NPM Elements

One of our SLX servers currently has 8,835 elements associated with it after a discussion yesterday with one of the support reps I learned that while the max SLX will support is 10,000, Solarwinds recommends not exceeding 8,000 elements so I've got a bit of a problem as I've got in the region of 1000 more elements to add.

As far as I can see we have two options

1. We purchase an SLX poller server etc and split the existing SLX server between it and the extra poller.

2. We look at removing interfaces that are not required on a regular basis ie switch interfaces from edge switches.

My preference would be number 2 but was wondering what the community thought and whether you monitor every single interface possible or only required interfaces?

Thanks

Jon

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Accepted answers

FormerMember

" Orion Network Performance Monitor SLX is a comprehensive, highly scalable, web-enabled fault, bandwidth and performance management platform that gives you broad visibility across your network by monitoring an unlimited number of network elements."

Do we really say that there's a max of 10,000 somewhere? That's incorrect. The "max" is dependent on lots of things, but especially the polling interval. Using default polling intervals and good dedicated hardware, you can get 8,000 easily. If you poll less frequently, you can poll more than 8000; i know customers with 12000 on a single poller. If you poll more frequently than the default (e.g., pull stats every 2 minutes), you might not get more than 3,000.

A good rule of thumb is 1000 elements per minute of polling statistics. But it's a rule of thumb, not a rock hard max. That's why the SLX is unlimited elements. We place no artificial limits on the number elements, but there are natural limits on how much hardware and software can do.

All comments

jeffnorton

Buy another polling server. You won't be able to reduce the load on the existing server enough by removing interfaces. Also with over 8000 devices on single server you're taxing the physical interface with the output stream.

jonchill

Jeff

Its only 8000 elements and not devices, also by my calculations if I was to remove the interfaces from our edge switches 76 in total, it would remove 3648 interfaces which is over a third of all the current elements. This would surely reduce load on the server?

Jon

Mars

I learned that while the max SLX will support is 10,000, Solarwinds recommends not exceeding 8,000 elements

Max support is 10.000 elements and on the website is mentioned:
" Orion Network Performance Monitor SLX is a comprehensive, highly scalable, web-enabled fault, bandwidth and performance management platform that gives you broad visibility across your network by monitoring an unlimited number of network elements."

This sound a bit contradictory.

On the recommendation i would agree as this is what they are saying in their administrator guide:
"If you plan to monitor 8000 or more elements, it is recommended that you install additional polling engines on separate servers to help distribute the work load."

But that is something complete different than a Max support statement!!!

Greetings

brian_duvall

Jon

I have three SLX boxes and to keep things safe try to be below 8,000 elements per poller. I limit the interfaces I monitor especially on edge switches. I only monitor the trunk ports going to the core switches. Edge ports I don't bother monitor. If servers are connected to edge ports I simply monitor the NIC on the server to capture that data. This will save you a ton of polls and should allow you not to buy another poller. Money saving is always a good option. You know your environment but typically people don't car if edge ports go down. Utilization numbers are easily captured on the trunk ports to see what type of traffic is coming out of a particular switch.

FormerMember

Mars

Hi Denny,

Thanks for clarifying this!!
Somehow also what I expected (No Max).

jonchill

Denny

Thanks for the info, just to confirm its the stats side of the collection we should concentrate on when deploying number of elements?

So if I ping a number of devices every minute but only pull stats every 15 minutes I could get 8000 or more elements on a poller dependant on hardware etc?

Also we're looking at moving our NPM and NCM installs to VM do I need to take anything else into account or is it just a case of specking it the same as I would a physical server?

Thanks

Jon

FormerMember

Everything has some impact. Pinging more often has a cost, but statistics has a bigger impact because we're pulling a lot of data.

If you're VM has the equivalent power of a physical server you will be fine. I would recommend against putting your DB on a VM unless you are using a physical disk and have experience running a DB on a VM; otherwise, your database will run slowly on a VM.

hcaballe

Can someone give me the definition of elements? Or what table would I look under in the database to get the exact count. The database details info gives me one number, but the pollers combined show a lower number.

mavturner

This is a relatively old post and there have been several changes made to Orion. However, this is still a good rule of thumb.

An element is a node, interface, or volume. The license details page gives you a break down of how many you have.

Mav