Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

How can I order Paessler products by credit card?

We recommend ordering online and paying with your credit card because this is the fastest option! To do so please visit the Paessler Software Store, choose a product and click the "Add To Cart" button. Fill out the upcoming form, choose payment method "credit card" and follow the instructions. Your card will be charged immediately and you will then receive an invoice and your license key by email in a few minutes.

How can I order if I can not or do not want to pay with a credit card?

If you wish to order online and pay by bank transfer or check, please visit the Software Store homepage, choose a product and click the "Add To Cart" button. Fill out the upcoming form, choose the desired payment method, and follow the instructions. You will receive an invoice by email. Please pay this invoice to the Paessler bank account or send a check over the amount as stated on the invoice.

Important: We will send you your license key as soon as the payment is received, so it can take several days to receive the license key due to the time it takes to transfer the money to our account.

How can I order by purchase order?

We accept purchase orders from corporate customers and government agencies only. We recommend to add the requested products to the shopping cart of our webshop and then follow the instructions. Choose purchase order as payment method and print out the order form. Then send or fax your purchase order to:

Paessler AG
Burgschmietstrasse 10
90419 Nuremberg
Germany

Fax
Germany: +49 911 309 3064
USA: +1 914 462 3255

Important: Please supply the following information with your purchase order, so we can process your order quickly:

• Official order by fax or letter with the letterhead of the company/ organization.
• Authorized signature.
• E-mail address for electronic delivery.
• Product name and product ID (and if you wish to have the software delivered on CD-ROM, plus $49.95 incl. shipping).
• Correct unit price and also the correct total price.
• Coupon code (e.g. for an upgrade).
• The company name the software shall be licensed to.

How can I order by fax?

Please visit the Software Store homepage, choose a product, and click the "Add To Cart" button. Fill in your contact data on the following page and choose "Purchase Order" as payment option and follow the instructions.

Please note, that we can only accept fax orders from corporates or government agencies, but not from private persons.

How can I order from a reseller in my country?

To make your purchase of our products as seamless as possible, Paessler partners with software companies from all over the world. This partner network makes it easy for you to find out more about Paessler products and to purchase your license locally. Please find your nearest partner in our Worldwide Partner Network.

How can I upgrade from an older version to the current version of a product?

In our Support Center we explain how we handle upgrades and updates.

You can also visit the Paessler Update Center and login with your e-mail address you used during the purchase to receive all promotional offers and upgrades, which apply to you.

If I buy one edition (e.g. Professional) now, can I later upgrade to a higher edition (e.g. Enterprise)?

Yes, you can always upgrade to higher edition licenses within one product family at the price difference of the two licenses (at time of the new purchase). To receive a coupon code for your discounted upgrade order, please login to our Update Center or write to sales@paessler.com stating the license you are using now, which license you want to upgrade to, and, if available, the order number of your original purchase.

Is there a money back guarantee?

We are so confident that you'll be delighted with our software that we make ordering our software totally risk-free, with our 30-day Risk Free Unconditional Money-Back Guarantee! That's right - if you should not be satisfied with our software for any reason whatsoever, just let us know within 30 days of purchase and we will refund your order in full.

Are Maintenance, Support, and Updates included in the list prices?

When purchasing a license you receive 12 months of Software Maintenance.

During the time of this Software Maintenance...

• ...you can log in to download the latest version for free at any time (this includes all bugfixes and all new versions of the product that you have purchased).
• ...you are entitled to receive priority email support via our support-ticket system.
• ...you can log in to re-request your license key for free at any time.

The Software Maintenance can be renewed after one year. The price will be 25% of the current list price of the original license, in effect when the renewal is ordered. For your convenience, we will give you advance notification by e-mail before your maintenance plan expires.

Please note that after expiration, you will no longer be able to download the software or new versions from our website. When you extend your Software Maintenance plan we sum up the total maintenance packages and calculate the duration from the time of the initial purchase of the license on.
In the case of support issues, priority is always given to customers with maintenance contracts.

How do I receive the software?

We deliver electronically (ESD). That means that you will receive an e-mail with your license key(s) and the download URL(s).

What is the difference between the Enterprise Site License and the Enterprise Unlimited License of PRTG Network Monitor?

The Enterprise Unlimited license allows you to set up unlimited sensors. It comes with 30 probes and one core server installation on one computer. It is the ideal license for large networks and also allows the monitoring of up to 30 locally distributed networks.

The Enterprise Unlimited SITE License of PRTG also allows you to set up an unlimited number of sensors. Beyond that the SITE license enables an unlimited number of probes (local and remote) and also multiple installations of the core server within one site (for a definition of site please see our license terms and conditions).

The Enterprise Unlimited SITE license is ideal for MSPs or companies with multiple sites or very large networks. It enables you to monitor as many networks / sites as you want to with one central installation / license of PRTG Network Monitor.

Where can I find the license terms and conditions?

You can find our detailed license terms and conditions here.

Do you have a question that is not answered here?

If you have questions not answered here, please write to sales@paessler.com. We would be happy to help.

What is the difference between the PRTG Network Monitor licenses?

Licenses of PRTG differ by three parameters:
the maximum number of Sensors, Probes and xFlow/NetFlow Sensors.

* Additional xFlow/NetFlow sensors can be purchased as add-on
** The Enterprise Site License allows multiple installations of the core server within one network.

What counts as a sensor?

The licensing options are based on the number of sensors (not on the number of devices or IPs). We define one (1) sensor as any particular, individual monitoring entity. One sensor monitors one network service, one URL, one network connection, one port of a switch, one NetFlow export stream, one CPU load, one disk drive, etc. Please have a look at the list of supported sensor types. Monitoring one item from this list counts as one sensor.

What is the difference between xFlow/NetFlow sensors (PRTG 7) and NetFlow collectors (PRTG 6)?

PRTG Traffic Grapher 6 uses NetFlow collectors for monitoring Cisco devices using the NetFlow protocol. One NetFlow collector for each device to be monitored. Additionally it needs one PRTG standard sensor for each parameter to be monitored at that device. PRTG 6 NetFlow collectors support NetFlow 5.

PRTG Network Monitor 7 works with xFlow/NetFlow sensors. Each xFlow/NetFlow sensor counts as one sensor against the overall sensor count available under PRTG. However, each xFlow/NetFlow sensor can monitor an individual device (as such also functioning as a NetFlow collector).

Depending on the type of sensor defined, the sensor(s) in case can be broken down to display further parameters. This is particularly useful in conjunction with Custom NetFlow sensors which offer the ability to define individual filter and channel parameters.

PRTG 7 xFlow/NetFlow sensors support NetFlow 5, NetFlow 9, and sFlow.

See these links for more information about the use of customer sensors with PRTG Network Monitor 7:
http://www.paessler.com/support/kb/prtg7/rules_custom_sensors
http://www.paessler.com/support/kb/prtg7/channel_custom_sensors

With the update from PRTG 6 to PRTG 7 one PRTG 6 NetFlow Collector is transferred into 5 xFlow/NetFlow sensors.

How many sensors can I monitor using PRTG Network Monitor?

PRTG has rather low hardware requirements compared to similar other products. A standard office PC or server (built 2007 or later) can easily monitor 1.000 sensors and much more (some restrictions apply).

Please see "Planning large installations of PRTG Network Monitor" in the knowledgebase.

Does PRTG support reporting?

PRTG is able to create (and/or store) daily/weekly/monthly/annually reports for selected sensors. You can configure the reports to be sent to you via email in PDFs, or have them stored on the hard-drive. Additionally you can run a report interactively in the web browser (in HTML format). You also can have the reports generated on a schedule, e.g. every Monday. There are various templates available which include different sets of data tables and graphs. Please see the "In-Depth Reporting" section in the feature list.

Does PRTG support notifications and alarms?

PRTG offers several means of notifications. The most often used means are sending emails or SMS, starting an executable file, sending SYSLog-messages, playing sounds or adding entries to the Windows Event log, among others. Furthermore you can configure notifications on schedule, so that you (or your staff) won't alerted up in the middle of the night for failures of less important servers. You can define numerous conditions for notifications, not only if a sensor is down, also of course if the traffic on a certain interface hits a limit over a certain time, and much more.

Please see the "Flexible Alerting" section in the feature list.

Does PRTG support multiple user accounts and user rights?

There are various account types in PRTG, e.g. "Read-Only" users and "Read/Write"-Users. Furthermore, you can configure the access rights for every group/device/sensor to control which users are allowed to see or edit it. These settings are automatically inherited in the device-tree, so that it is not necessary to edit the access rights of every sensor individually.

How can I monitor which user, PC, server in my network creates how much traffic and what type of traffic?

There is no simple answer to this question. The approach depends completely on the setup and topology of your network as well as the software and hardware used. Please have a look at the following article: How to set up traffic monitoring with PRTG for various infrastructures.

Can I monitor multiple locations with one license of PRTG Network Monitor?

Yes, you can. PRTG Network Monitor consists of two parts: the core server and the remote probes. The probes monitor the network and send the data to the core server. The core server analyzes the data and publishes it. All PRTG license allows you to set multiple probes without extra cost (See above for the number of probes per license: "What is the difference between the PRTG network Monitor licenses?").

More about multiple and remote probes.

Can I keep my monitoring configuration while upgrading from Freeware or Trial to one of the Commercial Editions?

Yes, you can keep all configured sensors, notifications, dependencies and everything else. If you want to upgrade from the Freeware or Trial Edition to the Commercial Edition after a purchase, simply download the commercial installer from the Paessler Website and install it on top of your existing installation. If you are not asked for your license key during the setup, please use the "PRTG Server Administrator" afterwards, to enter your registered Name and License key in the tab "License".

Do I need PRTG Traffic Grapher or PRTG Network Monitor?

PRTG Network Monitor 7 is our strategic core product and our most powerful monitoring solution ever. It has replaced PRTG 6 and IPCheck 5 in June 2008. For legacy projects PRTG 6 is still available, but will not be developed any further. Support for PRTG 6 will be provided until June 2010. Please note that you will receive a download for both products, regardless which one you purchase. One license key will unlock both version 6 and version 7.

Which license will be applicable when upgrading my IPCheck 5 / PRTG 6 license?

Upgrade for PRTG Traffic Grapher
The smallest license of PRTG 6 - the PRTG Pro 25 - will no longer be offered for PRTG Network Monitor. In exchange the freeware license was expanded to 10 sensors. PRTG Traffic Grapher Pro 25 licenses will be upgraded to the Pro 100 license for free.

Upgrade from IPCheck Server Monitor

As an user of IPCheck Server Monitor with active maintenance contract you can upgrade your installation to PRTG Network Monitor for free. As of the final release of PRTG Network Monitor you can download the new software at your personal service center. Here, you can also renew the maintenance for your IPCheck license. Since the licensing model of PRTG Network Monitor differs from the licensing model of IPCheck Server Monitor, we implemented an upgrade path. Many customers will benefit from the upgrade not only by having more features but also by having more sensors. For details see the table below:

PRTG Network Monitor has no user limitations, as such you can set up as many users as you need.

Do I need the Freeware Edition of PRTG or one of the Commercial Editions?

The Freeware Edition is free for personal and commercial use but is limited to monitoring only up to 10 sensors (no NetFlow support). If you want to monitor more sensors or want to use Netflow based monitoring you must purchase one of the commercial editions. The commercial editions offer the following added features (depending on the edition):

• More devices and more ports/interfaces can be monitored
• Cisco Netflow Collectors can be set up (NetFlow collector as add-on required)

Do I need PRTG Traffic Grapher or PRTG Network Monitor?

PRTG Network Monitor 7 is our strategic core product and our most powerful monitoring solution ever. It has replaced PRTG 6 and IPCheck 5 in June 2008. For legacy projects PRTG 6 is still available, but will not be developed any further. Support for PRTG 6 will be provided until June 2010. Please note that you will receive a download for both products, regardless which one you purchase. One license key will unlock both version 6 and version 7.

How does PRTG Traffic Grapher work?

For network usage and bandwidth monitoring PRTG Traffic Grapher supports three methods to acquire the data:

• It can log the amount of data flowing in and out of SNMP enabled network components using the "Internet MIB-2" standard
• It can inspect all data packets passing a computer's network card ("packet sniffing")
• It can use bandwidth usage data sent by Cisco routers using the Netflow protocol (V5)

Can I monitor the bandwidth usage of different protocols?

Yes, using the Packet Sniffer or Netflow based monitoring you can differentiate the traffic by protocol, IP addresses and MAC addresses.

Can I monitor the traffic of several websites running on one machine?

Yes, using the Packet Sniffer or Netflow based monitoring you can differentiate the traffic by protocol, IP addresses and MAC addresses. But: If several websites share one common IP address PRTG is not able to classify the bandwidth usage between them.

Can I monitor the traffic of several computers using one leased line?

Yes, using the Packet Sniffer or Netflow based monitoring you can differentiate the traffic by protocol, IP addresses and MAC addresses.

Can I monitor the individual bandwidth usage of each port of my router?

Yes, using the SNMP monitoring you can monitor the traffic on each single port of your router (or PC, server, etc.) regardless of IP addresses and/or protocols used.

What counts as a sensor?

The licensing options are based on the number of sensors. Each of the following items counts as one sensor:

• SNMP monitoring of traffic/bandwidth on one port of any device (e.g. switch, firewall, server) using the MIB2 standard (incoming and outgoing traffic count as one sensor)
• Monitoring errors/min, unicast packets/s, non-unicast packets/s on one port of a device via SNMP using the MIB2 standard (incoming and outgoing readings count as one sensor)
• Monitoring one other system parameter via SNMP (e.g. CPU, diskspace etc.) that is accessible via one OID value
• Monitoring traffic going through one local network card (NIC) via Packet Sniffing. If you use filtering then each set of filters counts as one sensor.
• Monitoring of one stream of data traffic via Netflow Monitoring. If you use filtering then each filterset counts as one sensor.

The number of actual hardware devices is not taken into account at all, only the number of sensors. For the "unlimited licenses" the number of sensors that can be monitored is not programmatically limited by the software itself, but may be limited by your software, hardware and network. See Planning large installations of PRTG Traffic Grapher.

How many sensors can I monitor using PRTG Traffic Grapher?

Please see "Planning large installations of PRTG Traffic Grapher" on the Knowledge Base.

Edition Comparison

What are the benefits of using this tool?

The simplicity of Webserver Stress Tool means any webmaster, programmer, or administrator of a web site can test a webserver/web application under heavy load in real-time. This provides unparalleled ability to quickly adjust webserver configurations for optimal performance (i.e. when a new feature or content is launched).

How long does it take to learn the usage?

Any webmaster or network administrator can use this web testing tool with little guidance. If you want to see how simple it is to assess your webserver using Webserver Stress Tool please have a look at the manual.

How long does it take to install and be running?

After running the standard installer it takes a few minutes to configure and start a test. Several customers reported to us that they found a long searched bug in their software within 15 minutes after ordering and installing Webserver Stress Tool.

What support is available?

Please check our support pages.

What documentation is provided?

Paessler provides a detailed, printable Adobe Acrobat help manual that is both included in the software and downloadable from this website. Webserver Stress Tool also features the same support content integrated into a helpfile.

What is the license model for Webserver Stress Tool?

Please see at the bottom of the order page.

Can I meet with users who are achieving real benefits using this tool?

On our case study page you can find several case studies for Webserver Stress Tool.

What influence do tool users have on future development of the tool?

We always try to implement suggestions and feature requests from our end users. It is this invaluable input that will continue to make Webserver Stress Test a leading, cost-effective tool for businesses to maximize webserver technologies. Paessler also provides other custom programming upon request.

What does this tool do?

Webserver Stress Tool simulates lots of users by sending http-requests to a webserver. It works with almost any server based technology like asp, jsp, cfm, or java. Many different load patterns can be generated with this web testing tool.

How long does it take to install and be running?

After running the standard installer it takes a few minutes to configure and start a test. Several customers reported to us that they found a long searched bug in their software within 15 minutes after ordering and installing Webserver Stress Tool.

What does this tool not do?

This web testing tool does not simulate the client based processes (e.g. javascripts or java applets running inside the webbrowser). It simulates the HTTP requests (for webpages, HTML, images, frames, etc.) sent by a computer a user uses to access a website.

Nevertheless websites using JavaScript/Java can usually be tested. Since most client side scripts create nothing else but HTTP requests, it is still possible to test such web sites. You can record the URLs using the included URL recorder for the test or you can write your own script with the URLs to test.

What volume and throughput can the tool cope with?

Webserver Stress Tool simulates anything between 1 and 10.000 users. The maximum number of simultaneous users that can be simulated successfully depends on the power of the client machine Webserver Stress Tool runs on. E.g. we have tested up to 10.000 users on a Xeon 2.8 Ghz machine with hyperthreading.

What environment is needed to run this tool?

Webserver Stress Tool runs under Windows 2000/XP/2003/Vista/7/2008. The target webservers can be of any operating system.

How much disk space and RAM does it use?

5-10 MB of disk space plus space for the log files (can be several MB) and about 100 kb of RAM per simulated user.

Why does Webserver Stress Tool show errors when I run it against my server? When I access the website with my browser I doesn't see errors.

In most cases when people write us about errors when using Webserver Stress Tool, they have discovered exactly what Webserver Stress Tool is designed to discover: Problems with scripts or webservers that crash or fail when multiple users access it simultaneously. You can be quite sure that you have a server problem if you get errors other than "timeout" and "404". For example the error code 500 (internal server error) is never generated by Webserver Stress Tool but by the webserver.

Here are some tips:

• Run the test with just one user, increase the number of users step by step. If that works with one or a few users without errors it is almost certain that your website has a problem with simultaneous users
• Enable Write Detailed and User Logs and Write Headers to Log and review the user logfiles for hints about the problem
• Enable Save All HTML files and review the resulting webpages
• Review the webserver's or the application's error log file