When Weather Services International upgraded its switches with Gigabit links, Jeff Larkham knew he'd also have to upgrade the monitoring tools he had in place.

"We just needed something that could handle that kind of speed,” says Larkham, senior communications specialist at WSI in Andover, Mass. About two years ago, the company went shopping for a product that could handle the speeds and help it troubleshoot customer problems on the WAN. Larkham says Network Instruments' Observer helped him address his network needs.

WSI uses the Internet to provide clients with weather information, Larkham says. He adds it's important that he have access to information about how Web sites perform. To keep an eye on Web site performance, he has to closely manage the company's Internet connectivity.

"Usually we will hear from a customer first, but then if we look at Observer, we can quickly see the source of problem," Larkham says.

He previously used Ethereal to monitor network traffic, including Internet communication. Ethereal could not keep up with the Gigabit rates, and it only provided a half-duplex view of the connection. That's why Larkham says he turned to Observer Suite and a Gigabit probe to manage the network.

"We liked that it was passive and wouldn’t interfere with our traffic," he says. "We also liked that it just does what it needs to do as a protocol analyzer, which is help us troubleshoot problems."

Ann Bednarz is associate news editor at Network World.