Documentation forNetwork Configuration Manager
Managing network configurations is a key capability of SolarWinds Observability Self-Hosted (formerly Hybrid Cloud Observability) and is available in the Advanced edition. Network Configuration Manager (NCM) is also available in a standalone module.

NCM 2024.2 system requirements

Release date: June 4, 2024

SolarWinds strongly recommends that you install the SolarWinds Platform on a server that is neither public, nor internet-facing. To learn about best practices for configuring your SolarWinds Platform installation securely, see Secure Configuration for the SolarWinds Platform.

The Network Configuration Manager requirements vary based on:

  • The number of nodes
  • The frequency of configuration downloads
  • The length of time that configurations are maintained in the database

For additional information on requirements and configurations, see the Multi-module system guidelines. You should also review your product administration guides and release notes for the exact product requirements beyond these minimums.

See the following sections:

Port requirements

The following ports might be needed for the SolarWinds Web Console, depending on how NCM is set up to download and upload configurations.

SolarWinds does not recommend the use of HTTP (Port 80). Please use HTTPS (Port 443) to ensure that any web-related connections are secure.

Port Protocol Service/Process Direction Description
22 SSH/SCP

SCP server

 Bidirectional

SSH/SCP default port for NCM to transfer configs
23 Telnet

NCM Business Layer Plugin, NCM Jobs (collector)

 Outbound Telnet default port for NCM to transfer configs
25 TCP SolarWinds Alerting Service V2 Outbound SMTP email default that NCM uses for notification (If SSL/TLS encryption is set up on SMTP server, default port is 465)
69 UDP TFTP Server Inbound TFTP server listens on this port
80 TCP IIS Inbound HTTP default for the SolarWinds Web Console
137 UDP File and Printer Sharing (NB-Name-In) Bidirectional Used to transfer firmware updates and configuration files remotely
138 UDP File and Printer Sharing (NB-Datagram-In) Bidirectional Used to transfer firmware updates and configuration files remotely
139 TCP File and Printer Sharing (NB-Session-In) Bidirectional Used to transfer firmware updates and configuration files remotely
161 UDP SolarWinds Job Engine v2 Outbound SNMP statistics collection, the default for polling in NCM
162 UDP SolarWinds Trap Service Inbound Trap messages listened for and received by the Trap Server
443 TCP IIS Inbound Default port for HTTPS binding
445 TCP File and Printer Sharing (SMB-In) Bidirectional Used to transfer firmware updates and configuration files remotely
465 TCP SolarWinds Alerting Service V2 Outbound The port used for SSL/TLS-enabled email alert actions
514 UDP SolarWinds Syslog Service Inbound Used to listen for incoming syslog messages
587 TCP SolarWinds Alerting Service V2 Outbound The port used for TLS-enabled email alert actions
5671 TCP RabbitMQ Bidirectional For encrypted RabbitMQ messaging (AMQP/TLS) into the main polling engine from all SolarWinds Platform servers
17774 HTTPS/TCP SolarWinds REST Endpoint Inbound to the SolarWinds Platform server Used for access to the SWIS API.
17777 TCP

SolarWinds Platform Module Engine

SolarWinds Information Service

SolarWinds Information Service V3

 Bidirectional SolarWinds Platform module traffic. Open the port to enable communication from your poller to the SolarWinds Platform Web Console, and from the SolarWinds Platform Web Console to your poller. The port used for communication between the SolarWinds Platform Web Console and the poller.
17778 HTTPS SolarWinds Agent Inbound to the SolarWinds Platform server Required for agent communication
17779 HTTP SolarWinds Toolset Inbound to the SolarWinds Platform server SolarWinds Toolset Integration over HTTP

Ports 4369, 5672, and 25672 are opened by default. These ports can be blocked by the firewall.

Server, database, and browser requirements

NCM runs on the SolarWinds Platform and has the same server, database, and browser requirements as SolarWinds Platform 2024.2. See the SolarWinds Platform 2024.2 requirements for details.

For more information about managing the storage space that NCM requires, see NCM storage requirements.

Additional information

  • The SolarWinds NCM Information Service requires that the Net.TCP Port Sharing service be enabled and port 17777 open for TCP traffic to the NCM server. By default, this service is disabled. The setup program sets the service to manual. Resetting the service setting to disabled is not recommended.

  • To take advantage of the numerous integration points in NCM, install the SolarWinds Engineer's Toolset on the same server. You can also take advantage of integration points built into the Web Console by installing the Toolset on computers used to access the Web Console.

Scalability

NCM 2020.2 was tested for scalability in a standalone deployment of three servers: one server hosts the main server and the other two servers each host an additional polling engine. The main server manages up to 10,000 nodes, as does each additional polling engine. Therefore, the deployment supports up to 30,000 nodes total.

The standard SolarWinds Platform deployment has the SolarWinds Platform on the main server, polling for node status at the default rate. This deployment supports two NCM operations, inventory update and configuration download, performed per day on all 30,000 nodes.

Though the main server and each additional polling engine can manage up to 10,000 nodes, the actual total depends on the system hardware of the server hosts, the types of devices being monitored, and the number of jobs being run concurrently. Should you need to manage more devices, and you decide to add servers, consider consolidating your views of multiple servers with the SolarWinds Enterprise Operations Console (EOC). For more information, see Scalability Engine Guidelines for SolarWinds Products.

Factors that affect scalability

The server requirements table above lists the minimum CPU and RAM requirements for the NCM server. CPU and RAM requirements depend on the number of nodes being managed in your NCM deployment.

If scalability issues arise, you can adjust the following:

  • Increase the server CPU speed and the amount of RAM
  • Decrease the number of simultaneous transfers
  • Decrease the frequency of uploads, downloads, and inventory jobs
  • Increase the node polling interval for up/down monitoring

Inventory jobs may run longer than expected in larger environments. To remedy this situation, break large inventory jobs into smaller jobs that do not include as many nodes, and space these jobs over a longer period of time. Adjusting server CPU and memory will enhance user interface performance and job execution speed.

If you are deploying multiple SolarWinds Platform modules, see the multi-module system guidelines.