Applications Systems

Connection Quality polling fails on Windows Server 2012 nodes in SAM

After enabling Connection Quality polling, SAM deploys agent plugins with Npcap drivers to Windows nodes to support NPing, a tool that generates network packets so SAM can collect TCP connection metrics. Errors may occur after Connection Quality polls for Windows Server 2012 nodes generate an ADM Polling Error event. Restart nodes running Windows Server 2012, reset the related network interface, or install Npcap drivers manually and restart nodes.

First published date

11/12/2018 2:20 AM

Last published date

6/10/2019 6:50 AM

Overview

After you enable Connection Quality polling on the Application Connection Settings page, SAM deploys TCP agent plug-ins with Npcap drivers to Windows nodes to support NPing (©2018 InsecureOrg, available at https://nmap.org/nping, link obtained on March 5, 2018.), an open source tool that generates network packets so SAM can collect TCP connection metrics via synthetic polling. Errors may occur after each Connection Quality poll (every five minutes) for Windows Server 2012 nodes.

Product section

Server Application Monitor

Cause

When Connection Quality polling is enabled, SAM deploys agent plug-ins with Npcap drivers to Windows nodes with application dependencies. Windows Server 2012 nodes may not recognize Npcap drivers due to a network interface service that is also installed with that OS may not bind properly during initialization.

Resolution

Restart nodes running Windows Server 2012 and wait for the next Connection Quality poll to occur in five minutes. If the issue continues, create a list of impacted nodes and follow these steps:

Disable Connection Quality polling on the Application Connection Settings page. SAM will remove all Npcap plug-ins.
Uninstall Npcap. C:\Program Files\Npcap\Uninstall.exe on Windows Server 2012 nodes manually.

3. Restart each Windows Server 2012 machine, which will also reset network interfaces on nodes.

4. Enable Connection Quality polling on the Application Connection Settings page and check polling results.

Two other workarounds include:

Reset the related network interface. If multiple network interfaces are involved, reset all.
Reboot the machine running Windows Server 2012.

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