SmartSwitch Router User Reference Manual 299
Chapter 21
RMON
Configuration
Guide
RMON Overview
You can employ Remote Network Monitoring (RMON) in your network to help monitor
traffic at remote points on the network. With RMON, data collection and processing is
done with a remote probe, namely the SSR. The SSR also includes RMON agent software
that communicates with a network management station via SNMP. Because information is
only transmitted from the SSR to the management station when required, SNMP traffic on
the network and the management station’s processing load are reduced.
The SSR provides support for both RMON 1 and RMON 2 MIBs, as specified in RFCs 1757
and 2021, respectively. While non-RMON SNMP products allow the monitoring and
control of specific network devices, RMON 1 returns statistics on network segments at the
MAC layer. RMON 2 collects statistics on network and application layer traffic to show
host-to-host connections and the applications and protocols being used. For example, the
RMON 2 network layer matrix MIB group can show protocol-specific traffic between
pairs of systems which can help to diagnose protocol problems. Note that RMON 2 is not
a superset of RMON 1; on the SSR, you can configure both RMON 1 and RMON 2
statistics collection.
Configuring and Enabling RMON
By default, RMON is disabled on the SSR. To configure and enable RMON on the SSR,
follow these steps: