This article applies to PRTG Network Monitor 16.3.25 or later
How to monitor the status of FRU's (Field Replaceable Units) from my Cisco device using PRTG?
Yes, it is possible to monitor the Status of your device's Field Replaceable Units using PRTG. We've published a compatible device template, which can be used to automate the deployment of these custom sensors using auto-discovery.
The sensors will monitor the following FRU Properties:
- Power Supplies
- Operational Status
- Administrative Status
- Fans and Fan Trays
- Operational Status
- Modules
- Operational Status
- Administrative Status
- Uptime
Requirements
- PRTG Network Monitor 16.3.25 or later;
- Since the Device Template relies on the auto-discovery process, the device you want to monitor needs to be reachable via ping;
- SNMP must be enabled/working and the device must support/implement the ENTITY-MIB(for naming) and CISCO-ENTITY-FRU-CONTROL-MIB (for state).
Known Issues/Limitations
- Due to the way that the underlying SNMP Custom Table sensor works and the way that Cisco makes the data available, the sensors deployed by this template may not work after a reboot/reset or firmware update of the monitored device. Technically speaking, the issue is that no index update is possible with the information available in the monitored tables. Please perform the discovery/deployment anew as required.
- This Device Template will mimic the alerts as reported by the monitored device via SNMP(via lookups), if the status is not reported correctly via SNMP, PRTG will not be able to pick up any issues.
- This device template is created based on data collected from other customers, we can not guarantee that the above described sensors will work on your systems. You use all components at your own risk.
Deployment/Usage
- Download the required zip-archive here.
- Extract the archive to the PRTG program directory. By default, this is %Program Files (x86)%\PRTG Network Monitor\. See the Paessler Knowledge Base to learn more about how and where PRTG stores its data.
- In the PRTG web interface, navigate to Setup | Administrative Tools and click Go! in the Restart Core Server section. This is to ensure that the MIB and lookups are loaded before doing the discovery.
- Create a new device in PRTG with the address (IP or FQDN) of the device that you want to monitor and configure its SNMP Credentials accordingly.
- Right-click your new device, select Run Auto Discovery With Template, and select the "Custom Cisco FRU v02" from the list. Note: Using the auto-discovery with a dedicated Device Template is convenient here because it automates the creation of the dedicated sensors organized in an SNMP Custom Table Sensor.
- The sensors should be deployed after a couple of seconds.
- You can adjust the Channel limits or lookups to your needs later.
Result
The resulting sensors will look like the one below:
No sensors deployed? :(
Please read ahead for troubleshooting.
Troubleshooting
Got any issues? Please don't hesitate to contact us by replying to this post or by contacting us via a support ticket. Please make sure to link/mention this KB-Post. Please read ahead for troubleshooting steps that you can perform in advance.
Auto-Discovery
Your Auto-Discovery log can tell you a lot about what went wrong during the sensor's deployment. It's possible to troubleshoot the auto-discovery by inspecting the auto-discovery log, if you get entries like the one below ( NOT FOUND) it means that the required OID's aren't available.
[...] 27.12.2016 12:18:54: Device ID: 22848 Name: nue-ws-011 EMULATOR@163 Host: somehost.somedomain.sometld 27.12.2016 12:18:54: Device Templates; Device ID: 22848; Selected: 1 27.12.2016 12:18:54: Template Loaded; Device ID: 22848; Name: Custom Cisco FRU v02 27.12.2016 12:18:55: Template Check; Device ID: 22848; Check ID: ping; FOUND 27.12.2016 12:18:56: Template Check; Device ID: 22848; Check ID: snmp; FOUND 27.12.2016 12:18:57: Template Check; Device ID: 22848; Check ID: entPhysicalTable; FOUND 27.12.2016 12:18:58: Template Check; Device ID: 22848; Check ID: snmp_cefcFRUPowerStatusTable; FOUND 27.12.2016 12:18:59: Template Check; Device ID: 22848; Check ID: snmp_cefcFRUFanTable; FOUND 27.12.2016 12:19:00: Template Check; Device ID: 22848; Check ID: snmp_cefcModuleTable; NOT FOUND [...]
In the case above, we would expect to get the sensors for Fans and Power Supplies, but not for modules, as these were reported as NOT FOUND by the Auto-Discovery Process. This log would also tell you if the discovery was interrupted because the device didn't respond to Ping or to a basic snmp check.
SNMP Data
If the discovery log isn't sufficient, you can review the SNMP Data from your device directly. To do so, please refer to the information below. You should have this information at hand when contacting our Support Team. The text below (in the square) can be saved as .txt and used with the scan script option from our SNMP Tester. This will allow you to review which SNMP Queries succeed and which ones don't deliver any data.
entPhysicalTable walk=1.3.6.1.2.1.47.1.1.1 ---- cefcFRUPowerStatusTable walk=1.3.6.1.4.1.9.9.117.1.1.2 cefcModuleTable walk=1.3.6.1.4.1.9.9.117.1.2.1 cefcFanTrayStatusTable walk=1.3.6.1.4.1.9.9.117.1.4.1 ----
Disclaimer:
The information in the Paessler Knowledge Base comes without warranty of any kind. Use at your own risk. Before applying any instructions please exercise proper system administrator housekeeping. You must make sure that a proper backup of all your data is available.
