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The days of solving network problems by purchasing more bandwidth, extra storage or new servers are over. As network traffic demands increase rapidly, these traditional approaches to resolving network issues become costlier and more inefficient. Network architects are tasked with redesigning the network so that network monitoring is more agile. When your CIO tells you there have been performance concerns and you need to track down the root cause, what are you going to say?
What steps do you need to take to ensure monitoring visibility in your network?
You have two options. Under traditional network designs, you would tell the CIO that you need to work with IT to build a new network access point in the problem area—which could take days. If you design your network with visibility in mind, you could have a network analyzer hooked up in an hour. When it comes to designing architectures for efficient network monitoring, it all comes down to visibility with network TAPs.
When the network was compact—just a few appliances for security and minimal servers to take care of web traffic—monitoring wasn’t such an issue. However, traffic demands are forcing networks to become bigger and more complicated and it’s up to you to keep the design in check. If visibility isn’t top-of-mind from the start, network monitoring will be a tall task down the road.
Root-cause analysis is the main goal of network monitoring systems. Visibility is the most important factor in root-cause analysis because without access to every bit, byte and packet, there’s no way to determine where things are going wrong.
The only way to ensure visibility is to design the network with access points at key locations. Deploying network TAPs throughout the network is the visibility answer you need.
Network architects can gain favor with security professionals by implementing network TAPs to ensure appliances can do their jobs effectively. But what about network monitoring? Network architects must implement network TAPs throughout their designs to make troubleshooting more convenient.
Deploying purpose-built network TAPs makes it easy for network analyzers to be plugged in at key points in the network, drastically reducing mean time-to-detection and mean time-to-repair. If you’re looking to gain points with your CIO, make sure network TAPs are an integral part of your network design so that when issues are reported, root-cause analysis can be quick and efficient without the hassles of makeshift access point creation.
The only question left to answer—where should network TAPs be placed to ensure easy network monitoring processes? If you want to learn more about proper network TAP placement to ensure monitoring visibility, download the Planned Visibility: Network Architecture Tips for Supporting Security and Monitoring Tools from the Start.
Don’t let your CIO down by telling them they’ll have to wait a few days to even start the root-cause analysis process. Access the white paper and learn how to use network TAPs to create a network architecture designed for modern demands.
Looking to add Network TAPs solution to your security deployment, but not sure where to start? Join us for a brief network Design-IT consultation or demo. No obligation - it’s what we love to do!
