What is Network Troubleshooting? - The Ultimate Survival Guide

Are you tired of feeling like a lost sailor on a stormy sea of computer problems? Well, fear not, dear reader, for we are about to embark on a journey to demystify the world of network troubleshooting! Intermittent network problems interrupt your flow of work, frustrate users, and can wreak havoc on your business. Troubleshooting network problems as fast as possible is the key to making sure that doesn’t happen.

In this article, we’re running you through what is network troubleshooting, how to troubleshoot network connectivity issues, and how to troubleshoot networks with Network Monitoring and Network Troubleshooting software. We'll equip you with the tools and knowledge you need to navigate the treacherous waters of network issues and emerge victorious. So grab your life jackets and let's set sail!"

Network troubleshooting refers to the combined measures and processes used to identify, locate, and resolve network problems located anywhere along a network, from WAN to LAN.

It's a logical process that network engineers or IT professionals use to resolve network problems and improve network performance. Essentially, to fix, you need to troubleshoot them. When troubleshooting a network, many IT pros will use a network troubleshooting software or various network troubleshooting tools to help with the process.

Network troubleshooting involves a range of techniques and tools, such as network performance monitoring, network analyzers, ping and traceroute utilities, and network performance testing tools. Network administrators and technicians use these tools to identify and diagnose network issues, which may include slow network speeds, connectivity problems, security breaches, and other issues.

Some common steps involved in network troubleshooting include identifying the problem, testing the network, isolating the issue, analyzing network logs, and implementing a solution. This process may require collaboration among network administrators, IT support staff, and other stakeholders to identify and resolve the issue.

Effective network troubleshooting is critical for maintaining reliable network performance, minimizing downtime, and ensuring the security of network resources.

Network troubleshooting is used to identify and resolve issues that can occur in a computer network. Computer networks are complex systems that are made up of various components, such as routers, switches, servers, and cables, that work together to transmit data and enable communication between devices.

When problems occur in a network, they can manifest in many ways, such as slow connection speeds, dropped connections, or complete network outages. Network troubleshooting is used to pinpoint the root cause of these issues, so that they can be resolved quickly and efficiently.

Network troubleshooting involves a range of techniques, including analyzing network traffic, checking hardware and software configurations, and testing network connections. By using these techniques, network administrators can diagnose and resolve issues, ensuring that their networks run smoothly and efficiently.

In summary, network troubleshooting is used to:

• Troubleshoot network issues when a user complains of network or application slowdown or poor connectivity.
• Provides end-to-end visibility to pinpoint the source of a network problem.
• Offers in-depth data about the location, and cause of a problem to quickly provide solutions.

Network troubleshooting isn't just for fixing boring old technical glitches. It's also a superhero that saves the day in many different situations! From battling slow speeds to fighting off security breaches, network troubleshooting is the hero we need, but not always the one we deserve. So put on your cape, grab your utility belt, and let's dive into some exciting network troubleshooting use cases!

There are many different use cases for network troubleshooting. Here are a few examples:

1. Slow network speeds: When users experience slow network speeds, network troubleshooting can be used to identify the cause of the problem. This could be due to a congested network, a faulty switch, or a misconfigured router.
2. Dropped connections: When users experience dropped connections, network troubleshooting can help identify the source of the problem. This could be due to interference from other wireless devices, a faulty network card, or a weak signal.
3. Network outages: When the network goes down, network troubleshooting can be used to quickly identify and resolve the issue. This could be due to a power outage, a failed piece of network hardware, or a configuration issue.
4. Security breaches: Network troubleshooting can also be used to identify and address security breaches. For example, if a user's computer is infected with malware, network troubleshooting can be used to isolate the infected device and prevent the malware from spreading to other devices on the network.
5. Software compatibility issues: When new software is installed on a network, compatibility issues can arise. Network troubleshooting can help identify and resolve these issues, ensuring that the new software works as intended and does not cause any network problems.

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• Identify and troubleshoot live network problems

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Troubleshooting network problems so they stop affecting your users is important. But, what's even better is if you identify and troubleshoot network problems before they affect your end-users. This is what we call proactive network troubleshooting.

Proactive network troubleshooting involves anticipating and addressing potential network issues before they occur, rather than simply reacting to problems as they arise and is done through Continuous Network Monitoring. It typically involves using network monitoring tools to identify performance trends and potential issues, as well as regularly auditing network configurations and implementing best practices to prevent problems.

It is important because it gives you a real-time overview of your network at all times, so you can identify, locate, and solve issues before they start affecting end-users, therefore before you receive complaints, and (for Service Providers especially) before it hurts your reputation. By taking a proactive approach to network troubleshooting, organizations can reduce downtime, improve network performance, and enhance overall network security.

With the increasing complexity of technology and network infrastructures, Network Monitoring has become an integral part of any business that needs to ensure the proper functioning of their network, devices, and applications.

Network Monitoring is generally used for three main purposes:

• Network Assessments
• Network Troubleshooting (like in we talk about in this article)
• Continuous Network Monitoring.

The longer network problems exist in your network infrastructure, the more disruptions they cause. Which is why network troubleshooting is essential.

Because so many businesses depend on high-functioning networks that can span across several locations, poor network performance can impact a number of different factors like:

1.IT Services:

• Poor VoIP Quality causing choppy voice and video calls
• Slow Internet performance
• Slowdown of critical applications such as ERP, CRM, finance, and ecommerce systems.
• VPN connection problems
• Failing Citrix, RDP or Terminal Server sessions
• Low transfer rate

2. Business Affairs:

• Wasted time and productivity
• Overworked IT infrastructure
• Increased operating costs
• Damaged reputation
• Loss of income

3. Clients and Users:

• Lost productivity
• Frustration and disengagement
• Increased user complaints

• Bad customer experience

  Becuase of that, network troubleshooting is important for several reasons:

• Downtime Reduction: Network downtime can be costly for businesses, causing lost productivity, revenue, and customer dissatisfaction. By quickly identifying and resolving network issues, network troubleshooting can help minimize downtime and keep business operations running smoothly.
• Increased Network Performance: Network troubleshooting helps identify performance bottlenecks, configuration issues, and security vulnerabilities, which can all negatively impact network performance. By addressing these issues, network troubleshooting can help improve network performance and enhance the end-user experience.
• Cost Savings: Network troubleshooting can help businesses save money by preventing unnecessary hardware replacement, reducing the need for expensive IT support, and optimizing network resources. By identifying and resolving issues quickly, network troubleshooting can help minimize the costs associated with network downtime.
• Enhanced Security: Network troubleshooting can help identify security vulnerabilities, such as malware infections, unauthorized access, or weak passwords. By addressing these issues, network troubleshooting can help prevent security breaches and protect sensitive data from unauthorized access.
• Improved User Experience: Network troubleshooting can help ensure that end-users have a positive experience when using network resources. By optimizing network performance, resolving connectivity issues, and preventing downtime, network troubleshooting can help enhance the end-user experience and increase user satisfaction.

In summary, network troubleshooting is important for maintaining a reliable, secure, and high-performing network, which is critical for businesses of all sizes and industries.

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Ready to add some new tricks to your network troubleshooting toolbox? Get ready to tap into your inner network ninja with these network troubleshooting techniques! From ping and traceroute to port scanning and packet analysis, these techniques will help you become a master of network problem-solving. So sharpen your sword, don your ninja outfit, and let's dive into the exciting world of network troubleshooting techniques!

There are many different network troubleshooting techniques that can be used to identify and resolve network issues. Here are a few examples:

This complete, end-to-end network troubleshooting technique involves the use of network monitoring software, like Obkio to identify issues and monitor network performance in real-time. This technique is particularly useful for identifying issues such as congestion, bandwidth issues, and security threats, and is a valuable network troubleshooting technique that involves the continuous monitoring of network performance and activity to identify and resolve issues.

Network monitoring allows network administrators to:

• Detect issues early: Network monitoring helps detect issues as soon as they occur, allowing administrators to quickly address them before they escalate into bigger problems.
• Identify performance issues: Network monitoring can help identify performance issues such as slow network speeds, packet loss, and high latency.
• Track network activity: Network monitoring can help track network activity, including which devices are connected to the network, what applications are being used, and how much bandwidth is being consumed.
• Alert administrators: Network monitoring tools can alert administrators of issues through notifications, emails, or text messages, allowing for quick resolution.
• Analyze historical data: Network monitoring software can store and analyze historical data, allowing administrators to identify long-term trends and patterns and plan for future network upgrades and changes.

Network monitoring is especially useful for troubleshooting issues related to network congestion, bandwidth usage, and security threats. By monitoring network traffic, administrators can identify abnormal activity and quickly address any security threats or breaches.

In summary, network monitoring is a powerful network troubleshooting technique that allows administrators to detect and resolve issues in real-time, analyze historical data, and improve overall network performance and security.

Ping is a basic network troubleshooting technique that sends a small packet of data to a device on the network to verify if it's reachable. The ping tool measures the round-trip time for the data packet to be sent from the source device to the destination device and back. If the destination device responds to the ping request, it indicates that the device is reachable and there is no issue with network connectivity.

Ping is a useful troubleshooting tool because it can help identify several network issues, such as:

• Network connectivity issues: Ping can help identify whether a device is reachable on the network, which can be useful in troubleshooting network connectivity issues.
• DNS issues: If the ping fails to resolve a domain name into an IP address, it can indicate a problem with the DNS configuration.
• Firewall issues: Ping can help identify firewall issues by determining whether the firewall is blocking incoming or outgoing traffic to a specific device.
• Network latency: The round-trip time reported by ping can help identify network latency issues, which can impact network performance.

Ping is a quick and easy network troubleshooting tool, but it does have limitations. For example, if a device is configured to block incoming ping requests, the tool may report that the device is not reachable even though it is functioning normally. Additionally, the tool does not provide detailed information about the nature of network issues.

In summary, while ping is a simple and useful network troubleshooting tool, it should be used in conjunction with other techniques for a more comprehensive analysis of network issues.

Traceroute is a network troubleshooting technique that helps identify the path that network packets take from the source device to the destination device. It works by sending a series of packets to the destination device, with each packet having a different time-to-live (TTL) value. Each router along the path to the destination device decrements the TTL value, and if it reaches zero, it discards the packet and sends an ICMP "Time Exceeded" message back to the source device.

Traceroute uses the ICMP protocol to identify the routers along the path to the destination device, and it reports the IP address, hostname, and response time of each router. This information helps network administrators identify the location of network issues and diagnose latency or connectivity problems.

Some of the uses of traceroute as a network troubleshooting technique include:

• Identifying network routing issues: Traceroute helps identify routing issues by reporting the IP address and hostname of each router along the path to the destination device.
• Identifying network latency issues: The response time reported by traceroute helps identify latency issues and can help identify where delays are occurring along the path to the destination device.
• Diagnosing connectivity issues: Traceroute can help diagnose connectivity issues by identifying where packets are dropping or being lost along the path to the destination device.

Traceroute is a valuable network troubleshooting technique that can help administrators identify and resolve network issues. However, it does have limitations. For example, some routers are configured to block ICMP packets, which can result in incomplete traceroute reports. Additionally, traceroute only reports the path taken by network packets and does not provide detailed information about the nature of network issues.

In summary, traceroute is a powerful network troubleshooting technique that helps identify network routing and latency issues, as well as diagnose connectivity issues. It should be used in conjunction with other network troubleshooting tools for a comprehensive analysis of network issues.

While port scanning is often used as a reconnaissance tool by hackers, it can also be used as a network troubleshooting technique by network administrators. A port scanner is a software tool that scans a range of network ports on a device to determine which ports are open and accepting incoming connections. This information is useful for network administrators who need to verify that their devices are properly configured and secure.

Here are some ways that port scanning can be used as a network troubleshooting technique:

• Identifying open ports: Port scanning can be used to identify which ports are open on a device, which is useful for verifying that services are running and accessible.
• Verifying firewall rules: Port scanning can be used to verify that firewall rules are configured correctly and that the necessary ports are open to allow traffic to flow.
• Checking for rogue devices: Port scanning can be used to identify any unauthorized devices on the network that may be accepting incoming connections on unsecured ports.
• Checking for vulnerabilities: Port scanning can be used to identify any vulnerabilities in the network by identifying open ports that are commonly exploited by attackers.

It's important to note that port scanning can also be used by attackers to identify potential vulnerabilities on a network, so it should be used carefully and with appropriate security precautions in place.

In summary, port scanning can be a useful network troubleshooting technique for network administrators to identify open ports, verify firewall rules, check for rogue devices, and identify potential vulnerabilities. However, it should be used with caution and appropriate security measures in place to avoid unintended consequences.

Configuration auditing is a network troubleshooting technique that involves reviewing and verifying the configuration settings of network devices to ensure that they are properly configured and compliant with organizational policies and industry best practices. It is an important technique for ensuring the security, reliability, and performance of network devices.

Here are some ways that configuration auditing can be used as a network troubleshooting technique:

• Identifying configuration errors: Configuration auditing can be used to identify configuration errors that may be causing network issues or security vulnerabilities. For example, misconfigured network settings can cause devices to not function properly, resulting in connectivity issues.
• Verifying compliance: Configuration auditing can be used to verify that network devices are configured in compliance with organizational policies and industry best practices. For example, it can ensure that devices have been configured with appropriate security settings and that they are using the latest software updates and patches.
• Improving performance: Configuration auditing can be used to optimize network device configurations to improve network performance. For example, it can identify unused or unnecessary services that can be disabled to improve device performance.
• Enhancing security: Configuration auditing can be used to identify security vulnerabilities in network devices, such as weak passwords or open ports that can be exploited by attackers. It can also identify configuration settings that may increase the risk of security breaches, such as unnecessary services running on devices.

Configuration auditing can be performed manually or using automated tools that can scan and analyze device configurations. Automated tools are often preferred because they can perform configuration audits more quickly and thoroughly than manual methods.

In summary, configuration auditing is a valuable network troubleshooting technique that can help identify configuration errors, verify compliance with organizational policies and industry best practices, improve network performance, and enhance security. By using configuration auditing, network administrators can ensure that their devices are properly configured and functioning optimally.

Packet analysis is a network troubleshooting technique that involves capturing and analyzing network traffic to identify issues with the network. It is a powerful tool for diagnosing and resolving network issues because it provides detailed information about how data is flowing through the network.

Here are some ways that packet analysis can be used as a network troubleshooting technique:

• Identifying network bottlenecks: Packet analysis can be used to identify where network traffic is being slowed down or congested, which can help network administrators pinpoint where network bottlenecks are occurring.
• Diagnosing application issues: Packet analysis can help diagnose application issues by providing detailed information about how data is flowing between applications and network devices. For example, it can identify issues with application protocols or data formats that may be causing problems.
• Analyzing security incidents: Packet analysis can be used to analyze security incidents, such as malware infections or network intrusions. By examining network traffic, network administrators can identify the source of the incident and determine how it spread throughout the network.
• Verifying network configurations: Packet analysis can be used to verify that network devices are configured correctly and that traffic is flowing as expected. For example, it can confirm that network policies are being enforced and that network devices are properly configured to handle different types of traffic.

Packet analysis requires specialized tools that can capture and analyze network traffic. These tools can provide detailed information about packet headers, payload data, and protocol information. They can also generate graphs and charts that help visualize network traffic and identify patterns.

In summary, packet analysis is a powerful network troubleshooting technique that can help identify network bottlenecks, diagnose application issues, analyze security incidents, and verify network configurations. By using packet analysis, network administrators can ensure that their networks are functioning optimally and securely.

Firmware updates are a network troubleshooting technique that involves updating the software that controls the hardware components of network devices. Firmware updates can be used to fix bugs, address security vulnerabilities, and improve device performance.

Here are some ways that firmware updates can be used as a network troubleshooting technique:

• Addressing software bugs: Firmware updates can be used to address software bugs that may be causing network issues. For example, a firmware update can fix a bug that causes a network device to crash or behave unpredictably.
• Patching security vulnerabilities: Firmware updates can be used to patch security vulnerabilities that may be present in network devices. For example, a firmware update can address a vulnerability that allows attackers to gain unauthorized access to a network device.
• Improving device performance: Firmware updates can be used to improve device performance by adding new features or improving existing ones. For example, a firmware update can add support for new networking protocols or improve the speed of data transfer.
• Enhancing compatibility: Firmware updates can be used to enhance compatibility with other network devices or software. For example, a firmware update can add support for a new type of network card or improve interoperability with a specific software application.

Firmware updates can be performed manually or using automated tools that can scan and analyze network devices to identify outdated firmware versions. Automated tools are often preferred because they can perform firmware updates more quickly and thoroughly than manual methods.

In summary, firmware updates are an important network troubleshooting technique that can help address software bugs, patch security vulnerabilities, improve device performance, and enhance compatibility. By keeping their network devices up-to-date with the latest firmware versions, network administrators can ensure that their networks are functioning optimally and securely.

Even the best designed networks are not immune to problems. With the growing complexity of network infrastructures, problems are bound to happen, but just harder to pinpoint. All IT managers generally agree on one thing: it’s not about whether there will be network problems, but rather when they will occur and how to solve them as soon as possible.

Are you tired of constantly putting out fires on your network? Want to take a proactive approach to network troubleshooting? Look no further than network monitoring!

In order to troubleshoot a network as efficiently and painlessly as possible, it’s important to have some best practices or steps in mind that you can follow every time. For this tutorial, we're going to show you how to perform network troubleshooting using the Network Monitoring Technique!

Not only does it provide a real-time view of network activity, but it also enables you to detect and resolve issues quickly, allocate resources more effectively, and enhance network security. Say goodbye to network headaches and hello to smooth sailing with network monitoring!

Most businesses don’t have time to manually assess every part of their network to find the cause of a problem. When you have a flood of user complaints and the executive team breathing down your, it can be overwhelming to try to find the problem, let alone fix it.

Luckily, there are several network troubleshooting tools available in the vault of a network administrator or IT specialist - the most important being Network Monitoring. A great network monitoring software, like Obkio Network Performance Monitoring software will provide continuous end-to-end monitoring of your network performance, to identify problems and collect the information you need to troubleshoot, all with one tool!

Obkio continuously monitors end-to-end network performance with synthetic traffic using Network Monitoring Agents. The Agents exchange synthetic traffic to measure network metrics, like packet loss, between each other, identify network issues, and collect the information to help you troubleshoot.

Get started for free!

Issues can arise at numerous points along the network. To start troubleshooting a network, you want to have a clear understanding of what the problem is, how it happened, who it’s affecting, when it occurred, and how long it’s been going on.

Once you’ve deployed Obkio Monitoring Agents in your key network locations, they will start measuring key network metrics like jitter, packet loss, and latency and displaying them on Obkio’s Network Response Time Graph.

Obkio's Network Response Time Graph and VoIP Quality Graph showing Latency, Jitter, and Packet Loss

By gathering the right information and clarifying the problem, you’ll have a much better chance of resolving the issue quickly, without wasting time trying unnecessary fixes. Network troubleshooting helps you get all the information you need about:

• What network problems are affecting your network or application performance.
• Where the network issues are located anywhere along your network.
• Who the owner of the problem is (user, application, network, or ISP), and who is responsible for fixing it.
• How to solve problems for a quick and smooth fix.

To begin the network troubleshooting process, you've got to catch and isolate the network problem.

To do this, compare the monitoring sessions you created from deploying Obkio's NPM tool.

As a reference, below is an example of a Network Session with no network problems.

If you're not experiencing a network problem, it might be a user issue. In this case, you can troubleshoot by installing a Monitoring Agent directly on a user’s workstation (the user who is experiencing the performance problems) to see the issue from their point-of-view.

If you still don’t find that it’s a network problem at this point, it may just be a problem that IT specialists can troubleshoot and resolve directly on the user's workstation or on the remote destination. The problem could be several other hardware-intensive videoconferencing systems, which use up a lot of resources (CPU, RAM).

Obkio monitors these other resource metrics as well.

In the screenshot below is an example of a network problem on both network sessions.

In this case, the network problem is on a network segment that is common to both network sessions. This means that the problem is:

• Broader and not exclusive to a single network path or destination.
• Affects all services and applications dependent on the network.
• Could be happening in LAN, the firewall or the local loop Internet connection.

In the screenshot below is an example of a network problem on only one network session.

This means that the network problem is happening specifically towards that specific location on the Internet and that the problem is further away.

If the network problem is on both network sessions, compare that data using Obkio’s Device Monitoring feature to further understand if the network issue is happening on your end, or over the Internet, in your Service Provider’s network.

Believe it or not, many network problems may be caused by faulty hardware, bad physical connections, or incorrect configurations. When you begin the troubleshooting process, check all your hardware to make sure it’s correctly connected, turned on, and working.

If a cord has come loose or has broken, or somebody has switched off an important router, this could be the problem behind your network issues. There’s no point in going through the process of troubleshooting network issues if all you need to do is replace a cord, so make sure all switches are in the correct positions and haven’t been bumped accidentally.

Here are some general network troubleshooting steps for network hardware that can help you identify and resolve network issues:

1. Check physical connections: Ensure that all physical connections are secure and correctly plugged in. Loose or damaged cables can cause network connectivity issues.
2. Restart devices: Power cycle the affected devices, including the router, switch, and modem. Sometimes, this can resolve the issue by resetting the devices and clearing out any temporary network configurations.
3. Check network settings: Verify that the network settings, including IP addresses, subnet masks, and default gateways, are correctly configured. Misconfigured network settings can cause connectivity issues.
4. Update firmware and software: Ensure that the devices and software used in the network are updated to the latest versions. Newer versions can contain bug fixes and performance improvements that can resolve network issues.

Going through to check every cord one-by-one can be tiresome and a gigantic loss of time. Thankfully, a network performance monitoring software like Obkio monitors problems within your network interface that are commonly caused by hardware!

When you compare your previous data with Device Monitoring metrics, you may find CPU or Bandwidth issues. These resource issues likely means that the network issue is on your end and you need to troubleshoot internally.

Here are a few network troubleshooting suggestions got CPU or bandwidth issues:

1. Traffic Analysis: Examine your firewall logs to determine if the traffic passing through your network is legitimate. This will help identify potential security breaches such as data exfiltration or improper data backup during business hours.

2. Firewall Management: Prioritize important traffic in order to reduce congestion during periods of high traffic. This ensures that traffic to and from critical applications is given priority and is less likely to cause network congestion.

3. Bandwidth Upgrade: Contact your Internet Service Provider (ISP) to upgrade your bandwidth if you are experiencing bandwidth constraints.

4. Resource Investigation: Investigate the reason for missing resources and high CPU usage on your device. This may be due to a software issue, firmware update requirement, buggy software update, or simply inadequate resources, which can be resolved by upgrading to a more powerful device.

If you don’t see any resource issues from your devices, this is a sign that the network problem is actually on your Service Provider’s end.

If you suspect that the issue is with your ISP, you should open a service ticket and provide as much information as possible to support your claim. This will help to quickly escalate the issue past the first level of support. Additionally, Obkio's app can serve as a valuable tool to aid in this process.

The data you can provide is that from your dashboard in the previous steps, as well as your Traceroutes in the next step.

The next step in the network troubleshooting process is to collect the last bit of data to help you pinpoint exactly where the network problem is located so you can share that information with your Service Provider.

To do this, we’ll be using Obkio Vision, Obkio’s free Visual Traceroute tool that runs continuously to interpret Traceroute results to identify network problems in your WAN and over the Internet.

Note: If the network problem happening only on your end, you don’t need to do this step. It’ll just give you the same results.

Use Traceroutes, the Network Map, and the Quality Matrix to identify if:

A. The network issue is happening specifically towards a specific location over the Internet. So only one specific site is being affected.

Obkio Vision Network Map

B. The network issue is on your ISP’s side. At this point, open a service ticket with as much information as you can collect.

Obkio Vision Traceroutes

If you encounter an issue, it is recommended to contact your Service Provider (MSP or ISP) for assistance with troubleshooting. However, this time, you won't have to deal with first-level support simply instructing you to "reboot your modem." Armed with the data collected using Obkio, you can hold your Service Provider accountable and provide them with all the necessary information to effectively troubleshoot the issue.

1. Contact your ISP to get technical support using the screenshots of Monitoring Sessions, Dashboards or Traceroutes in Vision.
2. Share results of Live Traceroutes with your ISP using a public link.
3. If your ISP wants to analyze your data further, you can create a temporary Read-Only User in your Obkio account for them.

By sharing traceroute results, ISP network engineers can see the problem, change the traceroute options and validate that their changes are fixing the issue without having to get back to you.

Your ISP will then be able to confirm if your analysis is good or not, and if they can fix the issue at hand. If you have the chance to have a good ISP, they will also explain why your analysis is wrong if this is the case.

At this point, if you're still ensure of the cause of the issue, one last thing you can do it perform a DNS check.

DNS, which stands for Domain Name System, is a directory for the Internet (and every internet-connected device) that matches domain names with IP addresses. Every single website has its own IP address on the web, and computers can connect to other computers via the Internet and look up websites using their IP address.

Use the “nslookup” command to determine whether there’s a problem with the server you’re trying to connect to. If you perform a DNS check on, for example, google.com and receive results such as “Timed Out,” “Server Failure,” “Refused,” “No Response from Server,” or “Network Is Unreachable,” it may indicate the problem originates in the DNS server for your destination. (You can also use nslookup to check your own DNS server.)

With Obkio’s Application Performance Monitoring (APM) for HTTP URLs feature, users can now monitor DNS performance! DNS is key to URL monitoring, and is one of the five steps to download the content of a single URL.

Continuing to monitor network performance is a crucial step in network troubleshooting. After implementing a fix, it's essential to ensure that the network is operating optimally and that the issue is resolved.

Here's why continuing to monitor network performance is important:

• Verify that the issue is resolved: Continuing to monitor the network performance can help you ensure that the issue is resolved. If the issue persists, you may need to investigate further and implement additional fixes.
• Identify new issues: Even if the original issue is resolved, new issues may arise. Continuously monitoring the network performance can help you identify any new issues and address them proactively.
• Optimize network performance: Monitoring the network performance can help you identify areas of the network that can be optimized for better performance. For example, you may find that some devices or applications are using an excessive amount of bandwidth, causing performance issues for other devices on the network.
• Ensure network security: Monitoring the network performance can help you identify potential security threats and breaches. You can set up alerts to notify you of any suspicious network activity and take action to prevent security breaches.

In summary, continuing to monitor network performance after troubleshooting helps you ensure that the network is operating optimally and proactively address any new issues that may arise.

We’re running you through an example of when and how network troubleshooting can help you resolve networks problems!

Let’s say that users in your company start reporting intermittent network performance and slowness issues, like choppy VoIP Quality and lagginess which makes voice calls incomprehensible.

VoIP Quality is highly reliant on network performance, which means that many network problems like packet loss, latency, and jitter can cause high levels of VoIP degradation.

If you’re a member of the IT team, you’re definitely the first person that users come to with their complaints. Which means that you now need to solve the problems fast because employees are wasting time and the executive team is breathing down your neck.

When you're looking into how to troubleshoot network connectivity problems, deploy a network monitoring and network troublshooting tool that measures end-to-end network performance to pinpoint network issues located within your business’ LAN, Firewalls, or internet infrastructure.

Get a 360-degree view of network and application performance to help you identify network performance issues you never would have had visibility of before.

Monitoring network performance using a network performance monitoring software continuously measures the most critical network performance metrics to find issues, even before your users experience them.

That means that you can stay on top of problems by proactively identifying if problems are related to the network, where they are located and when they occurred, even if they happened in the past.

With information about what, where, how, and when network problems occurred, you can drastically improve the time it takes you to troubleshoot and solve problems!

Congratulations, network troubleshooters! You've made it to the end of the ultimate survival guide for network troubleshooting. Armed with the knowledge of network troubleshooting techniques, steps, and tools, you're ready to tackle any network issue that comes your way.

Remember, network troubleshooting is not just about fixing problems, but also about optimizing network performance and ensuring network security. By following the network troubleshooting steps and using the appropriate tools, you can quickly identify the root cause of network issues and implement the necessary fixes to ensure optimal performance.

And let's not forget the importance of monitoring network performance even after fixing an issue. By continuing to monitor the network, you can ensure that the issue is resolved, identify any new issues, optimize network performance, and ensure network security.

As mentioned earlier, the easiest and most accurate way to troubleshoot networks is by using a Network Monitoring and Network Troubleshooting software, like Obkio.

Obkio is a simple Network Monitoring software for Enterprises and service providers that allows users to continuously monitor end-to-end performance of their network and core business applications to identify network issues, collect data on network performance, and improve the end-user experience!

Obkio is the ultimate network troubleshooting survival tool - Get started with Obkio for free!