This article applies to PRTG Network Monitor 8.2 or later

Introducing a New Database Format with PRTG 8.2

PRTG uses its own database format to store monitoring data and other data, to ensure data access is as performant as possible. The old system (based on SQLite) was sufficient for small to medium installations, but for installations with thousands of sensors it could cause performance bottlenecks. As of PRTG version 8.2, the data format for log entries, Toplists, and ToDos is further improved.

You Benefit from It

This leads to a massive performance boost, especially for large installations that make massive use of Toplists, or where log files are viewed frequently in the web interface.

The new engine is up to 300 times faster when writing data and up to 100 times faster when reading data. Furthermore, the writing speed is not affected by the size of the database at all; you can now store a whole year of log data without affecting the performance—regardless of the size of your installation!

This is a major breakthrough! You will be amazed at how fast log data is displayed in the web interface when browsing through the logs of the system (main menu item Logs) or when viewing logs of a single monitoring object.

Automatic Converting May Take a While

After upgrading to version 8.2 or higher, during first core server service start up, PRTG will convert your existing data into the new database format. Depending on the size of the Log and ToDo database, this may take some time for the import. To give you a number, according to measurements in our labs, the import process takes about 1 minute per 10-50 MB of file size of Log Database.db (similar for ToDo Database.db). However, this is only needed once, at first startup after updating.

The conversion process for existing Toplist databases is different: After startup, PRTG will start converting your Toplist databases in the background, so after a while all historic Toplist databases will be visible in the sensors' Toplists tab. While converting on slow systems, you might notice that some of your current Toplists are missing, as conversion is given priority in case your server running PRTG cannot provide sufficient performance. In our labs conversion takes about 1 minute per 50 MB of the Toplist Database folder's total size.

PRTG will automatically back up the data files in the old format and delete them after 70 days.

Can I Revert to Old Method?

Due to the great advantages the new storage method brings, we will not support the old storage method in future. However, you can disable data conversion in order to avoid downtime during first startup, or to avoid background conversion of Toplists after startup. Using this option, historic data will not be available. For more details, please see below.

Disable Automatic Database Conversion

Modifying the Windows registry, you can disable the automatic conversion to the new database format which is performed on first startup of PRTG 8.2.

Note: Using the settings described below, your historic data for Logs, ToDos, and/or Toplists will no longer be accessible. PRTG will store new data in the new database format.

Caution: Please back up your system before manipulating the Windows registry!

Please perform the following steps before you update/upgrade to PRTG 8.2 or later.

Step 1

On the system running PRTG core server, please stop the core server Windows service. If you don't, your changes might not be saved. You can stop the service using the PRTG Server Administrator program (Start/Stop tab).

Step 2

• On the system running the PRTG core server, open the registry editor.

• For a 64-Bit Windows system, go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Paessler\PRTG Network Monitor\V8\Server\Core\

• For a 32-Bit Windows system, go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Paessler\PRTG Network Monitor\V8\Server\Core\

Note: If your current PRTG v8 was previously upgraded from PRTG v7, you will see V7 instead of V8 in both paths above.

Step 3

• You will find DWORD entries with the following names. If they do not exist (true for PRTG versions which haven't been updated for a while), please create them (right-click: New | DWORD Value):
  • todoraw
  • lograw
  • toplistraw
• For each database you do not want to be converted, set the value to 2 (values 0 or 1 will start conversion after update/upgrade). Data in non-converted databases will no longer be accessible.

Step 4

On the system running PRTG core server, please use the PRTG Server Administrator program (Start/Stop tab) to restart the core server Windows service.