PRTG Traffic Grapher

PRTG Traffic Grapher is an application designed for system administrators who need to monitor their network in order to assess speed and reliability. This monitoring application focuses mainly on bandwidth usage, but it can also display readings for other parameters, such as memory and CPU utilization.

The installation process is rather smooth and it only prompts you to choose whether to install the Watchdog service or not. The interface is simple and offers easy access to options. At the first run, you can use the 'How to get started' section to configure the application step by step.

What you have to do next is to setup a new sensor to monitor. The built-in wizard guides you through the whole process. Depending on your network configuration, you can choose one of the four data acquisition methods that this application offers: SNMP (Simple Network Management Protocol); Packet Sniffing, NetFlow Collector Protocol or Latency Monitoring.

Even if you do not know which method is suitable for your network, you don't have to worry, as the wizard gives you detailed information about each one of them. You can use the network discovery wizard to let the program discover and create the SNMP connection.

The next steps of the configuration process depend on your choices. For example, choosing the Packet Sniffing options leads to setting a filter for data monitoring and the desired protocols.

The actual monitoring process splits the main window into multiple panes, where you can view the sensor list and the corresponding live data stream graph. The traffic tables contain data for the last day, month, year, as well as the top traffic consumers. Scheduling options are also available.

Not only can you configure and view live data regarding the monitored sensors, but you can also create usage reports, send them by email or save them for later reference. Custom graphs or tables can also be generated.

Although no longer supported by the developer in its initial form, PRTG Traffic Grapher remains a complete network monitoring application. It works with most network devices and supervises bandwidth consumption and traffic variations with the purpose of better network management.