Documentation forNetFlow Traffic Analyzer
Analyzing network traffic and bandwidth is a key capability of SolarWinds Observability Self-Hosted (formerly Hybrid Cloud Observability) and is available in the Advanced edition. NetFlow Traffic Analyzer (NTA) is also available in a standalone module.

Enable flow monitoring from unmanaged interfaces

SolarWinds NTA provides the option to retain data for any flow defined with at least one interface monitored by SolarWinds NPM.

It is possible that you may be managing a node in NPM by one interface and IP address, but NetFlow data is coming from a different interface and IP address on that node. In such cases, you can choose to have NTA attempt to associate unknown traffic with a non-primary IP address on a currently monitored NPM node.

For more information about managing interfaces in NPM, see Discovering and Adding Network Devices.

Disabling the option to monitor flows from unmanaged interfaces may significantly decrease the processing load on both your NTA server and your SolarWinds Platform database server, but it will also decrease the amount of flow data stored in yourSolarWinds Platform database.

The following procedure enables the option of monitoring traffic on unmanaged interfaces in NTA.

  1. In the SolarWinds Platform Web Console, click Settings > All Settings.
  2. Under Product Specific Settings, click NTA Settings.
  3. Under NetFlow Management, select Allow Monitoring of Flows from Unmanaged Interfaces.
  4. Select Allow Matching Nodes by Another IP Address to allow NTA to attempt associating unknown traffic with non-primary IP addresses on a currently monitored NPM node.
  5. Click Save.

    If there are unknown traffic events, resolve the unknown traffic and add the appropriate devices for monitoring first to NPM, and then to NTA. For more details, see Resolve unknown NetFlow traffic.