Monitor bandwidth of connected devices?

Paul. W · 16 May 2012 at 13:11

Does anyone know of a program that I can use to monitor the bandwidth usage of devices connected to my router?

Ideally, I just want a simple realtime (or as near to) graph, which shows a list of IP's connected, and the corresponding bandwidth showing.

Ive tried to use PRTG, but its just too complex for my liking. I know the router supports SMNP if this helps.

PistolPete · 16 May 2012 at 14:02

SNMP will only be any good if it shows per device stats, but most only show per interface stats.

Chances are you'll need an additional device to do it - I'm running bandwidthd on Pfsense and this does what you need - but maybe a sledgehammer to crack a nut for you.

Paul. W · 16 May 2012 at 14:16

pfSense would do the trick (ive never used it), but your anology is very true.

There's literally loads of easy simple programs that will monitor the machine its installed on, but I need a program that monitors everything including connected iphones, ipads etc.

**EDIT - does bandwidthD need to be ran on a seperate machine controlling DHCP and the likes of, or can I just install it onto a normal machine connected to the network?

PistolPete · 16 May 2012 at 14:29

It would have to run on a machine sat between your LAN and your router ie
internet -> router -> bandwidthd -> all your devices.

It simply watches the traffic passing through it and creates graphs per IP address it sees.

1337z0r · 16 May 2012 at 17:31

Ideally if you have a machine with two NIC's then you can use the pfsense machine as your main router and use your current router as a switch, you can have all types of monitoring along with a very good firewall and intrusion prevention system.

Your network would be...

Modem > pfSense > Switch or (Router/Wireless Router with DCHP & Firewall disabled)

Give it a test if you have a spare pc sitting around, it does not need very much power unless your have lots of packages running, I have had mine running at 512MB in a virtual machine on my ESXi server for while. Only recently upgraded it to 2GB..

PistolPete · 16 May 2012 at 21:12

1337z0r said:
II have had mine running at 512MB in a virtual machine on my ESXi server for while. Only recently upgraded it to 2GB..

My watchguard pfsense build was a P3 1Ghz with 256Mb ram..... ran like a dream