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Measuring wireless users bandwidth

Is there a free or very cheap method of measuring wireless users bandwidth usage? Ive got an 8 Meg connection with a Netgear DG834G modem and 5 access points throughout the building. I have a windows SBS2003 server but the wireless users are not on the domain but on an freely accessible side of the network. I dont have enough users to justify buying the products I've seen so far. Thanks Kieran

Reply to
kierankelly
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Any reason why you didn't bother specifying the model numbers of your

5 access points?

Two reasons why it's not going to happen with the DG834G.

  1. It does not support SNMP which is used for almost all traffic graphing programs (MRTG, RRDTool)
  2. It's a combined DSL and wireless router. You would need access to the connection between the DSL modem and the router section in order to sniff the internet traffic.

If you want to do this, get a wireless router, or wireless access points that support SNMP. This incidentally, is one reason why I recommend buying seperate boxes for modem, router, and wireless.

See:

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SNMP graphing tools.

Here's an example of wireless traffic monitoring at a university:

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on the graphs for history.

Reply to
Jeff Liebermann

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Click on the graphs for history.

Reply to
frankdowling1

Sure. Any SNMP MIB browser will work for extracting numbers from any SNMP enabled device includeing the WRT54G with Sveasoft firmware. Sveasoft includes parts of NET-SNMP (see

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The problem is how to enable and configure SNMP in the router. I've been meaning to scribble a web page on how to do it for MRTG and RRDTool.

Meanwhile, if you want to Learn by Destroying, find and download GetIF

2.3.1 which is a MIB browser. Enable SNMP on the Administration page. Leave the read password as "public" and the write password as "private". Point GetIF 2.3.1 at the IP address of the WRT54G and see if you can get it to display a MIB tree (huge list of OID's and values). If you get that far, I can fill in the rest of the destructions quite easily.
Reply to
Jeff Liebermann

All my access points are D-Link DWL-900AP+ I do have in a box a D-Link DI-804HV. I could use that perhaps and disable the wireless on the DG834G? Thanks for your response.

Kieran

Reply to
kierankelly

Yep. The DWL-900AP+ has SNMP. You'll need it to identify the OID's and run a MIB browser. You'll also need IEEE802dot11-MIB. Digging...

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  1. Download and install GetIF 2.3.1 from:
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  2. Copy the above MIB files to the directory: C:\PROGRAM FILES\GETIF 2.3.1\MIBS\
  3. Erase the file C:\PROGRAM FILES\GETIF 2.3.1\.index Running the program will recreate the index file if it's missing. Every time you add a MIB database to the MIBS directory, erase the files.
  4. Run GetIF and point the IP address as the DWL-900AP+ Hit start and browse the MIB tree. Lots of OID's and numbers to play with.

GetIF will NOT draw pretty graphs and record traffic and use history like MRTG and RRDTool. However, it's a fairly easy program to use to browse the MIB tree with SNMP to see what's available.

Reply to
Jeff Liebermann

Here's another idea. I was blundering around the web and found:

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is a program that generates traffic reports on multiple WRT54G access points using SNMP. If the program uses the usual ifInOctets, ifOutOctets, and such, then it should work with the DWL-900AP+ SNMP. I still prefer the graphs from MRTG and RRDTool, but this looks like an easier program to install and use. I haven't tried it yet.

Reply to
Jeff Liebermann

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