6 tips for monitoring your LAN

What is LAN monitoring all about?

This is one of the basic activities that should be carried out in IT departments. It involves regularly checking the operation and status of the local network and detecting and reporting problems and failures. It allows the company to track and control network traffic. In LAN monitoring, it is also important to monitor network capacity and load to ensure efficient data flow and avoid network blockages. This makes it possible to prevent the occurrence of problems related to connection speed, lack of availability of particular services or data leakage.

Why monitor LANs?

Local Area Network (LAN) monitoring is an important aspect of many organizations’ operations. Below we have pointed out some of the most important reasons why networks should be monitored.

Quickly identify and resolve network problems

LAN monitoring makes it possible not only to quickly find the source of a network-related problem, but also to pinpoint its characteristics by continuously recording failures and incidents. This makes it possible to prepare a direct action plan and implement solutions immediately, ensuring high network stability.

Improving network performance

Monitoring a computer network can identify and remove performance-limiting areas of a network, resulting in better performance. It can include changing the settings of network protocols, adding additional switches or routers to the network or changing the way it is managed. This increases the speed and reliability of the network.

Protection against cyber attacks

This functionality makes it possible to prevent hacking attacks and other dangerous external activities that can damage the network or take control of it. Such measures minimize the risk of a cyber-attack and allow the network to be protected from its effects much earlier. However, protecting a network from cyber attacks requires constant security updates to increase its effectiveness.

Data security

By monitoring networks, an administrator is able to identify and prevent unauthorized data access or loss in real time. This process includes monitoring network traffic to detect and prevent potential threats as quickly as possible.

Increase in work efficiency

By monitoring network components such as computers, routers, switches and other devices, the administrator can solve network resource availability problems without much effort. This significantly increases the efficiency and productivity of his work. By streamlining the network management process, IT departments can therefore focus on more important tasks related to the implementation of key IT projects.

Network connection monitoring software

To be able to effectively monitor the networks in an organization, it becomes necessary to take advantage of the various tools and technologies available on the market, such as network management systems or specialized network monitoring software. But which one should you choose in order to be sure that LAN monitoring will be done correctly? Check out 6 tips to help you make a good decision.

1. Identify your needs – before starting your search for the right network connection monitoring program, consider what features are most important to you and what kind of information you want to obtain. This will allow you to narrow the field of choices and find the program that best meets your needs.

2. Note the user interface – make sure the program has a user-friendly interface that is easy to use and allows you to quickly get the information you need.

3. Make sure the program allows you to monitor network traffic – verify that the system allows you to track network traffic, taking into account data transfer, number of packets and transmission speed.
4. Check if the system has failure alerts – pay attention to the available options for receiving notifications about possible failures or problems with the network.

5. Make sure the program allows integration with other tools – this issue concerns cooperation with tools that are dedicated to computer network management or external management systems.

6. Note the ability to generate reports – make sure that the program you choose allows you to generate reports on the status of the entire LAN and the performance of individual network devices with the given range of IP addresses.