NetFlow Traffic
Analyze Network Traffic Using NetFlow Monitoring
PRTG Network Monitor enables you to analyze NetFlow traffic. Paessler's powerful network monitoring solution includes support for NetFlow sensors, which read pre-aggregated traffic data from Cisco routers and switches. This gives you detailed data that can be used to analyze bandwidth consumption in your network: a NetFlow traffic analysis shows you which IP address, application or protocol consumes most bandwidth, and makes it easy to filter traffic data.
PRTG - More Than NetFlow Traffic Analysis
However, PRTG is not only a NetFlow traffic analyzer: the network server monitor also acquires bandwidth usage data using packet sniffing, WMI and SNMP. Those technologies are also included in the IP monitor freeware. The advantage of doing a NetFlow traffic analysis is that it provides a great level of detail, but puts only little load on the router and the machine running PRTG.
In addition to bandwidth and NetFlow traffic monitoring, PRTG can also be used for windows server monitoring: the software checks the availability of network devices, triggers an alarm if a downtime occurs or a certain threshold has been reached, monitors CPU load, temperature, free disk space, router packet loss, etc. More than 115 different sensor types make network and server monitoring really easy and help you to monitor network performance at all times.
The network monitor (for XP and later Windows editions) is available in two editions. For basic, free bandwidth tracking and availability monitoring, the Freeware Edition may be downloaded and used for personal and commercial use completely free of charge. For more advanced needs, including the NetFlow traffic sensors, licenses for the Commercial Editions start at $400 / €300.