Observer Expert

Observer Expert speeds network troubleshooting by proactively identifying network issues and offering immediate solutions. Pinpoint difficult problems through real-time or post-capture Expert analysis.

Observer Expert tracks applications, VoIP traffic, transactions and more across your LAN, wireless 802.1 a/b/g, gigabit, token ring, and FDDI networks. Observer Expert includes a 64-bit core to maximise 64-bit processing. A 32-bit version is also included.

With the Network Instruments’ Distributed Network Analysis architecture, (NI-DNA™), Observer is unique in the network analysis industry. It’s the only analyser built from a unified code set, offering scalability and seamless integration across the entire Observer product family. Network administrators need to only learn one interface to monitor across multiple topologies, locations, and technologies.

Have 570 Network Experts at Your Disposal

With Observer Expert network administrators can predict network bandwidth and response time impacts, track and solve application problems, view application session flows graphically, reconstruct data packets, and isolate transaction delay. Observer Expert is one of the most powerful and functional network analysers on the market. Key features are automatically included with Observer Expert:

• VoIP Analysis
• Application Analysis
• Expert Events
• Stream Reconstruction
• NetFlow Data Collection
• Server Analysis
• Wireless Experts

Observer Expert includes all the benefits of Observer Standard plus additional key features for identifying network issues and offering immediate solutions

Expert Events

Expert is about solving network problems efficiently and effectively. Observer Expert displays protocol and application problems in real time and also provides an effective means of discerning between application and network issues. It also includes over 570 Experts designed to isolate problems and suggest possible solutions for network problems.

Expert Event features:

• Local traffic is judged differently than WAN/Internet traffic
• No false readings
• Common services are tracked and organised
• Response performance is sorted and flagged by severity
• Tracks all port-based protocols for slow response and other issues
• Measures delay to differentiate between network and application problems

See Expert Event list:

• TCP
• UDP
• ICMP
• IPX
• NetBios
• Wireless
• VoIP
• NetBeui

Connection Dynamics

A unique feature to Observer, Connection Dynamics provides a graphical view of system conversations to allow for instant identification of long latency and response times. Retransmissions and lost packets are flagged in red for quick identification. Connection Dynamics is a simple way to easily pinpoint network impediments.

Expert VoIP Analysis

What other companies charge thousands for we’ve conveniently included in our Observer Expert system. But don’t discount our VoIP analysis—with over 70 VoIP-specific metrics it’s one of the most robust features within Observer. Monitor VoIP connections, save or play voice and video, gather actionable detail and diagnostics, gain high-level traffic summaries and much more.

Use the VoIP system to monitor at an aggregate level and drill down to optimise individual communication from one seamless interface.

Application Analysis

Observer Expert’s Application Analysis provides a way to track application communications to easily identify application problems. Obtain statistics on errors, monitor application response time, perform automatic server / application discovery, and obtain up to-the-minute application performance. Observer Expert eliminates the need to purchase a separate application monitoring system.

MPLS Analysis

For organisations moving to MPLS, use Observer to stay on top of the migration. Observer provides a detailed breakdown of your MPLS network so you can pinpoint MPLS problems and measure performance.

MPLS benefits:

• Report on performance before, during, and after the transition
• Isolate MPLS issues quickly
• Track varying MPLS priorities
• Scrutinise SLAs by creating MPLS-specific alarms
• Segment MPLS data by label, CoS (Class of Service), and embedded protocol type

SSL Decryption

Observer now provides the capability to decrypt Secure Socket Layer (SSL) data traversing the network. SSL is primarily used to secure Internet communications, but is also utilized in TCP ports and can transfer files using SFTP or SCP connections. Configure Observer with SSL certificates to decrypt secure data and troubleshoot problems by accessing packet-level detail.

MultiHop Analysis

MultiHop Analysis answers the critical question “Is it the access layer, the core, or my service provider…?” By isolating and identifying transaction problems, delay, and intermittent connectivity Observer Expert solves network issues caused by network congestion, fragmentation, and packet loss. Now MultiHop Analysis is automated—Observer can now start simultaneous packet captures from different network segments and then automatically synchronise the buffers to find delay and packet loss.

Stream Reconstruction

For enterprise administrators concerned with forensics, compliance, and security, Observer can take captured traffic and recreate communication in an easy-to-read format. Rebuild web pages (including images), reconstruct e-mails, documents, and instant messaging communication to gather hard evidence on network activity. Stream reconstruction can also help maintain corporate Internet usage policies, assist law enforcement, and contribute toward Sarbanes-Oxley compliance.