tool coughZabbix*cough that will let you monitor the network switches for bandwidth, packet loss, and ping times.
So much effort to get that going again. . . didn't yourself or @JaredBusch write a guide on standing Zabbix up?
Not really that much effort. It's quick to setup and you can probably find an snmp template for your switches.
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It's a Zabbix kind of day around here.
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As a MSP, when you walk in and see unmanaged switches under desks, you kind of know what needs to happen.
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Last week I was onsite and uncovered a 100 Mb switch. The bonus was the 20 year old print controller hooked to it.
