Netmeter progs tests and review

[Roger Johansson]

I needed a display of the activity on my internet connection.

There was a very crappy display on my firewall kerio in the tray, but I
recently got a hardware firewall so I don't run any software firewall
anymore.

I tried a number of netmetering programs. Many of them needed .net
installed or other special environments, so I ignored them. (I use
win2000pro sp4)

Left with two alternatives, Lanspeed2 and Netmeter, one older and a
beta.

Netmeter was the best because it can be set to have no title line and
resized to a suitable form to fit in always on top at a place on screen
where it doesn't disturb.
It can be set to your own connections max rate as top value and the
text under it can be hidden, left is a small window showing activity
and download speeds which is very useful.

I first used the new beta version, but it wouldn't stay on top in spite
of being set to that, so now I use the older version of Netmeter.
http://readerror.gmxhome.de/

If anybody has a better suggestion please say so.

 

[K3]

I needed a display of the activity on my internet connection.

There was a very crappy display on my firewall kerio in the tray, but
I recently got a hardware firewall so I don't run any software
firewall anymore.

I tried a number of netmetering programs. Many of them needed .net
installed or other special environments, so I ignored them. (I use
win2000pro sp4)

Left with two alternatives, Lanspeed2 and Netmeter, one older and a
beta.

Netmeter was the best because it can be set to have no title line and
resized to a suitable form to fit in always on top at a place on
screen where it doesn't disturb.
It can be set to your own connections max rate as top value and the
text under it can be hidden, left is a small window showing activity
and download speeds which is very useful.

I first used the new beta version, but it wouldn't stay on top in
spite of being set to that, so now I use the older version of
Netmeter. http://readerror.gmxhome.de/

If anybody has a better suggestion please say so.

--
Kendall F. Stratton III
Fort Fairfield, Maine USA
k3@(86_the_Spam)Maine.rr.com
http://home.maine.rr.com/k3

"Support Bacteria - It's the only culture some people have!"

 

[hummingbird]

On 16 Jul 2006 09:33:45 -0700 'Roger Johansson'
posted this onto alt.comp.freeware:

[snip]

If anybody has a better suggestion please say so.

There's a free version of Traffic Grapher available here:
http://www.paessler.com/prtg which displays pretty charts of what's
happening with your bandwidth etc.

 

[John Jay Smith]

dont mind the "beta" is stable and very good, light etc

 

[Roger Johansson]

dont mind the "beta" is stable and very good, light etc

Does it stay on top? After you have used it for an hour?
Mine stayed on top for half an hour, then stopped doing that.

Do you use similar settings as me, no title bar, no numbers below, half
transparent.
Mine is set to occupy the center part of title bar and the menu bar of
a maximized program, it doesn't get in the way there, at the center of
the top of the screen.

It is just a rectangle 16*80mm, where my top download speed is fixed as
the upper border, and I see all transfers as they happen, so I know how
fast it is going, if there are pauses in the transmission, etc.. It
will also tell me if transmissions are going on which I have not
initiated or intended.

It also has features like click-through and fade away if mouse cursor
points to it, to simplify use in programs where there is something
behind it you need to use.
Rightclick the tray symbol to get a menu for turning it off and on, and
options etc..

When I send a msg like this I see a very small blip, indicating a small
transfer.
When I download a file at maximum speed a red wave covers the fields
from top to bottom for the time of transfer.
A bad server gives an irregular shape with pauses and the speed goes up
and down.

It is exactly what I need for keeping an eye on internet transfers for
the moment.

Others suggested more complicated monitoring programs, for long time
statistics and such, and with displays that did not look nice enough
for me to try them out.
But thanks for the suggestions anyway.

 

[John Jay Smith]

take a look at what I use, embeded in the taskbar....
not only what I use.. these configs for samurize are my design.

http://www.computerboom.com/samurize

Samurize is here www.samurize.com

you are welcome to change them to fit your needs..

once you learn how to do things in samurize you will see
that it can do almost anything

 

[Susan Bugher]

I needed a display of the activity on my internet connection.

If anybody has a better suggestion please say so.

dunno if it's better but you might take a look at this boomer sized app:

Program: Netmeter
Author: Michael Herf
Ware: (Freeware)
http://www.stereopsis.com/

http://www.stereopsis.com/netmeter/
"netmeter.exe, click to download [44kb]"
http://www.stereopsis.com/netmeter/netmeter.exe
"(Note: this won't work if you are running Windows 98.)"

There's a screen shot on the web page. . .

Susan
--
Posted to alt.comp.freeware
Search alt.comp.freeware (or read it online):
http://www.google.com/advanced_group_search?q=+group:alt.comp.freeware
Pricelessware & ACF: http://www.pricelesswarehome.org
Pricelessware: http://www.pricelessware.org (not maintained)

 

[Jim]

http://www.stereopsis.com/netmeter/netmeter.exe
"(Note: this won't work if you are running Windows 98.)"

Susan

Here is a copy that will work with Win98

http://readerror.gmxhome.de/

 

[Susan Bugher]

Here is a copy that will work with Win98

http://readerror.gmxhome.de/

erm. . . not needed by the OP who uses "win2000pro sp4".
and also. . . that's a DIFFERENT program.

I posted about:

Program: Netmeter
Author: Michael Herf
Ware: (Freeware)
http://www.stereopsis.com/

You posted a link to:

Program: NetMeter (was Haim's Net Meter)
Company: NetMeter
Author: (Haim Gelfenbeyn)
Install: n.i.
Ware: (Donationware)
http://readerror.gmxhome.de/

FWIW that's the "Netmeter" that was mentioned in the first post in this
thread. IOW we've now come full circle.

Susan
--
Posted to alt.comp.freeware
Search alt.comp.freeware (or read it online):
http://www.google.com/advanced_group_search?q=+group:alt.comp.freeware
Pricelessware & ACF: http://www.pricelesswarehome.org
Pricelessware: http://www.pricelessware.org (not maintained)

 

[schrodinger's cat]

I needed a display of the activity on my internet connection.

If anybody has a better suggestion please say so.

dunno if it's better but you might take a look at this boomer sized app:

Program: Netmeter
Author: Michael Herf
Ware: (Freeware)
http://www.stereopsis.com/

http://www.stereopsis.com/netmeter/
"netmeter.exe, click to download [44kb]"
http://www.stereopsis.com/netmeter/netmeter.exe
"(Note: this won't work if you are running Windows 98.)"

There's a screen shot on the web page. . .

Susan

How do you work this puppy? All that happens when I launch it is that a
black rectangle opens on my Win XP screen and then stays on top of
everything else. No display, no controls, no nuthin'. I have to use Task
manager to make it go away again.

 

[In_Parentheses]

I needed a display of the activity on my internet connection.

If anybody has a better suggestion please say so.

dunno if it's better but you might take a look at this boomer sized
app:

Program: Netmeter
Author: Michael Herf
Ware: (Freeware)
http://www.stereopsis.com/

http://www.stereopsis.com/netmeter/
"netmeter.exe, click to download [44kb]"
http://www.stereopsis.com/netmeter/netmeter.exe
"(Note: this won't work if you are running Windows 98.)"

There's a screen shot on the web page. . .

Susan

How do you work this puppy? All that happens when I launch it is that
a black rectangle opens on my Win XP screen and then stays on top of
everything else. No display, no controls, no nuthin'. I have to use
Task manager to make it go away again.

It should work right upon starting, the rectangle should turn pale
yellow and from that moment you will see the network (internet
activity); except for the fact that you indeed need taskmanager to shut
it down, the program works like a charm!

 

[Roger Johansson]

http://www.stereopsis.com/netmeter/
"netmeter.exe, click to download [44kb]"
http://www.stereopsis.com/netmeter/netmeter.exe
"(Note: this won't work if you are running Windows 98.)"
There's a screen shot on the web page. . .

How do you work this puppy? All that happens when I launch it is that a
black rectangle opens on my Win XP screen and then stays on top of
everything else. No display, no controls, no nuthin'. I have to use Task
manager to make it go away again.

I have the same problem with it, it shows a black box and nothing else,
I touch the box and it gives an error message and closes itself, it
says it will write to the error log but I cannot find any error log.

So I wonder too, how to handle this prog.
I'm using win2000pro, by the way, you use XP, same problem anyway,
obviously.

 

[Roger Johansson]

http://www.stereopsis.com/netmeter/
"netmeter.exe, click to download [44kb]"
http://www.stereopsis.com/netmeter/netmeter.exe
"(Note: this won't work if you are running Windows 98.)"

It should work right upon starting, the rectangle should turn pale
yellow and from that moment you will see the network (internet
activity); except for the fact that you indeed need taskmanager to shut
it down, the program works like a charm!

When I let it run, and did some downloading, it showed a few pale
yellow bands across it but no activity, and there is no way to move it,
no settings, no output.
When I touch the border of it, trying to move it, it ends itself.

To me it looks like a not-working program.

Maybe it needs to be run from a certain location, I ran it from drive
F:
Some programs are sensitive to such things, written to be run from the
C root, or whatever. But how do you move it, or do you like to have it
where it happens to appear? If you say it is working like a charm it
must have some better features than just appearing wherever it likes
and stay there.

 

[In_Parentheses]

http://www.stereopsis.com/netmeter/
"netmeter.exe, click to download [44kb]"
http://www.stereopsis.com/netmeter/netmeter.exe
"(Note: this won't work if you are running Windows 98.)"

It should work right upon starting, the rectangle should turn pale
yellow and from that moment you will see the network (internet
activity); except for the fact that you indeed need taskmanager to shut
it down, the program works like a charm!

When I let it run, and did some downloading, it showed a few pale
yellow bands across it but no activity, and there is no way to move it,
no settings, no output.
When I touch the border of it, trying to move it, it ends itself.

To me it looks like a not-working program.

Maybe it needs to be run from a certain location, I ran it from drive
F:
Some programs are sensitive to such things, written to be run from the
C root, or whatever. But how do you move it, or do you like to have it
where it happens to appear? If you say it is working like a charm it
must have some better features than just appearing wherever it likes
and stay there.

Hi Roger,

Nope, a special location is not the problem either, I ran it from drive I:,
and it worked perfectly! Yo move the window hold down the left mouse button
while clicking inside the window, then drag it somewhere.

I guess it attaches itself to the network-layer in some way, and doesn't
need any settings. About two seconds after starting it, the rectangle
became pale yellow, as I described before, from that moment on I also saw
blue/red bars running across it for down-/uploads. Are you running W98 by
any chance??? The site explicitly states the program won't work on Win 98!

 

[In_Parentheses]

http://www.stereopsis.com/netmeter/
"netmeter.exe, click to download [44kb]"
http://www.stereopsis.com/netmeter/netmeter.exe
"(Note: this won't work if you are running Windows 98.)"
There's a screen shot on the web page. . .

How do you work this puppy? All that happens when I launch it is that
a black rectangle opens on my Win XP screen and then stays on top of
everything else. No display, no controls, no nuthin'. I have to use
Task manager to make it go away again.

I have the same problem with it, it shows a black box and nothing
else, I touch the box and it gives an error message and closes itself,
it says it will write to the error log but I cannot find any error
log.

So I wonder too, how to handle this prog.
I'm using win2000pro, by the way, you use XP, same problem anyway,
obviously.

Hi agan Roger:

For comparisson: I too use W2KPro (SP4), and it works The error log is
Dr. Watson's error log, you can find that whereever these are stored on
your system.

Perhaps your video-driver is the culprit?

 

[schrodinger's cat]

http://www.stereopsis.com/netmeter/
"netmeter.exe, click to download [44kb]"
http://www.stereopsis.com/netmeter/netmeter.exe
"(Note: this won't work if you are running Windows 98.)"

There's a screen shot on the web page. . .

How do you work this puppy? All that happens when I launch it is that
a black rectangle opens on my Win XP screen and then stays on top of
everything else. No display, no controls, no nuthin'. I have to use
Task manager to make it go away again.

I have the same problem with it, it shows a black box and nothing
else, I touch the box and it gives an error message and closes itself,
it says it will write to the error log but I cannot find any error
log.

So I wonder too, how to handle this prog.
I'm using win2000pro, by the way, you use XP, same problem anyway,
obviously.

Hi agan Roger:

For comparisson: I too use W2KPro (SP4), and it works The error log is
Dr. Watson's error log, you can find that whereever these are stored on
your system.

Perhaps your video-driver is the culprit?

Not working here on WinXP Pro SP2. I can drag the black box around my
screen, but that's all. Did a test download with NetMeter open and saw
no change in the display whatsoever - it just stayed completely black. I
give up, the program is of no use to me.