Overview

This chapter contains information about the Cisco Prime Network Analysis Module (Prime NAM) software and describes task overviews.

This chapter contains the following sections:

Introducing Cisco Prime NAM

The Cisco Prime Network Analysis Module (Prime NAM) software is a network monitoring and analysis tool that combines flow-based and packet-based analysis into a single tool set. Prime NAM software provides network operations and engineering with user, command line, and application programming interfaces that you use for traffic analysis of applications, hosts, and conversations, performance-based measurements on application, server, and network latency, quality of experience metrics. as well as ways to see deeper into your network. The robust graphical user interface makes traffic monitoring and troubleshooting simple and cost-effective.

This chapter contains an overview on ways to use Prime NAM to monitor and analyze your network traffic. See Table 1-1 for details on high-level function areas and how they map to the user interface.

For a list of the key features in this release, see the Cisco Prime Network Analysis Module Release Notes.

 

Table 1-1 Prime NAM Task Areas

Task Area
Menu Mapping
Function Description
Used By

Plan and Prepare

Setup menu

Create a list of your network performance goals. Set expected goals and limits for response time, expected ranges for MOS values, bandwidth usage per application, and utilization on critical WAN links. Determine on which performance issues you want to concentrate.

Network Engineers, Designers, and Architects

Monitor and Analyze

Home, Capture, Analyze and Monitor menus

View dashboards which give you a quick view of traffic performance information, and various incidents. Use interactive reports filter data when monitoring specific network traffic and troubleshooting problems.

Monitor your network and perform other day-to-day operations related to proactive and reactive traffic analysis and troubleshooting.

Analyze QoS policy traffic using alarms, syslogs, traps, and e-mail alerts.

See Monitoring and Analyzing Traffic and Capturing and Decoding Packets.

Network Engineers, NOC Operators, and Service Operators

Administer

Administer menu

Change default system display, notification, and user settings, as well as manage database access control and view system diagnostics.

See Performing User and System Administration.

Network Engineers

Deploy

Setup and Admin menus

Configure devices to share data with NAM. Configure managed devices and data sources.

Perform customized setup of NAM including sites, alarms and thresholds, scheduled exports, and so on.

Monitor an extended level of your managed device’s data (health and interface information).

Determine which locations are ingress or egress points of a logical network boundary (aggregation layer, core, campus edge, and so on) that can offer valuable insights into the network activity within that partition.

Create a baseline of current metrics including applications, bandwidth per application, top conversations and hosts, QoS values used in the network, unrecognized protocols, and current server and end-to-end response time measurements.

See Customizing Cisco Prime NAM.

Network Engineers, Designers, and Architects

Troubleshoot

Capture, Analyze and Monitor menus

Resolve common NAM issues including login problems and unresponsiveness, understand error messages, and troubleshoot network issues using Prime NAM.

See Troubleshooting Network and NAM Issues.

Network Engineers, NOC Operators, and Service Operators

Overview of the Cisco NAM Platforms

Cisco NAM is supported on a variety of platforms. This guide focuses on functions and capabilities of the platforms.

For a list of Cisco NAM models and their features and capabilities, see the data sheets in Products & Services on Cisco.com .

It is important to note that the portfolio of Cisco NAM models differ in memory, performance, disk size, and other capabilities. Therefore, some allow for more features and capabilities (for example, the amount of memory allocated for capture).

Throughout this guide, there may be notes explaining that some features apply only to specific platforms. If there is no note, then that feature or aspect applies to all Cisco NAM platforms.

For details on memory, performance, disk size, and other capabilities, see the NAM Compatibility Matrix.

Platforms Supported on Cisco Prime NAM 6.3

Prime NAM 6.3 supports Cisco Prime NAM 2404 appliance, Cisco Prime NAM 2440, Cisco Prime NAM 2420, Cisco Prime NAM 2320 appliance, Cisco Prime NAM 2304 appliance, Cisco NAM 2220 appliance, and Cisco NAM 2204 appliance.

Cisco Prime NAM 2404 Appliance

The Cisco Prime NAM 2404 appliance is based on UCS C220 server. The Cisco Prime NAM 2404 appliance includes four one-Gigabit Ethernet monitoring interfaces. The Cisco Prime NAM appliance has the option for one of two interface card types according to your requirement:

  • 4x1G RJ45
  • 4x1G optical

For more information on the Cisco Prime NAM 2404 appliance, see the Cisco Prime Network Analysis Module (NAM) 2404 Appliance Installation and Configuration Guide.

Cisco Prime NAM 2400 Series Appliances

There are two models of the Cisco Prime NAM 2440 appliance (both are 2RU form-factor):

  • Cisco Prime NAM 2440—This model receives collected data over up to four 10 GbE ports at a data rate of 10 Gb/s each, uses fiber-optic cables, and connects to the data collection devices with SFP+ connectors.
  • Cisco Prime NAM 2420—This model receives collected data over up to two 10 GbE ports at a data rate of 10 Gb/s each, uses fiber-optic cables, and connects to the data collection devices with SFP+ connectors. The data ports also support 1GbE SFP modules.

For more information on the Cisco Prime NAM 2400 Series appliances, see the Cisco Prime Network Analysis Module (NAM) 2400 Series Appliances Installation and Configuration Guide.

Cisco Prime NAM 2300 Series Appliances

Cisco offers two appliance models in the Ciso Prime NAM 2300 Series appliances, the Cisco Prime NAM 2320 and the Cisco Prime NAM 2304:

  • The Cisco Prime NAM 2320 appliance includes two ten-Gigabit Ethernet monitoring interfaces for application monitoring in high-speed, high-density environments.
  • The Cisco Prime NAM 2304 appliance includes four one-Gigabit Ethernet monitoring interfaces to meet diverse performance analysis needs in scalable multi-gigabit switching and routing environments.

For more information on the Cisco Prime NAM 2300 Series appliances, see the Cisco Prime Network Analysis Module (NAM) 2300 Series Appliances Installation and Configuration Guide.

Cisco NAM 2220 Appliance

The Cisco NAM 2220 appliance comes preloaded with Cisco Network Analysis Module (NAM), 6.3 software. NAM 6.3 software enables network managers to understand, manage, and improve how applications and services are delivered to end-users.

For more information on the Cisco Prime NAM 2300 Series appliances, see the Installation and Configuration Guide for the Cisco NAM 2220 Appliance.

Cisco NAM 2204 Appliance

The Cisco NAM 2204 appliance comes preloaded with Cisco Network Analysis Module (NAM), 6.3 software. NAM software enables network managers to understand, manage, and improve how applications and services are delivered to end-users.

The NAM offers flow-based traffic analysis of applications, hosts, and conversations, performance-based measurements on application, server, and network latency, quality of experience metrics for network-based services such as voice over IP (VoIP) and video, and problem analysis using deep, insightful packet captures.

For more information on the Cisco Prime NAM 2300 Series appliances, see the Cisco NAM Appliances Installation and Configuration Note, 5.0 (2204).

How to Use Prime NAM to Analyze Your Traffic

The Cisco Prime NAM software helps you to address the following major areas:

  • Network Layer Traffic Analysis. Prime NAM provides comprehensive traffic analysis to identify what applications are running over the network, how much network resources are consumed, and who is using these applications. Prime NAM software offers a rich set of reports with which to view traffic by Hosts, Application, or Conversations. See the discussions about Dashboards, starting with Using Traffic Summary.
  • Application Response Time. Prime NAM can provide passive measurement of TCP-based applications for any given server or client, supplying a wide variety of statistics like response time, network flight time, and transaction time. See Using Response Time Summary.
  • Voice Quality Analysis. Prime NAM provides application performance for real time applications like Voice and video. Prime NAM can compute MOS for voice and MDI for video, as well as provide RTP analysis for the media stream. See Analyzing Media.
  • Advanced Troubleshooting. Prime NAM provides robust capture and decode capabilities for packet traces that can be triggered or terminated based on user-defined thresholds. See Application Performance Monitoring Using Capture and Decode.
  • Open instrumentation. Prime NAM is a mediation and instrumentation product offering, and provides a robust API that can be used by partner products as well as work with customer-created applications. Contact your account representative for a copy of the Cisco Prime Network Analysis Module API Programmer’s Guide.

To understand which types of monitoring are supported by specific NAM data sources, see Table 1-2 .

 

Table 1-2 Data Source Monitoring Capabilities
Data Sources
Monitoring Capabilities
Capture
Traffic
ART
RTP/Voice
URL

SPAN/VACL/ERSPAN

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

NetFlow

No

Yes

No

No

No

For information on which data sources Prime NAM uses to deliver this functionality, see Understanding Prime NAM Traffic Sources. For information about which traffic sources are supported on each platform, see the NAM Compatibility Matrix.

Before You Begin

Depending on your Cisco NAM, ensure the following list of requirements are complete before you use Prime NAM. For detailed instructions, see your platform installation guide, except where noted:

  • Reset your Cisco NAM root password
  • Set up a data source to send traffic to the Cisco NAM
  • Configure access to the Prime NAM user interface or CLI
  • Synchronize your Cisco NAM to the standard time source outside the NAM in addition to the router or switch (depending on your platform). For detailed instructions, see Synchronizing Your System Time.

For optional advanced customizations, such as adding sites or configuring alarms and thresholds, see Advanced Configuration Overview.