What Is A Probe Instance - Network Instruments GigaStor User Manual

Figure 4: Typical network

What is a probe instance?

Observer has only one kind of probe instance: the probe instance. If you have a GigaStor then you have two
special probe instance types available to you: the active probe instance and the passive probe instance.
The Observer analyzer uses probes to capture network data. In some cases you may want or need more than one
probe in a specific location. You can achieve that through probe instances. A probe instance provides you the
ability to look at multiple network interfaces, have multiple views of the same interface, or to publish to multiple
Observer analyzers.
Table 2 (page 18) compares the features of active and passive probe instances with an Observer probe
instance found on all non-GigaStor probes.
Table 2: Active vs. passive GigaStor instances and Observer probe
Better suited for troubleshooting
Better suited for data capture
Start packet capture
Stop packet capture
Start GigaStor packet capture
Schedule packet capture
Change directories where data is
stored
Able to set permissions
Able to redirect to different
analyzer, etc.
1)
An Observer probe is the Single Probe, Multi Probe, or Expert Probe software running on a non-GigaStor probe.
A passive probe instance may capture packets to RAM and allows you to do reactive analysis or look at real-time
statistics for troubleshooting. The passive probe instance binds to a virtual adapter or a network adapter that
has data coming to it that you want to capture. You can change whichever adapter a passive probe instance is
18 | GigaStor™ (pub. 25.Apr.2014)
GigaStor Active probe
instance
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
GigaStor Passive probe
instance
X
X
X
X
X
X
1
Observer Probe
X
X
X
X
X
X
X