NetScanTools (r) Basic Edition 2.1 Released July 8, 2011

On Friday we released NetScanTools Basic 2.1 - our first update to this software since January 2010. This is our freeware version of NetScanTools. It has just a few helpful tools that introduce people to the NetScanTools Product line.

Tools:
DNS Tools - simple query (ipv4 to hostname etc.), Who Am I (shows your IPv4 address, hostname and DNS servers), Test Default DNS (takes IP address or hostname and asks each default DNS server for translation).

Ping - uses standard ICMP ping to contact an IPv4 or hostname.

Graphical Ping - uses standard ICMP ping to contact an IPv4 or hostname and it graphs the response times over time.

Traceroute - uses ICMP packets to show the route between your computer and a target computer.

Ping Scanner - uses ICMP packets to ping every IPv4 address between a start and ending IPv4 address.

Whois - shows basic whois information for around 70 domain extensions and IPv4 addresses.

These tools are simplified in comparison to NetScanTools Pro which means you don't have all the options available and you only get one mode of operation - for example traceroute is ICMP only instead of ICMP, UDP, TCP etc.

Have a look and enjoy!
Kirk

NetScanTools (tm) Basic Edition Released May 14, 2009

What? another NetScanTools?

Yes. When we stopped producing NetScanTools Standard 5.1 in August 2004, we left a whole lot of registered users without any alternative. Business users who wanted to move up opted for NetScanTools Pro, but many, many home and small business users could not justify or afford the upgrade, so they either kept using on NetScanTools Standard (yes, we still hear from people who have used it for years) or they found something else.

Two weeks ago we decided to make a new program using the latest Visual C++ 2008 compiler along with an updated interface -- that's right two (2) weeks ago. Now there is a new program created from almost scratch and it is completely finished! And it works fine on Windows 7, Vista 32/64, 2008, 2003, XP and even Windows 2000.

This new tool has simplified versions of six tools: Ping, Traceroute, Ping Scan, Graphical Ping, DNS Tools and Whois. They are very usable versions of more advanced tools found in NetScanTools Pro. There are embedded web pages comparing the NetScanTools Basic versions of the tools with the NetScanTools Pro versions. Plus we show you what other tools are available in NetScanTools Pro -- just in case you are interested.

It is now our entry level program.

And it's freeware. Try it. Enjoy it. And don't forget to give us feedback on the About NetScanTools Basic page.

You can find it here:
http://www.netscantools.com/nstbasicmain.html

More on Graphical Ping

We've always wanted to produce a good graphical ping tool and now I think we've finally got one. Enter an IP and press start -- and away it goes. The cool thing about it is that you can monitor congestion, in other words you can watch the round trip travel time go up and down as you browse the web. If dropouts occur, you get a little red triangle appearing in the graph where a packet should have been.

The graph is cool because you can see at a glance what's happening. Did I mention you can print it? yes you can, but you have to stop it from collecting data first. And you can also 'window' the graph. What I mean is that you can enter in the maximum number of points you want to see and then the older points drop off the left side. The older points are not lost because they are saved in the database.

The database is cool because you can export it in native format or in tabbed delimited format. If you export it in native format, you can import it back and review a previous ping session in the graph later. You can also do two reports. The first gives a list of all dropped packets. The second is a list of all packets with a travel time longer than what you specify -- this shows a list of slow packets.

You can view a video of it here.

NetScanTools Pro 10.90 Released on May 2

This new release has a new cool tool: graphical ping. It works by pinging an IP or host on a periodica basis, then displaying the packet travel time vs the time on a graph. You can print the graph in color. The packet travel times are saved in a database for later analysis. There are two reports that can be shown in your web browser based on the packet info in the database. The database can be saved and reloaded later for further analysis.

The second major improvement is to NetScanner Ping Sweep tool. Previously the NetScanner tool was taking about 20-30 seconds to scan a 254 IP linear range of IPs on your local subnet. By making some changes, I was able to get this down to the low 6 second range. A speed improvement of about 4 times.

There are a number of other improvements that you will run into: ARP Scan now has a hostname column, Domain Keys now query on default._domainkey. etc., SMTP Email test now can request receipts and set priority at urgent, plus you can add a custom header item.

I'll get a page together and post a video soon about the new Graphical Ping tool.