And there was the problem: One device, mistakenly added to the voice VLAN, was using a tonne of video streaming traffic. There seemed to be an excessive about of bandwidth being utilized on the voice VLAN that we had set up for all telephones.

Eventually, we found the problem when we noticed something strange. We checked and double-checked the QoS (quality of service) settings, and everything seemed to be working correctly. After further investigation, we found that the phones themselves were all up to snuff, no hardware issues and no firmware or software issues. For example, a network I worked on years ago noticed there was an increasing number of dropped phone calls happening on their system. It can also affect how certain time-and-delay-sensitive traffic are performed, such as voice and video, as well as applications that require frequent access to the mouse or keyboard. It can also create serious productivity problems for the rest of your users. Why bandwidth use mattersīandwidth use matters because it affects not only the performance of your network, but can cost your company money in expensive bandwidth that’s being over-utilized. Let’s talk about why how to check bandwidth usage is so important, how to find hogs, and what to do to optimize your network for future use once you get them under control.

The good news is, many of these problems can be located and dealt with before they cause you all kinds of stress. Because what’s hogging your bandwidth might not be apparent just by looking at basic statistics. How to check bandwidth usage can be one of those exasperating problems that don’t always reveal themselves right away.

Bandwidth monitor