NetIQ expands VoIP management

SAN JOSE - NetIQ this week added features to its voice-over-IP management software that observers say should help enterprise users improve call quality and performance.

Through new software modules, NetIQ's VoIP Manager 2.0 now can monitor H.323 Call Setup servers, as well as Cisco VoIP and videoconferencing servers. The company also released modules that let the software work with Micromuse's Netcool and Hewlett-Packard's OpenView network management software. NetIQ also added a module for Dell OpenManage to let NetIQ users monitor hardware performance from the VoIP Manager console.

H.323 Call Setup is a way to link the Internet to a private phone network, and NetIQ now can tap in to it to track voice performance. All new modules give users the capability to see a more complete picture of their combined voice and data networks, says John McConnell, president of research firm McConnell Associates.

"Some of the quality of voice out there is not the kind of thing enterprise users want to do their business on; there's delay and jitter, things that don't affect performance on a data network as much," McConnell says. "NetIQ is addressing the performance of voice applications, helping users find the contributors to delay by measuring and monitoring service quality."

NetIQ added these software modules to help users further integrate their VoIP networks into a standard network-management strategy. The NetIQ console can show performance metrics on voice applications, such as unified messaging, and can display network metrics collected by Netcool or OpenView, such as router downtime. It also can show users how their voice applications affect the network and vice versa, McConnell says.

VoIP Manager runs on a Windows 2000 Server and uses a SQL Server database repository. The software communicates with agents and modules installed on PBXs and servers on a network via a secure, remote procedure call - meaning the agents don't poll the network. Users configure the agents to collect and batch data, and send it back to the repository at predefined frequencies, NetIQ says.

IDC Senior Analyst Paul Bugala says VoIP management products from companies such as NetIQ, NetScout Technologies and Brix Networks can help data network managers learn how voice applications perform in the IP world.

"Managing the quality and performance metrics of a VoIP network may help push enterprise users past the assessment stage into deploying VoIP applications on their networks, which can offer cost savings in the long run," Bugala says.

VoIP Manager 2.0 costs $2,500 for the management console. The modules are priced on a tiered basis. A company looking to manage a 50-telephone pilot VoIP network could spend $5,000, while a larger deployment of VoIP Manager and modules could cost more than $100,000.