Ipswitch WhatsUp Gold Premium 15

User accounts can be created natively within the program or imported from Microsoft Active Directory (AD). As well as importing security groups from AD, you can now also create security groups within WUG itself. So users whose networks aren't AD-based can easily apply access rights to many users at once, saving time and cutting hassle.

You can configure WhatsUp Gold to warn you when an important device goes down. Wherever you log in to the web interface, a pop-up appears accompanied, if desired, by an attention-grabbing klaxon sound.

The program allows you to apply three types of monitor to a device: active, passive and performance. Active monitors are those which poll devices at regular intervals. SNMP is the default for this, but there are also plenty of other options. These include queries for web and FTP services, IMAP and so on. Passive monitors, on the other hand, are triggered by certain device events -a device or link going down for a certain length of time for example. When this happens, it triggers an alarm, alerting administrators to the problem. The last type of monitor is performance monitors. On SNMP-enabled devices, the software can track a range of indicators, including CPU and disk utilisation, memory usage and so on. As well as the default alerts, you can also add monitors for printer performance, SNMP performance and a range of other variables.