ELM Enterprise Manager Licensing

ELM Enterprise Manager is licensed per Server.

What is the difference between a Service Agent and a Remote Agent?

ELM Enterprise Manager Service Agent

A Service Agent is an executable (TNTAgent.exe) and companion files. The TNTAgent.exe process is installed as the TNT Agent Service on the monitored system. It communicates with an ELM Server via TCP sockets, and all communications are encrypted and authenticated.

Service Agents can be installed on Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 computers. All Monitor Items that are assigned to a Service Agent are executed within the TNTAgent.exe process.

NB: Only Service Agents can monitor systems in real-time, providing the highest level of monitoring.

Pros

• Distributes some of CPU cycles required to monitor the computer to the computer being monitored. The amount of CPU used by a Service Agent depends on the configured monitor items and their scheduled intervals, as well as the amount of data to be collected, if any.


• Provides system level caching. If the ELM Server or network between the ELM Server and Agent computer is disrupted, the Agent process will cache collected data to the Agent's local disk drive and it will transmit the collected data when connectivity is restored.


• Provides single TCP socket port connectivity to the ELM Server, which is necessary if a firewall separates the ELM Server and Agent computer.


• Less network bandwidth is required for communication between the ELM Server and the Service agent on the computer being monitored.


• ELM Server service account only needs administrative privileges for single reason (e.g., Agent Monitor auto-restart).

• Adds overhead to the monitored system.


• Cache file is limited to 10MB.

A Remote Agent provides agentless monitoring becausenothing is installed on the monitored system. Remote Agents can be used to monitor Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 computers. All Monitor Items assigned to a Remote Agent are executed within the ELM Server process running on the ELM Server computer. Many of them use remoted Win32 API calls and therefore require RPC and NetBIOS connectivity between the ELM Server and the Agent.

Pros

• Uses less processor CPU on the monitored computer.


• No software is installed on the monitored computer.

• Higher network overhead due to RPC authentication and encryption, and other remoted functions.


• RPC and NetBIOS dependency make them not firewall friendly


• Because the ELM Server performs the monitoring of Remote Agents over the network, Remote Agents cannot be monitored in real-time.


• ELM Server service account requires administrative rights on all monitored computers.

ELM Enterprise Manager Server Agents are priced and licensed under a common name "Server Agent". When deploying Server Agents both remote and service agent installation options are available.

Server Agent pricing and licensing remains the same regardless of whether you choose a Service Agent, Remote Agent, or mixed deployment strategy (your choice).

This is an advantage / reason for choosing ELM Enterprise Manager over competing tools.....

Most monitoring solutions on the market today require either all remote monitoring or agent installation onto all monitored systems, or charge extra for one or the other, depending on which they feel has more value.

ELM offers you the flexibility to pick and choose the way you would like to monitor your systems - either with a remote agent or service agent, your choice.