Devices discovered and classed as Other device class

Last Modified

Thu Mar 30 14:45 GMT 2023

Description

• When performing Asset Discovery of windows devices, the OS and other info is not recognized. The result is a device with only an IP or hostname, and the device class assigned is Other.

Environment

• N-able N-central all versions
• Windows Devices Only

Solution

• This could occur for a number of reasons:
  • credentials configured on the probe do not have enough rights to access WMI on the device to determine the OS.
  • device is not reachable for WMI (but ip scan succeeds)
  • device is not domain-joined
  • There is a problem with the WMI repository on the target.
• How to prepare an environment for a proper discovery:

• Firewall Rules

  • Allow inbound Remote Administration
  • Allow File/Print Sharing
  • Allow ICMP inbound echo request
• Network Changes:
  • Ensure SNMP is enabled on all network devices and servers with the same community string . By default on many printers and network devices this is "public"
• DNS Manager Changes:
  • DNS Scavenging every 12 hours (or a time that interval that works with your environment)
• User Changes:
  • For a fast setup, always create a user that has domain admin privileges and is only used for N-able N-central probes.  However if you require more detailed permissions, you can find this here:

  Windows probe required privilege levels

• WMI and DCOM Changes:
  • Be sure to enable DCOM permissions in the environment as per N-able N-central Help: KBA10001: Service Displays a 205 or 201 WMI Error
    
• How to test the Probe can reach the device for Installation
  • See Unable to access ADMIN$

• How to test the Probe credentials can pull from WMI

1. Login to the probe device.
2. Click Start > Run > WBEMTEST
3. Click Connect
4. Enter \\IP_TO_TARGET_DEVICE\root\cimv2
5. Enter the credentials the probe uses
6. Click Connect.
7. If the credentials do not have the rights, you will receive an error.
8. If no error is received, you will want to check the presence of the specific data you need. Clicking Query and enter an appropriate WMI query, such as the one below to pull the OS info:

select * from win32_operatingsystem

9. For further info and troubleshooting, or to update the probe credentials, see: Change Probe Username and Password