Frame Relay service

Frame Relay is an efficient data transmission technique used to send digital information such as voice, data, LAN, and WAN traffic quickly and cost-efficiently to many destinations using virtual circuits. Frame Relay is characterized by connection-oriented, permanent or switched virtual circuits (PVC and SVC) at speeds up to 50 Mbps. 

This service cannot use Self Healing.

N-able N-central can monitor the Frame Relay circuit status, congestion notifications and the amount of traffic on the Frame Relay virtual circuits. You can also set thresholds against counters that indicate congestion on the network.

Complete the steps below to monitor the Frame Relay service on a device.

  1. Click View > All Devices and click the name of a device.
  2. Click Settings > Properties and ensure Use SNMP is selected.
  3. Click Save if required.
  4. Click Monitoring > Status.
  5. Click Add, enter 1 for the number of instances of the Frame Relay service.
  6. Click Apply.
  7. Click the Frame Relay service and then click the Service Details tab.
  8. In Interfaces to Monitor, select the NICs/ports that you would like to monitor.
  9. Click OK.
Service TypeSNMP
Instances on a Device60
Device ClassServer - Generic, Workstation - Generic, Other, Printer, Scanner/Camera, Switch/Router, and Server - Windows
Monitored ByWindows probe
Scan Interval15 minutes
Interfaces to MonitorSelect the name or SNMP index of the NICs or ports that you would like to monitor.

The tables IF-MIBand FRAME-RELAY-DTE-MIB describe the SNMP objects that are queried by the probe.

IF-MIB

Object DescriptorsNumerical OID
sysUptime1.3.6.1.2.1.1.3
ifIndex1.3.6.1.2.1.2.2.1.1
ifDescr1.3.6.1.2.1.2.2.1.2
ifSpeed1.3.6.1.2.1.2.2.1.5

FRAME-RELAY-DTE-MIB

Object DescriptorsNumerical OID
frCircuitIfIndex1.3.6.1.2.1.10.32.2.1.1
frCircuitState1.3.6.1.2.1.10.32.2.1.3
frCircuitReceivedFECNs1.3.6.1.2.1.10.32.2.1.4
frCircuitReceivedBECNs1.3.6.1.2.1.10.32.2.1.5
frCircuitSentFrames1.3.6.1.2.1.10.32.2.1.6
frCircuitSentOctets1.3.6.1.2.1.10.32.2.1.7
frCircuitReceivedFrames1.3.6.1.2.1.10.32.2.1.8
frCircuitReceivedOctets1.3.6.1.2.1.10.32.2.1.9

OID/Calculation

N-able N-central services use Reverse Polish Notation (RPN) for all calculation formulae.

Metric NameOID/CalculationDescription
Octets (Transmitted and Received)^frCircuitSentOctets + ^ frCircuitReceivedOctetsThe total number of transmitted and received octets.
Frames (Transmitted and Received)^frCircuitSentFrames + ^ frCircuitReceivedFramesThe total number of transmitted and received frames.
Average Packet Size(^frCircuitSentOctets + ^ frCircuitReceivedOctets) / (^ frCircuitSentFrames + ^ frCircuitReceivedFrames)The average number of octets sent and received over this virtual circuit calculated as a percentage of the total capacity of the virtual circuit.
Transmitted Utilization( ^frCircuitSentOctets * 80000) / ($ifSpeed * ^ sysUptime)

The number of octets transmitted over the Frame Relay virtual circuit during a scan interval time, which is calculated as a percentage of the total capacity of the virtual circuit:

Transmitted octets is the difference between the number of octets transmitted during the previous scan and the number of octets transmitted during the current scan.

This threshold is measured as a percentage value.

Received Utilization( ^frCircuitReceivedOctets * 80000) / ($ifSpeed * ^ sysUptime)

The number of octets received over the Frame Relay virtual circuit during a scan interval time, which is calculated as a percentage of the total capacity of the virtual circuit:

Received octets is the difference between the number of octets received during the previous scan and the number of octets received during the current scan.

This threshold is measured as a percentage value.

Fwd Explicit Congestion Notification^frCircuitReceivedFECNs

This type of notification is transmitted from the source terminal requesting the destination terminal to slow its requests for data. The notification occurs when the data capacity level of the source terminal reaches the value set by the DTE, or when a switch queues a frame to a trunk that is congested.

This field displays the number of FECNs received from the network indicating forward congestion since the virtual circuit was created.

This threshold is measured in frames.

Bkwd Explicit Congestion Notification^frCircuitReceivedBECNs

This type of notification is transmitted from the destination terminal requesting the source terminal to slow its data transmission. The notification occurs when the data capacity level of the destination terminal reaches the value set by the DTE, or when a switch receives a frame from a trunk that is congested.

This field displays the number of BECNs received from the network indicating forward congestion since the virtual circuit was created.

This threshold is measured in frames.

Circuit Status$frCircuitState

Indicates whether the particular virtual circuit is operational.

There are two possible states:

Active (displayed as ‘Normal’) = 2

Inactive (displayed as ‘Failed’) = 3