In the classic break-fix world, resellers often relied on manual interpretations of internal system logs or simply waited for something to break. Fast forward to present-day MSPs, and active network monitoring is now the name of the game for managed IT support. MSPs now have the ability to know exactly if everything is working properly.
Key players in the market include Paessler AG. The company's flagship offering, PRTG Network Monitor, allows IT professionals to monitor the health and performance of their infrastructure. The system includes customizable dashboards that help sysadmins see the pieces of the puzzle they care the most about -- and alert them when problems arise.
HP Enterprise Server Monitoring
To further that effort, Paessler has unveiled sensors for HP Enterprise servers. The result? PRTG Network Monitor can see everything from system health to granular details like the RPMs of fans in specific servers
Using these sensors IT managers can monitor:
- Performance of HPE ProLiant servers: Quickly gauge the CPU and memory loads being placed on HPE ProLiant servers. Sensors can monitor the logical disk, memory controller, network interface, physical disk and system health.
- HPE BladeSystems: PRTG delivers real-time visibility over HPE BladeSystems, including blades and enclosures. Notably, PRTG allows IT to plan virtualization efforts by seeing usual CPU and memory load, disk usage, and network usage.
MSPs can also create custom sensors to monitor anything that ties into a network, Paessler claims.
It's great to see a monitoring platform so tightly integrated with a hardware partner like HPE, which has strong server market share.
However, one has to wonder if manufacturers will decide to cut out the middleman and build their own sensors inside their equipment. On the downside, the approach would force customers into specific monitoring platforms. But the built-in sensors could also contain APIs for third-party RMM integrations. I'd prefer that open approach for the networks I manage.
