Monitoring a Windows host
You can monitor your Windows host with Instana. Instana provides comprehensive insights into the Windows host's performance, health, and resource utilization, enabling efficient troubleshooting, performance optimization, and proactive issue detection.
System information
Instana retrieves various system details from the host. You can view the following details of the host on the Instana GUI in the System pane:
| Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| OS | The details of the operating system, the kernel version, and the architecture. |
| CPU | The details of the CPU and the count. |
| Memory | The amount of system memory in GiB (gigabytes). |
| Hostname | The hostname of the host machine. |
| FQDN | The fully qualified domain name. It is the complete domain name of the host, including the subdomain and top-level domain. |
| Machine ID | The unique identifier for the host that is generated during the installation of the host distribution. |
| System ID* | The custom identifier used by Instana to uniquely represent and manage the monitored host within its monitoring. System ID is used for correlation with asset management systems. |
| Host ID | The MAC address of the host's network interface, which is a unique identifier for the network adapter. |
| Started At | The time at which the host machine started. |
*For Windows, you need to enable System ID by using the agent configuration YAML file as shown in the following example:
"com.instana.plugin.host":
"collectSystemId": true
Interfaces
You can find the following details:
- Interfaces: The list of network interfaces and IP addresses.
- Instana agent: The Instana agent for the host.
- Process: The count and details of the processes that are running on the host.
Performance metrics
The following performance metrics are displayed for the host.
CPU usage - percentage
The CPU usage values, when combined, provide a detailed view of how the CPU resources are being utilized on a host.
| Metric | Description | Granularity |
|---|---|---|
| CPU Usage | The total CPU usage in percentage for the time range that you set. | 1 second |
Memory usage
| Metric | Description | Granularity |
|---|---|---|
| Memory Usage | The total memory usage in percentage | 1 second |
CPU usage - total
| Metric | Description | Granularity |
|---|---|---|
| User | The amount of CPU time spent running user-space processes (applications and services). | 1 second |
| System | The amount of CPU time spent running kernel-space processes (OS core functions). | 1 second |
| Wait | The amount of CPU time spent waiting for input/output operations to complete. | 1 second |
| Nice | The amount of CPU time spent running processes with a lower priority (nice value). | 1 second |
| Steal | The amount of CPU time lost due to the hypervisor managing other virtual machines or containers on the same physical host. | 1 second |
Individual CPU Usage
The CPU usage metric displays the following metrics in percentage on a graph for a selected time period for each CPU:
| Metric | Description | Granularity |
|---|---|---|
| User | The amount of CPU time spent running user-space processes (applications and services). | 1 second |
| System | The amount of CPU time spent running kernel-space processes (OS core functions). | 1 second |
| Wait | The amount of CPU time spent waiting for input/output operations to complete. | 1 second |
| Nice | The amount of CPU time spent running processes with a lower priority (nice value). | 1 second |
| Steal | The amount of CPU time lost due to the hypervisor managing other virtual machines or containers on the same physical host. | 1 second |
Datapoint: Filesystem
Individual GPU usage
The following table outlines the Individual GPU usage values:
| Metric | Description | Granularity | Unit |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gpu Usage | GPU usage percentage | 1 second | % |
| Temperature | GPU temperature in Celsius | 1 second | °C |
| Encoder | Encoder utilization | 1 second | % |
| Decoder | Decoder utilization | 1 second | % |
| Memory Used | Memory usage | 1 second | % |
| Memory Total | Total GPU memory | 1 second | bytes |
| Transmitted throughput | Transmitted data rate | 1 second | bytes/s |
| Received throughput | Received data rate | 1 second | bytes/s |
The metric is collected from nvidia-smi. The following table outlines the supported version of Nvidia graphics cards:
| Brand | Model |
|---|---|
| Tesla | S1070, S2050, C1060, C2050/70, M2050/70/90, X2070/90, K10, K20, K20X, K40, K80, M40, P40, P100, V100 |
| Quadro | 4000, 5000, 6000, 7000, M2070-Q, K-series, M-series, P-series, RTX-series |
| GeForce | Varying levels of support, with fewer metrics available than on the Tesla and Quadro products |
Prerequisites
You must install the latest official Nvidia drivers.
For more information about starting a Docker container for Instana Agent with GPU support, see Enable GPU monitoring through Instana Agent container.
Data collection of GPU metrics is carefully designed for minimal impact by splitting polling and querying into two processes by using nvidia-smi. The background process is started in a loop mode and kept in memory. This process
significantly improves the performance of metrics collection and prevents any potential overhead.
The sensor queries GPU metrics based on the configured poll rate (every second by default). The solution enables the sensor to collect accurate and up-to-date metrics every second for multiple GPUs without the overhead.
GPU Memory/Process
The following list of processes uses GPU:
| Datapoint | Collected from | Granularity |
|---|---|---|
Process Name |
nvidia-smi |
1 second |
PID |
nvidia-smi |
1 second |
GPU |
nvidia-smi |
1 second |
Memory |
nvidia-smi |
1 second |
The following table outlines the supported version of Nvidia graphics cards for GPU memory:
| Brand | Model |
|---|---|
| Tesla | S1070, S2050, C1060, C2050/70, M2050/70/90, X2070/90, K10, K20, K20X, K40, K80, M40, P40, P100, V100 |
| Quadro | 4000, 5000, 6000, 7000, M2070-Q, K-series, M-series, P-series, RTX-series |
| GeForce | Varying levels of support, with fewer metrics available than on the Tesla and Quadro products |
Memory
The following table outlines the unit for memory:
| Metric | Unit | Description | Granularity |
|---|---|---|---|
| Used | Percentage | Amount of memory in use | 1 second |
The values are displayed on a graph for a selected time period.
Datapoint: Filesystem
File system
These metrics provide insights into file system performance, capacity, and usage, allowing administrators to monitor and optimize their storage systems effectively.
| Metric | Description | Granularity |
|---|---|---|
| Device | The name of the device. | 60 seconds |
| Options | The options or parameters that are used when mounting the file system. | 60 seconds |
| Free | The amount of free space available on the file system. | 1 second |
| Leaked | Space that has been allocated but not used, considered "leaked" or wasted. | 1 second |
| Type | The type of file system. | 60 seconds |
| Capacity | The total capacity of the file system. | 60 seconds |
| Used | The amount of space used on the file system. | 1 second |
Datapoint: Filesystem
* The total, read, and write usage datapoint metrics display the disk I/O utilization as a percentage.
* Leaked (refers to deleted files that are in use and equates to capacity - used - free. You can find these files with lsof | grep deleted).
** The Total Utilization, Read Utilization, and Write Utilization datapoints are not supported for Network File Systems (NFS).
By default, Instana only monitors local file systems. You can list the file systems that are monitored or excluded in the configuration.yaml file.
The name for the configuration setting is the device name, which you can obtain from the first column of mtab file or df command output.
You must specify temporary file systems in the following format: tmpfs:/mount/point.
The following example shows the list of file systems that are monitored:
com.instana.plugin.host:
filesystems:
- '/dev/sda1'
- 'tmpfs:/sys/fs/cgroup'
- 'server:/usr/local/pub'
The following example shows the file systems that are included or excluded:
com.instana.plugin.host:
filesystems:
include:
- '/dev/xvdd'
- 'tmpfs:/tmp'
- 'server:/usr/local/pub'
exclude:
- '/dev/xvda2'
Network File Systems (NFS)
To monitor all NFS, use the nfs_all: true configuration parameter as shown in the following example:
com.instana.plugin.host:
nfs_all: true
Network interfaces
The following table outlines the network traffic and errors per an interface.
| Metric | Description | Granularity |
|---|---|---|
| Interface | The network interface being used for communication. | 60 seconds |
| Mac | The Media Access Control (MAC) address of the network interface. | 60 seconds |
| IPs | The IP addresses assigned to the network interface. | 60 seconds |
| RX Bytes | The total number of bytes received by the network interface per second. | 1 second |
| RX Errors | The percentage of errors encountered while receiving data on the network interface. | 1 second |
| TX Bytes | The total number of bytes transmitted by the network interface per second. | 1 second |
| TX Errors | The percentage of errors encountered while transmitting data on the network interface. | 1 second |
| Received/s | The number of packets received by the network interface per second. | 1 second |
| Transmitted/s | The number of packets transmitted by the network interface per second. | 1 second |
Datapoint: Filesystem
TCP activity
These metrics provide insights into TCP connection activity, including established connections, segment transmission rates, and error occurrences.
| Metric | Description | Granularity |
|---|---|---|
| Established | The number of established TCP connections. | 1 second |
| Open/s | The number of new TCP connections opened per second. | 1 second |
| In Segments/s | The number of incoming TCP segments per second. | 1 second |
| Out Segments/s | The number of outgoing TCP segments per second. | 1 second |
| Established Resets | Percentage of established TCP connections that were reset per second. | 1 second |
| Out Resets | Percentage of outgoing TCP connections that were reset per second. | 1 second |
| Fail | Percentage of failed TCP connection attempts per second. | 1 second |
| Error | Percentage of TCP errors per second. | 1 second |
| Retransmission | Percentage of TCP retransmissions per second. | 1 second |
Datapoint: Filesystem
Windows services list
Windows services are not monitored by default. This feature is enabled only when winServiceRegex is entered in the configuration.yaml file.
The winServiceRegex is a regular expression that is used to monitor services whose service name or display name matches the regular expression. For example, winServiceRegex: '(Sensor|Device)' monitors all services
that include Sensor or Device in their service name or display name.
| Metric | Description | Granularity |
|---|---|---|
| Service Name | Service name | 60 seconds |
| Display Name | Display name | 60 seconds |
| PID | Process ID | 60 seconds |
| State | Service state | 60 seconds |
The metrics are collected from Windows sc queryex.
Process top list
These metrics offer insights into running processes, including their process ID, name, CPU usage, normalized CPU usage, and memory consumption. The top process list is updated every 30 seconds and the list contains only the processes with system usage. For example, the processes with more than 10% CPU usage over the last 30 seconds or processes with more than 512 MB memory usage (RSS) are displayed in the process top list.
To create a combined list of processes from the top 10 CPU and memory usage lists, set combineTopProcesses to true. The processes are included in the combined list even if their CPU usage is less than 10% or memory
usage is less than 512 MB. If the same process is listed in the top 10 CPU and top 10 memory usage lists, it is listed only once in the combined list, which can include up to 20 entries.
com.instana.plugin.host:
combineTopProcesses: true
Linux top semantics are used. 100% CPU refers to full use of a single CPU core, and you can search a history of snapshots from the previous month. The normalized CPU is calculated by dividing the CPU by the number of logical processors.
| Metric | Description | Granularity |
|---|---|---|
| PID | The unique identifier that is assigned to each process by the operating system. | 30 seconds |
| Process Name | The name of the process as defined by the application or service. | 30 seconds |
| CPU | The amount of CPU resources consumed by the process. | 30 seconds |
| CPU (normalized) | The CPU usage of the process, normalized to a scale. | 30 seconds |
| Memory | The amount of memory consumed by the process. | 30 seconds |
Datapoint: Filesystem
Health signatures
For each sensor, a knowledge base of health signatures is evaluated continuously against the incoming metrics. They are used to raise issues or incidents depending on the user impact.
Built-in events trigger issues or incidents based on failing health signatures on entities, and custom events trigger issues or incidents based on the thresholds of an individual metric of an entity.
For more information about the built-in events for the Host sensor, see Built-in events reference.