FAQ


What If I Don't Have MS SQL Server?

We are in the process of releasing versions of each product which use Microsoft SQL Azure for data storage rather than depending on a local SQL server.
 
Azure is Microsoft's Cloud Computing platform and SQL Azure is SQL as a service ie the database is in the cloud (at a Microsoft Data Centre) and you pay for storage on a monthly basis.  Obviously there is a performance hit in sending data over the wire, in real time.  However due to the architecture of our solutions, which lends itself to this approach and the speeds that we can achieve, we can absorb this performance overhead quite transparently.
  
On each of the product pages you will find Cloud Computing demo versions, as they become available.  These versions only require that you enter your company name, which will be used to create a unique database, by that name, on the virtual SQL server (and the start and end IP addresses of the scanning range).  This database is your exclusive database and will remain in existance for 24 hours and will then be automatically dropped.  You can try each product using the same database (the same name) and the data will be merged.  As data is merged from each application (most specifically ScanITSystems plus anyother) you will see the results become more informative.
 
Please bear in mind that these are first releases.
 
Thank you for trying our products.

Which One Do I Need?

The fully licensed versions of these applications, will scan any number of nodes; but obviously the greater the number of nodes (the larger the network) the more resources are required and that requires more powerful hardware.  Also, the applications perform three tasks simultaneously ie they scan, present data and provide progress information.  The latter requires constant GUI updates, without which the app would appear erratic and this requires resources that the scanning engine would otherwise use.  In order to achieve this we have limited these applications to 20% of the scanning engine's optimal performance. which we believe is still faster than our competitors, try them, see what you think.   
 
We Have a Two Tier Solution
  1. For networks upto approx 1,500 nodes we have the desk top versions. These applications suit small to medium sized networks and companies engaged in the auditing of client sites, as the flexibility of running them from the web, regardless of location, is of great advantage.
  2. For larger networks, or to increase performance (due to low spec host for example), or to run on a dedicated server we have the ScanITnanoBot which functions in conjunction with the bv applications but automatically takes over the scanning tasks and runs as a Windows Service and as such does not provide progress feedback as it is transparent. As a consquence of not requiring GUI refreshes it can run at the full capacity of the scanning engine and is 5 times faster. nanoBot can be added to the solution at any time as it will simply take over scanning once added therefore expansion can be evolutionary
What Do You Want To Do? 
 
I want to
  1. know which nodes (IP Addresses, inc hostname and MAC address) are active on my network 
  2. be informed of unauthorised connections to my network
  3. know when a computer or computers become inaccessible 
  4. know when servers go down
  5. get a printed list or export to spreadsheet
       Solution: ScanIT Discovery  
 
  1. know how many laptops/static computers I have on my network.
  2. know how many workstations/servers I have on my network.
  3. know how many NT/XP/VISTA/7 OS I have on my network.
  4. know how many PDC/Member Servers/Workstations I have on my network.
  5. know how many processor types I have on my network.
  6. know the number of processors in computers I have on my network.
  7. know how many computer manufacturer types I have on my network.
  8. know when computers were built (had the Operating System installed) 
  9. know about BIOS versions/ motherboard versions and more about the computers I have on my network.
  10. know how many boxes we have/our service provider has, built/migrated/rolled out
  11. be informed when computer's spec changes.
  12. get a printed list or export to spreadsheet
        Solution: ScanIT Systems  
  1. know how many drives are reaching full capacity on my network.
  2. know what drives on my network are the most actve.
  3. know how many/what drives on my network are most likely to fail.
  4. know where CD ROMS are on my network.
  5. know where USB drives (memory sticks) are on my network.
  6. know who is using portable drives USB, CDROM on my network.
  7. be notified when unauthorised drives appear on the network
  8. be notified when specified tolerances/capacities are met
  9. get a printed list or export to spreadsheet
        Solution: ScanIT Drive
 
  1. find files on every drive (inc portables) on every computer
  2. find duplicate files on every computer
  3. view files that are on any computer
  4. open zip files that are on any computer
  5. install applications that are on any computer
  6. delete every instance of a file across the entire network
  7. delete all empty files across the entire network
  8. delete duplicate files networkwide
  9. move/copy files by type/name size in bulk regardless of source location
  10. know what users have which files
  11. get a printed list or export to spread sheet
        Solution : ScanIT File
 
  1. know what software is installed on each computer
  2. how many instances of any given software we have
  3. what vendors (manufacturers) do we have software from
  4. how much software do we have from xyz vendor
  5. which computers have xyz software installed
  6. what users have xyz software on their computer
  7. what computers has a user used that has xyz software installed
  8. who was using the computer when xyz software was installed
  9. get a printed list or export to spreadsheet
        Solution : ScanIT Software
 
  1. record software purchases
  2. record software licenses
  3. see how much we owe xyz vendor in under licensing
  4. see how much we are wasting in over licensing
  5. be notified when we exceed our licenses
  6. store copies of our licenses
        Solution : ScanIT License Manager
 
This list is work in progress please check back

Why Would I Use Them?

These tools have numerous applications and form somthing of a "Swiss Army Knife" solution in that there is something for everyone -
 
  • Auditor
  • Accountants (CFO)
  • IT Manager
  • Network Manager
  • Administrator
  • Engineer
  • Database Administrator (DBA)
  • Managed Service Provider
  • Managing Director (CEO)
  • Project Managers
 
example applications
 
  • Financial audits
  • Security audits
  • Compliance audits
  • SLA audits and monitoring
  • User policy audits and monitoring
  • Asset register creation
  • Capacity planning
  • Drive monitoring
  • Systems performance monitoring
  • Performance comparisons
  • Load balancing
  • User trend analysis
  • Compliance
  • Chinese Wall monitoring
  • Active directory management

and much more

What do they do?

Our products scan/audit TCP/IP networks (including the internet). They extend the reach of the application user  to other computers on the network, globally.   enabling the user to conduct tasks that their user rights will allow. When the user of our applications has domain admin rights the user has access to  every Windows computer within that domain or domain hierarchy (trusts), regardless of the physical or logical location.

Imiediate and Current Data
 
Other companies will tell you that they are monitoring in real time, because they put agents on each box. Let’s not get into the performance hit and conflict potential of that; just the real time statement. Yes they are monitoring in real time but they are not reporting in real time. This means that whilst the agent knows that this or that is occuring, it will only notify the server, and ultimately you, at intervals throughout the day, they have to for network performance reasons. So you only get to know about it later. With our software, you click the button and the results are instantly at your finger tips. We can tell you how many instances of x software are installed on your network now. How many boxes are up right now etc etc.

Our tools audit networks and as such we are one of many. There are many big names doing the same thing, but at a high price and painfully slowly and disruptively to your business. We, however, can do something they cannot. We can scan in seconds and then do it again and again (250 nodes/ip addresses per second), we can do it over wireless, from wireless devices to wireless devices. We can audit your network remotely, we can do it via VPN. We dont even have to be in the same country as your network, you can do it in a browser, without installing anything on any machine, not even the machine on which you run our apps. No disruption to staff, entirely transparently and, most importantly without limit to number of nodes, at a fixed annual subscription fee of US$299 per annum. Thats’s little more than a dollar per node on a class C network each year. We are the disposable lighter of IT audit, why pay the exorbitant prices of our competitors and get stale data when we provide current data now, for less than the price of one days labour of one person.

 

How large a network is supported?

Whilst these products are in their infancy the underlying engine is quite grown up, so don’t let the ease with which these apps get up and running fool you into thinking that they are just light weight solutions. The scanning engine has been tested by scanning large chunks of the internet from a lap top over wireless via a 10/100 network and a very poor broadband connection ie a worst case scenario.

We have scanned over a million IP address in a single scan on a number of occasions. They will scan highly fragmented global networks with numerous sites in many countries, in a single scan. They traverse global networks, utilise routing and will find every IP address in the supplied range, providing that there is a route to it.

They bypass local windows firewalls so even boxes that are effectively hiding will be found.

You can quite literaly scan the entire internet using ScanITDiscovery (at 250 nodes per second), the other products will scan the internet but rely on domain admin rights of the user to access/probe boxes, as the internet is not a Windows domain it cannot be probed in this way. However it can be discovered and ScanITDiscovery will return IP Address, HostName and MAC provided that your connection to the Internet is appropriatly configured.

A word of warning should you be inclined to attempt this, ie scan the internet, your activities may cause panic at your ISP because the behaviour of this app, at TCP/IP level, would give the appearance, to packet sniffers, of a bot net or DOS,DDOS attack due to the rapid processing of IP Addresses.

What makes you unique?

Besides our ability to audit networks at high speed (250 computers per second) on networks of any number (1- 1,000,000+)  of nodes, from a single PC, with software which does not install anywhere on that network (not even the host PC) on a Software as a Service basis (ie pay as you go); we also utilise Microsoft's SQL Azure, SQL as a service for data storage, giving access to flexible "pay as you store" secure storage capacity in the cloud.
 
We are confident that we are the first to provide such speed of asset detection, and to use that in conjunction with cloud computing in the field of asset / IT audit and management ie ITIL, SAM etc
 

Will they impact users?

No, in tests our products consume approximately 1.5% of network bandwidth on a 10 base T network and are imperceptible from a users perspective.

What about security?

The nanoTech Software products can only function when actioned under a domain administrator login. These products can/will only do that which a domain administrator can do. They will not give access or powers to a user above their domain group membership.

These products simply extend the reach of the domain administrator by enabling more tasks to be performed simultaneously.

Do we have to run your products with domain admin rights?

Yes – whilst they will successfully find all active IP addresses, even on the internet, they cannot query computers if the current user of the application is not logged in with domain admin rights.

Will your products impact network performance?

No – they have an approximate impact of 1.5% on a 10 base T network and as such they are imperceptible without specialist monitoring software.

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