Easy to use and inexpensive, puts professional network management within reach of every business

London, UK, 4 December 2003 – GFI today introduced GFI Network Server Monitor, a tool that automatically monitors the network and servers for failures, and allows administrators to identify and fix issues before users report them. Alerts can be sent by email, pager or SMS. Actions, such as rebooting a machine, restarting a service or running a script, can be done automatically. GFI Network Server Monitor is easy to set up and use, and is competitively priced.

Easier to use than traditional network monitoring products
Although there are several network monitoring tools on the market, GFI Network Server Monitor stands out because of its ease of use; its intuitive rules interface makes monitoring a network child’s play. With GFI Network Server Monitor, administrators can monitor their network within an hour of installing it. By comparison, conventional network monitoring programs are complex to install and have a steep learning curve.

Competitively priced
A further difference in other network monitoring/management products is that they are traditionally rather expensive. For example, Microsoft Operations Manager costs US$395 per monitored processor. By contrast, GFI Network Server Monitor costs US$699 for unlimited monitoring of all workstations and servers (independent of the number of processors) in a network; a five-server monitoring license costs US$375.

Automatically sends alerts via email/pager/SMS and takes corrective action
When it detects a failure, GFI Network Server Monitor can send alerts via SMS, pager, email or a network message. After an unexpected condition has occurred, GFI Network Server Monitor can automatically correct the problem by restarting a service (or multiple services) upon failure; rebooting a server; or launching an executable, batch job or VBScript.

Includes out-of-the-box checks to monitor all aspects of a network
GFI Network Server Monitor includes checks for:
Exchange Server 2000/2003 – Checks the status of an Exchange Server by monitoring critical Exchange services and performance counters (Information Store, mailboxes, SMTP service, etc)
All popular database servers (SQL/ORACLE/ODBC) - Natively checks the availability of all leading database applications, including Microsoft SQL Server, Oracle and others via OBDC
HTTP, FTP, SMTP, POP3, IMAP servers – Checks for availability and ensures that the servers are responding correctly
Windows servers and workstations, UNIX/Linux and Novell – Monitors Windows, UNIX/Linux and Novell platforms
Processes, services and CPU usage – Enables the checking of critical processes, services and CPU usage on local and remote computers
Users, groups and other Active Directory information – Monitors Active Directory information such as group membership of the domain admins group, and the addition of new members; also checks user accounts (locked out, disabled, etc), computer accounts and so on
Remote event logs – Scans Windows event logs on local or remote computers and looks for specific event sources, categories and IDs, as well as for patterns in the event description
SNMP devices – Monitors all devices that support SNMP, such as routers, switches and wireless access points
Disk and file – Performs directory size and disk space monitoring, checks physical hard disk status and authenticates file size and file existence.

Custom monitor functions using VBscript and RSH
Although GFI Network Server Monitor includes an extensive set of default monitoring functions, custom checks can be added by writing a VBscript (Windows) or a RSH shell script (UNIX). From VBscript, WMI and ADSI functions can be used. WMI is an interface to a broad range of hardware/software/OS-related properties of a computer, allowing users to perform almost any check. ADSI is an interface to Active Directory. The GFI Network Server Monitor website lists a number of sample scripts, and others are continuously added to the site (more information is available at http://www.gfi.com/nsm/scripting/).

Pricing and availability
GFI Network Server Monitor is available from distributors around the world or online at the GFI website (http://www.gfi.com). Pricing begins at US$375 to monitor five servers. For more product information, visit http://www.gfi.com/nsm/.