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Quick and Dirty SNMP Checklist: 5 Steps You Can Take Today to Start Your SNMP Monitoring Project

• Assess Your Existing Network
  Start with a thorough assessment of your exiting network equipment and data transport, checking for what you already have that's compatible with SNMP. The more you can keep, the more you'll save on capital expenditures.
  
• Survey Your Existing Data Transport
  The biggest challenge in your SNMP implementation is ensuring you have enough bandwidth for SNMP traffic. Examine your present telemetry map. Identify existing transport and identify what adjustments need to be made.
  
  • Check for SNMP-ready transport: LAN, overhead channel, channel bank, order wire or PPP over a dial-up or direct link
  • Make sure transport has adequate bandwidth for UDP traffic
  • Check if low-bandwidth transport can be rerouted to high-bandwidth
• Survey Your Existing Equipment
  Determine how much of your currently existing network elements support SNMP, so you can plan systematically what upgrades will be necessary for SNMP-based monitoring.
  
  • Equipment that natively supports SNMP
  • Equipment that can be firmware upgraded to support SNMP
  • Equipment that can be swapped out for a later SNMP model
  • Equipment that cannot be economically replaced with a direct SNMP equivalent (Don't replace this equipment - look for a protocol mediation solution instead)
• Collect MIB Files for Your Equipment
  Make sure that you have the correct Management Information Base (MIB) files for all of your equipment. The MIB file enables the SNMP manager to interpret Trap messages from devices. MIB files are equipment specific, so it's important to make sure that you have the correct MIB for your equipment type, model, and version number.
• Plan Your SNMP Implementation Budget
  Watch out for the capital expenditure and installation manpower costs of a forklift swapout. Use protocol mediation solutions to make your existing network SNMP ready. This will avoid the costs of a systemwide replacement, keeping your budget within reasonable limits.

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