Specifications

© 2006 Cisco Systems, Inc.
All rights reserved.
Product Features 2-3
NAM / Traffic Analyzer v3.5 Tutorial
© 2006 Cisco Systems, Inc. All rights reserved.
Product Features 2-3
NAM / Traffic Analyzer v3.5 Tutorial
Network Monitoring Using NAMs
Overview
Network Monitoring Using NAMs
Overview
NAM-Embedded Traffic Analyzer
0 ms 50ms 100ms 150 ms 200ms 250ms 300ms 350ms 400ms
RMON
MIB
SMON
MIB
DSMON
MIB
Voice
Analysis
ART
MIB
FTP
FTP
Multicast
HTTP
BPDU
FTP
Multicast
Ethernet Header
IP Header
TCP Header
Ethernet
FTP Data
Data Source
The Data the NAM Collects
What does the NAM collect? All the wealth in network analysis is contained in the packets that traverse the
network, and information about the packets are what the NAM collects. This offers us the benefit of seeing
and measuring traffic by the smallest details stored in the packets—its Layer 2, 3, and 4 headers—and
where it can also be measured by time. Capturing data at the source, the switch, also enables us to see the
participation of each packet in network activities, such as VLANs, MPLS, and voice calls.
However, the ability to collect packet information at the source alone does not give us the ability to analyze it
from different perspectives, those of VLANs, voice, or quality of service. Those abilities have been added
through the implementation of standard and proprietary monitoring specifications such as RMON, SMON,
ART MIB, DSMON, and Detailed Call Records. These MIBs and VoIP constructs enable us to analyze the
packets through the “eyes” that these MIBs offer, giving us more ways to look at each packet. As you can
see, the ability to monitor your network is expanded considerably when you can monitor at the source
combined with powerful analysis capabilities.
The various reports created by the NAM Traffic Analyzer software will be detailed and explained later in this
chapter when describing the use of the Traffic Analysis software.