PRTG Traffic Grapher is an easy to use Windows application for monitoring and classifying bandwidth usage.
 It provides system administrators with live readings and long-term usage trends for their network devices. PRTG is mainly used for bandwidth usage monitoring, but may also be used to monitor many other aspects of a network such as memory and CPU utilization.
With PRTG Traffic Grapher the user receives comprehensive bandwidth and network usage data that helps to optimize the efficiency of the network. Understanding bandwidth and resource consumption is the key to better network management: Avoid bandwidth and server performance bottlenecks; Find out what applications or what servers use up your bandwidth; Deliver better quality of service to your users by being proactive; Reduce costs by buying bandwidth and hardware according to actual load.
The Freeware Edition of PRTG Traffic Grapher is completely free for personal and commercial use and may be downloaded for free. PRTG Traffic Grapher is designed to run on a Windows machine in your network for 24 hours every day, and constantly records the network usage parameters.
The recorded data is stored in an internal database for later reference. Using an easy to use Windows interface you can configure the monitored sensors as well as create usage reports. For remote access PRTG Traffic Grapher comes with a built-in web server to provide access to graphs and tables. All common methods for network usage data acquisition are supported: SNMP: Simple Network Management Protocol is the basic method of gathering bandwidth and network usage data. It can be used to monitor bandwidth usage of routers and switches port-by-port as well as device readings like memory, CPU load etc.
Packet Sniffing: With its built-in Packet Sniffer PRTG can inspect all network data packets passing the network card to calculate the bandwidth usage. NetFlow: The NetFlow protocol is supported by most Cisco routers to measure bandwidth usage.

Note:
If you want to use more that 3 sensors you may purchase the Professional or Enterprise Editions of Paessler Router Traffic
If you want to use more that 3 sensors you may purchase the Professional or Enterprise Editions of Paessler Router Traffic

· Reliable network monitoring used by more than 100.000 users every day
· Supports data acquisition via SNMP, packet sniffing or Netflow protocol
· Classifies network traffic by IP address, protocol and other parameters
· Works with most switches, routers, firewalls, and other network devices
· Easy installation with a few clicks on Windows 2000/XP/2003
· Monitoring engine is capable of monitoring up to several thousand sensors
· A Freeware Edition is available for smaller networks and SOHOs
· Supported Data Acquisition Methods
Depending on your infrastructure you can monitor the usage of your network using different methods supported by PRTG Traffic Grapher. You can choose between four common methods for (bandwidth) monitoring:
· SNMP: Simple Network Management Protocol is the basic method of gathering bandwidth and network usage data. It can be used to monitor bandwidth usage of routers and switches port-by-port as well as device readings like memory, CPU load etc. Supports SNMP Version 1, 2c and 3.
· Packet Sniffing: The Packet Sniffer inspects all network data packets passing the PC's network card(s) and is able to classify network traffic by IP address, protocol and other parameters
· Netflow: The Netflow protocol is supported by most Cisco routers to measure bandwidth usage. Although being the most complex type to set up it is also the most powerful method suitable for high traffic networks and can also classify network traffic by IP address, protocol and other parameters.
· Latency: Monitoring performance of a data line or a device by measuring PING times
· Note: Only with packet sniffer and netflow based monitoring it is possible to measure the traffic by IP address, and/or protocol. SNMP based traffic measurement is port-based only.
· Windows and Web Based User Interface
· Monitoring data can be accessed via a Windows GUI and a web based front end
· Intuitive Windows user interface for data retrieval and configuration
· Integrated web server for remote access (no external web server necessary)
· Results are shown in various graphs and tables
· Graphs are always generated on-the-fly for live reporting
· Monitoring Database
· Internal database for fast and efficient storage of historic data
· Optional export of monitoring results into CSV files for custom reporting
· Database offers optional zipped backup and purging of old data
· Internal Web Server
· Easy to use navigation allows to drill into the live monitoring results
· Fully "skinable" web interface using HTML templates (several default skins included)
· Web server supports public (anyone can view the data) as well as authenticated access (username/password necessary) for multiple users
· Reports
· Configurable reports (graphs and data tables) in HTML, Excel, TIF, RTF, or PDF format
· Daily, monthly, and yearly reports can be exported via email or saved to file
· x% percentile calculation for any percentile value, any intervall, and any time frame
· Includes a billing system for bandwidth based billing
· SNMP Related Features
· Monitors any value that is accessible by SNMP (i.e. any given OID Object ID)
· Supports SNMP Versions 1 (base standard), 2C (64 bit counters) and 3 (authentication and encryption)
· Support 32-bit and 64-bit counters
· Brings its own extensive OID database with many preconfigured SNMP settings (e.g. for CPU loads, disk usages, printer page counts, environmental monitoring, and many more)
· Supports Paessler SNMP Helper for easy access to several thousand performance counters on Windows based machines via SNMP
· MIB files can be converted into OIDLIBs to monitor any device that supports SNMP
· Various SNMP parameters (e.g. port, timeout) can be set by the user
· Other System Features
· Runs as an "nt service" on Windows 2000/XP/2003 to ensure that monitoring runs all the time (you do not have to be logged into your machine to keep monitoring running)
· Extensive filtering can be applied for Netflow and Packet Sniffing based monitoring
· Sensors can be "tagged" for easy navigation in long sensor lists
· Easy setup of the same set of sensors for several devices usind Device Templates
· Monitoring and notifications can be paused using user defined schedules.

Requirements:
· 64 MB RAM (128 MB and more recommended)
· 20 MB disk space for installation
· between 25kb and 300kb disk space per sensor per day for the monitoring data database
· TCP/IP Network Connection

Limitations:
· Nag screen
· The freeware edition is limited to three sensors

What's New in This Release:
· Bugfix: Fixed a minor security issue (cross site scripting vulnerability in the web interface)
· Maintenance Release