Nullsoft NetMon: Visualize those pings

If you are on a connection like mine where a gateway comes in the way to the actual internet connectivity, you would have at sometime or the other pinged the gateway to know the status of the local network. The ping tells you how well the network is running (or is it running at all!). All operating systems bundle the oh so necessary ping command in their kits. So, why need an external utility to do what the command line tool already does?

Well, convenience comes to mind. Windows OS also comes with the FTP command, but still we use a GUI version. Similarly, a GUI application can make keeping tracks of the pings very easy. Nullsoft’s NetMon is what I found when I was looking for a similar kind of utility. I just needed something tiny that will show me the status of an IP by constantly pinging it. My initial requirement was an audio pinger which would give me a beep or something if the connection breaks or goes above a certain threshold. But I got better.

NetMon stays on the desktop as a small box and shows the ping status in a graphical form. The graph is color coded to show the status of the pings. The configuration box has several settings that you can modify. Of course, the IP to be pinged is required. Plus there are settings for maximum hops to measure, the frequency of the updates and the upward limit of the graph so that you can set the optimal setting for the color coded graphs.

The utility is basic, you can only monitor 1 ping at a time, it does not do anything more than pinging like trace-routing and stuff. But that’s the good part. Its simple and it does its job well. It comes from the same stable WinAmp comes from. So, you know it’s done by smart people.

One thing that really annoys me about this. There is no option to close the utility. You can only close it from the windows task manager. Maybe I am missing something but in 3 months of usage, I could not find it! But well, I rarely needed to close it. The local network is so unpredictable; I keep it on all the time. Saves me from running a DOS window that takes precious taskbar space and requires attention…

And yes, you can use it on any type of IP. Whether it’s Google.com or the computer next desk! My primary usage is for the local network.

Download: Nullsoft NetMon