ISPPlanet • Budget Network Management System Series - Wrap-Up

Product Support and Documentation
Product documentation varied greatly, from brief on-line help files to half-inch bound books. It could have been the hard copy, but we don't think so—Ipswitch and CastleRock provided the most user-friendly docs.

Vendor	ACE*COMM	MediaHouse	SNMP ToolChest Company	MG-SOFT	Ipswitch	Castle Rock Computing
Product	NetPlus AutoManage	ipMonitor	SNMP ToolChest	MIB Browser NetInspector LITE	WhatsUp Gold	SNMPc
Free Support	Email	Phone/Email60 days	Email	Phone/Email/Fax	Phone 60 Days Email	Phone/Email60 days
Support Contract	N/A	Unknown	N/A	N/A	$345 / year	$250 / year
Our Experience	Excellent	Did not use	Quick Turn-Around	Good	Slow Turn-Around	Excellent
Documentation	BasicElectronic	ThoroughElectronic	BasicElectronic	ThoroughElectronic	ThoroughHardcopy	ThoroughHardcopy

Technical Support can be spotty for entry-level products: some small vendors are highly responsive, others overwhelmed. We summarize our own experiences in the table above. ACE*COMM, SNMP ToolChest, and MG-SOFT put no end date on support for purchased products. Ipswitch and CastleRock sell extended warranty support after 60 days. We did not use MediaHouse support during our evaluation—the few problems we encountered were remedied with web site support. CastleRock includes personalized support site access for the first 60 days and to extended warranty users thereafter.

Overall Assessment
We found something admirable in each product. At $149, NetPlus AutoManage is rock-bottom inexpensive—a great deal if you just want to experiment with SNMP management. For those on a budget with an itch to script, SNMP ToolChest ($399) can expand your suite of monitoring tools. But don't expect polished shrink-wrap packaging from either.

Several products in this series provide service-level monitoring. Two that stand above the rest are WhatsUp Gold and ipMonitor. If the focus of this series were server monitoring, we'd give the nod to ipMonitor. This product does a wonderful job of monitoring services, individually and in groups. But the focus of this series is on network management, using SNMP—and these are not ipMonitor strengths.

The MG-SOFT MIB Browser/NetInspector duo has an extensible architecture and will benefit from the new Internet Plug-In for service-level monitoring. Until then, we consider this product a device-level SNMP network manager. In that space, we find WhatsUp Gold and SNMPc easier to use.

WhatsUp Gold has a lot going it for it. We like the way it understands and leverages network relationships for more efficient discovery and polling. The included web interface provides remote access, a key ingredient absent in NetInspector and SNMPc entry-level products.

But when it comes down to it, an SNMP manager should be able to do more than just monitor. For this reason, we find SNMPc the strongest network manager of the bunch. ISPs can use SNMPc Workgroup Edition to query, monitor, and control up to 1,000 devices, at 50 polls per second. If the Workgroup Edition included remote access, we would be happier. But, at $895, SNMPc is a solid entry-level network management system with features aplenty.

Pt. 1: Introduction / What We Tested	Pt. 5: Device Control
Pt. 2: Installation & Setup	Pt. 6: Network Montoring & Alerts
Pt. 3: Network Discovery	Pt. 7: Reporting
Pt. 4: SNMP Browse and Query	Pt. 8: Product Support / Overall Evaluation