N-central 2023.8.0.11
What’s New in N-central 2023.8
Analytics
We are so excited to announce the introduction of Analytics into N-central 2023.8! We have harnessed the industry standard of PowerBI, to bring you your N-central data in full visuals. With our GA release, you will be able to see device data (inventory, summary, warranty, etc.), backup data (last backed up, last checked in, etc.), and patch information (installed, approved, missing, etc.) And those are just the first of more dashboards to come.
Analytics is more than just our dashboards, it is also our reports that help you communicate the value you provide, to your customers. Our executive summary report is a streamlined view of the health of each customer account — this can be exported, or this can be sent on a repeating schedule as an email. We know reports are of high value, and we will continue to add more reports as our analytics feature set grows beyond GA.
What comes out of the box?
- Device inventory
- Device summary
- Backup Sessions
- Backup Devices
- Patch Status
- Executive Summary Report
And we are adding more often!
Our dashboards and reports were created to help answer common business problems, but we know we can’t predict all the questions you may have – you can customize your reports and dashboards to suit your business. Remove items you don’t need and adjust the charts to show only the information relevant to you, your users, and your business.
Your data security is important to us – here is a collection of potential questions and answers you may have around security.
To get started, please activate Analytics and set your permissions. Learn how here.
Device Management for Apple Enhancements
Coming to all on-prem partners, in this release, are our new MDM capabilities. We’re also moving access from the System level to the Service Organization level.
Migrating Account Level Certificates
As we move access of Device Management for Apple to the SO level, we’re bringing the account level certificate there as well. This shouldn’t affect anything in your environment and is simply a better way to control your certificates. Best practice recommendations, from us and Apple, for Certificates and Device Management for Apple is to use our multitenant capabilities and use Customer level certificates to manage individual customer’s devices.
Apple Business Manager zero touch deployment
We are pleased to announce that you can now enroll your devices via Apple Business Manager. Doing so enrolls your ABM purchased device or freshly wiped device into Device Management for Apple and, for your Apple workstations, will also deploy the latest N-central mac agent to your device upon completion of the boot up process.
You will now have the ability to enroll iOS and iPadOS devices into Device Management for Apple (DMA). You will no longer be able to enroll Apple or Android devices into our Legacy MDM service.
App Deployment
We are pleased to announce the addition of App Store management to N-central’s Device Management for Apple. N-central can now receive a token from an Apple Business Manager or Apple School Manager account and deploy App Store purchases made in those accounts to deploy company-owned apps to Macs, iPhones, iPads, and even AppleTVs enrolled in N-central.
This means that end-users of the devices won’t need to use a personal Apple ID or some other workaround to get the business apps they need on managed devices. You’ll be able to ensure they have all the apps they need, revoke the licenses as needed, and keep the apps up-to-date.
N-central’s Device Management for Apple is multi-tenant, meaning you can set up the tokens for each customer’s own ABM/ASM account in one dashboard.
Devices don’t need to have been enrolled in N-central via ABM/ASM. Purchased apps can be deployed to devices that were manually enrolled also.
OS Update Commands
There are up to 5 options in the command API:
- Download or install the update, depending on the current state. This lets the OS decide which action it should take based on whether a user is logged in and working or its configuration. This is the safest option and should be considered a default.
- Download the software update without installing it.
- Download the latest update and trigger the restart countdown: In iOS and tvOS, this will install a previously downloaded software update. In macOS it will download the software update and trigger the restart countdown notification via Notification Center.
- Download the software update and notify the user through the App Store. This option is only available in macOS.
- Download or install the latest update, force a restart if required: As it says, this will do the default action, but will make a restart mandatory. This could result in data loss from unsaved work. This option is only available in macOS.
Here are some important things to know about these commands:
- DMA can only send the command to the device. It’s up to the device to obey the command. Sometimes it won’t. We expect that Apple’s APIs and implementation will improve as new OS version are released. It’s already far more reliable on macOS Ventura than it was on previous macOS versions. N-able is only supporting these commands on macOS 13 Ventura and iOS 16 or later.
- The commands may succeed on previous OS versions, but they will always download and install the latest full OS version. For example, if you run the command on macOS 12 Monterey, it may or may not execute reliably, and if it does it will upgrade the device to macOS 13 Ventura.
- The behavior of these commands can be modified via Configuration Profiles.
- A lot also depends on whether the device has been provisioned as Supervised. Supervised devices, including those enrolled in DMA by way of Apple Business Manager/Apple School Manager automatic enrollment are far more likely to behave as desired. Non-Supervised devices will likely require user input to complete the process.
Endpoint Detection and Response
This new and improved EDR integration will give you full SentinelOne functionality while continuing to utilize N-central for bulk deployment (Windows and MacOS) and real-time monitoring of your devices. With full dashboard access to SentinelOne, including SSO access via Azure AD, you can now view detailed threat reports, configure granular notifications, and access the SentinelOne API. You can also try advanced security features like Threat Hunting, also known as “Deep Visibility”.
Currently, the integration supports new EDR customers. If you are currently using integrated EDR in N-central, you can look forward to an upgrade button in a near future release that will assist you in upgrading to this new EDR integration. For Mac support with this EDR integration, your Mac agents will require v1.8.2 or above.
AI Assisted Scripting
We have introduced a new and exciting feature to the Scheduled Tasks interface, which allows you to leverage ChatGPT’s artificial intelligence to generate new scripts and upload them to the script repository. Simply provide some script instructions in the UI, review the script that the AI provides, and upload it to the repository with the click of a button. To see this new feature, your account will need access to Manage the Script/Software Repository. You will also need an account with ChatGPT to provide a user token.
Cove Deployment Amps in the Repository
With N-central 2023.8, we’ve made it simpler for you to deploy Cove Data Protection to your managed devices, by adding the deployment AMPs to the Script/Software repository.
Automation Manager Update
Automation Manager 2.92 has an update in N-central 2023.8. Several bugs have been addressed, and the submission of data from the AM agent to Pendo has been disabled.
Upgrade paths and notes
Upgrade versions
To upgrade to N-able N-central 2023.8, your N-able N-central server must be running one of the following versions:
View versions:
- N-able N-central 2022.7.1.44
- N-able N-central 2023.4.0.32
- N-able N-central 2023.5.0.12
- N-able N-central 2023.6.0.9
- N-able N-central 2023.7.0.10+
Notes the following when upgrading N-able N-central.
Tasks may expire if the agent on an associated device is being upgraded when the task is scheduled to be completed. Agent upgrades are normally short in duration but may be delayed if a re-start of the device is pending.
Fixed Issues in N-able N-central
Release 2023.8
2023.8 GA
| Category | Description | Item |
| Analytics | WorkspaceId is sometimes not provided in embeddedtoken request | DV-5076 |
| Analytics | Restricting Custom Report creation with duplicated name under the same category | DV-4927 |
| Analytics | “Last sync” is not getting updated for other Golden dataset reports in case of one of them having a proper Last sync value | DV-4622 |
| Analytics | “Last sync” showing wrong value(ie Refreshing) on Dashboards List screen even in case of /reports/status having “Ready” status | DV-4621 |
| Analytics | “Development” value is highlighting always when clicking on the Category dropdown | DV-4513 |
| Analytics | Duplicate report names are allowing for Custom reports | DV-4511 |
| Analytics | Filter functionality on dashboards list screen is giving wrong result set | DV-4467 |
| Analytics | Dropdown list in reports view page is not getting closed when EU clicks on report details | DV-4269 |
| Automation Manager | Disable Pendo on Automation Manager | AM-3861 |
| Automation Manager | Get Windows Events – issues with date formats | AM-3738 |
| Automation Manager | Object Sync Time with External NTP returning Result 0 on error | AM-3560 |
| Automation Manager | Designer logs rotation | AM-3356 |
| Core | [FEATURE] Enhanced EDR Integration available in N-central for New EDR users | NCCF-49731 |
| Core | API-Service Related Enhancements | NCCF-132837 |
| Core | Contact Link Text Adds Escape Slashes to Links | NCCF-131729 |
| Core | Snapshot creation for CentOS and Ubuntu are failing | NCCF-130279 |
| Core | Cove Deployment AMPs need to be added to the N-central repository as stock, permanent items | NCCF-130207 |
| Core | Address code in Cove Integration related classes | NCCF-127943 |
| Core | Excessive Log Rollover Due to Linux Agent Spam | NCCF-121288 |
| Core | Linux agents skipping first entry in endpoint list when session is lost | NCCF-121020 |
| Core | Incorrect Spelling of N-central | NCCF-120987 |
| Core | Self-Healing is running much to often than is configured | NCCF-120506 |
| Core | Fix string exception HTTPS Monitoring Service misconfigured. | NCCF-115464 |
| Core | N-central Backup Restore throwing DFM restore errors with SQL on Azure | NCCF-111559 |
| Core | Optimize ServerUI API invocation from OS scripts | NCCF-108882 |
| Core | SPX Services not connecting | NCCF-107926 |
| Core | Unlinking SSO Account Does Not Re-Enable MFA | NCCF-65882 |
| Core | Command Prompt Timeouts After 5 Minutes | NCCF-40857 |
| Core | Modify Openfire Settings to Drop Offline Messages and Cleanup | NCCF-30867 |
| Core | configtypesignature Has No Foreign Key Constraint, So it Never Gets Cleaned Up | NCCF-24480 |
| Core | Miss-Spelling of N-central on Server Restart Warning | NCCF-22942 |
| Core | Uploading anything through Direct Support that takes more than 5 minutes has it’s request killed | NCCF-18911 |
| Device Management Apple | Change order of parameters when generating AAID | MSAD-3204 |
| Device Management Apple | Make DMA menu only visible at SO level for on-prem and NCOD instances | MSAD-3172 |
| Device Management Apple | Handle mobile device list at System level | MSAD-3163 |
| Device Management Apple | Remove DMA dropdown from System level | MSAD-3162 |
| Device Management Apple | Update Client / Site sync | MSAD-3161 |
| Device Management Apple | Update ABM Polling to loop through SOs | MSAD-3160 |
| Device Management Apple | Update AAID generation to have SO ID | MSAD-3159 |
| Device Management Apple | N-central – Provide client IDs in JWT | MSAD-3113 |
| Ecosystem Framework | Update agent to use new GRPC library. | KUIP-2817 |
Release 2023.7
2023.7 GA
| Category | Description | Item |
| Core | [USABILITY] Azure SSO Not Advancing Session Timeout | NCCF-119293 |
| Core | [USABILITY] Azure SSO IDP User Does Not Respect the User Timeout Setting | NCCF-99445 |
| Core | Resolved an issue not properly restricting user privileges | NCCF-134722 |
| Core | LaunchDarkly Processing Regarding Analytics Events | NCCF-125866 |
| Core | Automated N-central OS Package Update – August 16, 2023 | NCCF-123491 |
| Core | N-central does not provider user id / username fields to Azure Resource Manager GetUserToken endpoint | NCCF-121844 |
| Core | Hide Cloud Commander Setup when NOT at SO Level | NCCF-117957 |
| Core | Cloud Commander Navigation for Azure Resource Manager | NCCF-117597 |
| Core | Increase timeout for XMPP startup | NCCF-115736 |
| Core | Pop Up Box Each time you log into a device | NCCF-113878 |
| Core | Automated N-central OS Package Update – July 17, 2023 | NCCF-113077 |
| Core | Device Overview Active Issues tab does not show all active issues | NCCF-15517 |
| Core | Fully Disable Outbound Communication | NCCF-16757 |
| Core | NAC Recreate an Advanced Scripts page | NCCF-37467 |
| Core | DMA Hide ‘Administration > Certificate Management’ menu | NCCF-41139 |
| Core | NAC Version Management Upload upgrade file to server stops showing progress | NCCF-42273 |
| Core | NAC Version Management Cancel file upload shows old nacintegration admin page | NCCF-42302 |
| Core | NAC remove the cancel button from all Service Management pages | NCCF-42581 |
| Core | NAC Edit Device Class Does Not Appear to Work | NCCF-48196 |
| Core | Provide access group customer-based user permissions to C2C integration | NCCF-52105 |
| Core | Initial Application of Security Manager Does Not Reflect Database | NCCF-58876 |
| Core | JavaScript based Google SSO is being deprecated | NCCF-62750 |
| Core | Incorrect case on “multi-session” Causing System Errors | NCCF-75605 |
| Core | NAC should only be visible on the System level | NCCF-84572 |
| Core | Agents not upgrading from probes | NCCF-87866 |
| Core | DMA Maintenance task to process Unenroll command queue | NCCF-90252 |
| Managed Services for Apple | Add Apps & Books Permission to Default Administrator Role | MSAD-3137 |
| Managed Services for Apple | Permission Update for DMA UI access | MSAD-3112 |
| Managed Services for Apple | Add new script to Mac Script Repository | MSAD-2945 |
| Patch Management | [FEATURE] Support 3rd party patching on Intune enabled devices | PMCM-2081 |
Known Limitations
These items for the current version of the N-able N-central software is composed of material issues significantly impacting performance whose cause has been replicated by N-able and where a fix has not yet been released. The list is not exclusive and does not contain items that are under investigation. Any known limitations set forth herein may not impact every customer environment. The N-able N-central software is being provided as it operates today. Any potential modifications, including a specific bug fix or any potential delivery of the same, are not considered part of the current N-able N-central software and are not guaranteed.
Agents and Probes
| Description | Bug |
|---|---|
| New Windows Agent installations must have a valid FQDN as the first entry in the server address list in order to install successfully. Upgrades and existing agent communication should continue to work as expected. | NCCF-79152 |
| Communication issues may be encountered for N-able N-central Probes installed on Windows servers that have multiple NICs. For more information, refer to “KBA20020: Configuring A Server With Multiple NICs” in the online Help. | 67778 |
Automation Manager
| Description | Bug |
|---|---|
| Running Automation Manager Policies created using Automation Manager 1.6 or earlier may result in Failed to create an EndDate … errors if the Policies are run on a computer using a different date format. This issue does not affect Policies created using Automation Manager 1.7 or later. | 65712 |
Custom Services
| Description | Bug |
|---|---|
| Custom services may appear as misconfigured when the system locale of the device is not set to English. For example, in Portuguese the default decimal in c#/.net is not a period, “.”, it is a comma, “,”. If you are having this issue, please contact N-able Technical Support. | 65288 |
Core Functionality
| Description | Bug |
|---|---|
| Installing N-able N-central on Servers that have an Nvidia Video Card Due to a bug in CentOS 7 with Nvidia’s “Nouveau” driver, installing N-able N-central on servers that have an Nvidia video card may result in the N-able N-central console showing a blank screen, or displaying an Anaconda Installer screen with an error message about the video card driver. | NCCF-11842 |
| HDM doesn’t not work with the “Last 5 Tickets” widget. | NCCF-10855 |
Dashboards
| Description | Bug |
|---|---|
| Modifying a Dashboard that is associated with a large number of services may cause performance issues when using the Firefox browser. | 70326 |
PSA Integration
| Description | Bug |
|---|---|
| In some instances, tickets closed in PSAs are not being cleared in N-able N-central. This is likely because the ticketing recipient profile in N-able N-central has Do not change the Ticket Status selected (in order to manually configure tickets). Then, when the ticket is removed in the PSA, N-able N-central will not be able to update/resolve the ticket’s status and new tickets cannot be created for the same issue. Until a solution is available through the UI for this situation, the work around is to set a Return to Normal status and set a non-used status in the ‘updatable statuses’ section or set the same status as the return to normal one. This will cause N-able N-central to add a note to the ticket on return to normal but will not alter the ticket’s status. This will allow the stale ticket check to remove the ticket from the system. | 65620 |
UI
| Description | Bug |
|---|---|
| After re-naming, the Names of files or Registry entries may not be displayed properly in the File System window and the Registry window of the Tools tab when using Internet Explorer. | 68149 |
User Access Management
| Description | Bug |
|---|---|
| Login window reappears when new tab is loaded. When already logged into N-central and a user opens a new tab and browses to N-central from this new tab, the login screen reappears yet the user is already logged in. The left hand navigation is functional. | NCCF-29648 |
Available Ciphers for Non Agent/Probe Communication with N-central
View ciphers
TLSv1.3:
TLS_AKE_WITH_AES_128_GCM_SHA256
TLS_AKE_WITH_AES_256_GCM_SHA384
TLS 1.2:
TLS_ECDHE_ECDSA_WITH_AES_256_GCM_SHA384
TLS_ECDHE_ECDSA_WITH_AES_128_GCM_SHA256
TLS_ECDHE_RSA_WITH_AES_256_GCM_SHA384
TLS_ECDHE_RSA_WITH_AES_128_GCM_SHA256
End of support
The following are being deprecated in a future release of N-able N-central:
| Linux Agent Support | Due to declining usage in the field, the N-able N-central Linux agents will stop supporting CentOS 6, Ubuntu 14.04 and the 32- bit version of Ubuntu 16.04, in a future release. |
| Internet Explorer 11 | Due to declining usage in the field, a future release of N-able Ncentral will drop support for the Internet Explorer 11 web browser. |
| AV Defender 5.x | As of next major release for those of you still utilizing the AV5 Bitdefender Antivirus be advised that monitoring from our AV5 agents will no longer continue. As a result this will leave your environments in a vulnerable state. We encourage you to review your agents to ensure you are now utilizing our latest AV6 agents. Reminder that our online help for Security Manager is available for your reference. |
| Windows 8.1/Windows Server 2012 R2 | As older Windows Server and Desktop Operating Systems transition into Microsoft’s Extended Support Phase and beyond, they are no longer receiving OS level TLS version and cipher updates (SCHANNEL). As the .NET Framework relies on SCHANNEL for TLS based communications, and as newer vulnerabilities are discovered in the ciphers available to these older Operating Systems, the available Strong Cipher list for these devices continues to shrink. We continually review the ciphers used by N-central’s Modern Security Profile, to ensure we offer only secure ciphers. At this time, there are only two (2) secure RSA key based ciphers available to Windows Server 2012 R2/Windows 8.1 and older. N-central will endeavor to support these two ciphers in our Modern Security profile for as long as they remain secure, but there may come a time where we will need to drop Official support for these Windows versions before the end of their Extended Support Phase. If/when this does occur, they will still be able to connect if you switch to the Legacy Security Profile, but this will reduce the security of all devices connecting to your N-central server. If you monitor Windows Server 2003/2008/Windows XP/Vista devices, we would like to advise you that we will be dropping support for the “TLS_RSA_WITH_3DES_EDE_CBC_SHA” cipher in a future release. Coming changes to the web front end that will support TLS 1.3, have been identified as also disabling “TLS_RSA_WITH_3DES_EDE_CBC_SHA” due to the required version of OpenSSL. Fully patched Windows Server 2008/Vista devices should be able to connect to N-central on the Legacy Security profile, using one of the newer, but still weak ciphers. Windows Server 2003/XP will no longer be able to communicate over TLS/HTTPS at that time (using a site-to-site VPN between your firewall devices, and connecting over HTTP may still work). |
| 32-bit versions of the Windows, Linux and macOS operating systems | The number of 32-bit Operating Systems monitored by Ncentral has continued to drop over the past few years. Windows Agents/Probes have historically been 32-bit, with some 64-bit specific components. In a future release, we intend to convert the Agent and Probe code base to be a native 64-bit application; this will mean a hard deprecation of support for 32-bit Windows versions. N-central’s Linux and macOS agents will follow a similar path. |
N-able N-central System requirements
The following requirements are for typical usage patterns, acknowledging that some patterns may require greater system resources for a N-able N-central server than others.
If you have any questions about how your needs affect the system requirements of your N-able N-central server, contact your Channel Sales Specialist or email n-able-salesgroup@n-able.com.
| Processor | Server class x86_64 CPUs manufactured by Intel or AMD (i.e. Xeon or EPYC). Please refer to the Red Hat Hardware Ecosystem for further details |
| Operating System | You do not need to install a separate Operating System to run N-able N-central. The N-able Ncentral ISO includes a modified version of CentOS 7, based on the upstream Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7. |
| Physical Hardware | The physical server used to install N-able N-central in a bare metal environment must be certified to run Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.7 (x64) by Red Hat, or the hardware vendor, without any additional drivers. Please check the Red Hat Hardware Ecosystem for details. Server Grade hard drives connected to a RAID controller with a Battery/Capacitor Backed Cache are Required. Examples include 10K+ RPM SCSI or SAS drives, Enterprise Grade SSDs or NVMes for bare metal and virtualized hosts, or a Fibre Channel connected SAN with Enterprise Grade hard drives for virtualized hosts (Fibre Channel cards can be used for bare metal if they are configured in the pre-boot environment and do NOT require vendor-provided drivers). Although Desktop Hard Drives will work with the Operating System, they do not meet the minimum throughput required for the back-end Database of N-able N-central. |
For more details, please refer to the Red Hat Hardware Ecosystem to see if your current hardware will work with our customized version of CentOS 7.
System requirements by number of devices managed
The table below lists the minimum specifications required to manage the number of devices indicated (based on average usage). Performance can be improved by exceeding these requirements. When determining your hardware requirements, consider any growth in managed device count that may occur over time.
View more
| Number of devices | CPU Cores | Memory | Storage |
|---|---|---|---|
| Up to 1,000 | 2 | 4 GB RAM | 80 GB RAID |
| Up to 3,000 | 4 | 8 GB RAM | 150 GB RAID |
| Up to 6,000 | 8 | 16 GB RAM | 300 GB RAID |
| Up to 9,000 | 12 | 24 GB RAM | 450 GB RAID |
| Up to 12,000 | 16 | 32 GB RAM | 600 GB RAID |
| Up to 16,000 | 22 | 48 GB RAM | 800 GB RAID |
| Up to 20,000 | 28 | 64 GB RAM | 1 TB RAID |
| Up to 24,000 | 34 | 80 GB RAM | 1.2 TB RAID |
Notes
- Server Grade hard drives connected to a RAID controller with a Battery/Capacitor Backed Cache, are required to ensure performance and unexpected power-loss data protection.
- In a virtualized environment, hard drives for the N-able N-central server must not be shared with any other applications or VM guests that have significant I/O workloads. For example, Report Manager, SQL Databases, E-Mail Servers, Active Directory Domain Controllers, SharePoint, or similar should not be installed on the same physical hard drive as N-able N-central.
- N-able recommends two or more hard drives be placed in a redundant RAID configuration. With two drives, RAID 1 must be used. With more than two drives, RAID 1+0 or RAID 5 are recommended. RAID 6 is an option on servers with less than 1,000 devices (the additional write latency of RAID 6 becomes an issue above 1,000 devices).
- N-able recommends more, smaller disks in a RAID array, as opposed to fewer larger disks. Databasebacked applications, like N-able N-central, have better write performance with an increased number of parallel writes (hard drives).
- If using Solid State Drives (SSDs), N-able requires Enterprise Grade, SLC based (or better) SSDs with a SAS interface, or Enterprise Grade NVMes. SSD and NVMe drives must have an endurance rating of at least 0.2 DWPD (Drive Writes Per Day), and at least 2 physical disks in a redundant RAID array. On Bare Metal servers, the RAID array must appear to the operating system as a single Block or NVMe Device. Currently, many PCIe and NVMe drives do not meet this last requirement and would only work in a virtualized environment.
- Configure the RAID controller to use the default stripe size and a Read/Write cache of 50%/50%.
The underlying customized version of CentOS 7 has certain hardware limits that are consistent with the upstream Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 distribution. Of note are the following:
| Subsytem | Limit |
|---|---|
| Minimum disk space | 80 GB |
| Maximum physical disk size (BIOS) | 2 TB |
| Maximum physical disk size (UEFI) | 50 TB |
| Required minimum memory | 4GB for 4 or fewer logical CPUs 1GB per logical CPU for more than 4 logical CPUs |
| Maximum memory | 12 TB |
| Maximum logical CPUs | 768 |
Due to the ecosystem of different hardware, N-able does not certify specific hardware configurations. Instead we rely on the upstream Red Hat Enterprise Linux and hardware vendor testing and certification.
Examples of servers that have been Red Hat certified include HPE ProLiant DL360 Gen10 and Dell PowerEdge R620.
Please consult with your hardware vendor to ensure that any server to be used for a bare metal installation meets the above requirements, and is Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.7 certified, without the need for additional
drivers.
N-able recommends that for any Bare Metal server, two or more SAS 10k or faster hard drives be placed in a RAID array to improve redundancy. RAID 1+0 or RAID 5 are supported (at the hardware RAID BIOS level). RAID 6 is an option on servers with less than 1,000 devices (the additional write latency of RAID 6 becomes an issue above 1,000 devices).
Support for virtualized environments
N-able supports VMware ESX Server 6.0 or newer and Windows Server 2012 R2 Hyper-V or newer LTS versions. N-able recommends use of the latest stable versions of VMware or Hyper-V in order to ensure the best performance, feature set and compatibility with N-able N-central.
View more
Hyper-V on Windows Desktop Operating Systems not Supported.
N-able N-central installed on a virtual machine running on a Desktop Operating System (such as HyperV on Windows 10, Virtual Box, Parallels, VMWare Fusion or similar) is not a supported configuration. If
you are using Windows Hyper-V, it must be installed on a supported server class Windows Operating
System.
Windows Server Semi-Annual Releases are not Supported.
Only Long-Term Support (LTS) versions of the Windows Server Operating System are supported as a
Hyper-V host for N-able N-central. Microsoft currently releases “Semi-Annual Release” versions of
Windows Server as a technology preview for the next LTS version. Due to their technology preview
status, these “Semi-Annual Release” versions of Windows Server are not supported as Hyper-V hosts
for N-able N-central.
About virtualization
Virtualization provides an abstraction layer between the hardware and the Operating System which permits the operation of multiple logical systems on one physical server unit. The table below includes considerations when using this deployment method.
| System Performance | It is impossible to guarantee the scalability or performance of a N-able N-central server deployed on a Virtual Machine due to: 1. Variability in field environments resulting from host server configurations, 2. The number of virtual guests run on the host server, and 3. The performance of the underlying host hardware. |
| Supportability | N-able supports N-able N-central software deployed on VMWare ESX/ESXi 6.0 or newer, Windows Server 2012 R2 Hyper-V or newer LTS releases, Microsoft Azure and Amazon AWS EC2 in the same way that we support N-able N-central deployed on Bare Metal. This support is limited to the components (Software and Operating System) shipped with Nable N-central and does not include the troubleshooting of virtualization systems nor of performance issues related to environmental factors. N-able recommends reaching out to your hardware or virtualization vendor for support on the underlying virtualization and hardware components. Any assistance provided by Nable Support for virtualization or hardware issues is on a best-effort basis only. In the event of serious performance problems, we might ask you to migrate a virtualized N-able N-central system to a physical hardware deployment. |
| Virtual Hardware Support | In Windows Server 2016 Hyper-V or newer deployments, it is recommended to create a new Generation 2 VM. When configuring the VM virtual hardware, if you choose to enable Secure Boot, please select the Microsoft UEFI Certificate Authority template. For VMWare ESX/ESXi deployments, it is recommended to select the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 guest OS template, then under the Boot Options, select the UEFI Firmware. |
| Network Adapters | N-able recommends using the VMXNET3 network card in VMWare. When the VM is configured as Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7, it will use VMXNET3 by default. Unless you are using Network Interface Bonding, N-able N-central requires only one (1) network adapter added to the VM configuration. Multiple network adapters that are not used in a bonding configuration can cause connectivity and licensing issues. |
| MAC Addresses | By default, most virtualization environments use a dynamically assigned MAC address for each virtual network card. As your N-able N-central license is generated in part by using the MAC address of its network card, it is required to use a statically assigned MAC address in order to avoid becoming de-licensed. |
Recommended configuration for the virtualized server
Although provisioning virtual disks as “thin” or “thick” results in nearly-identical performance, thick
provisioning is recommended, particularly when more than 1,000 devices will be connected to your Nable N-central server.
- Assign the highest resource access priority to N-able N-central, as compared to other guest VMs.
- Do not over-provision resources (Memory, CPU, Disk) on the virtualization host. Over-provisioning these resources can causes memory swapping to disk, and other bottlenecks that can impact guest system performance.
- Ensure that the system has enough RAM and hard drive space to provide permanently allocated resources to the N-able N-central guest.
Supported Software
Browsers
N-able N-central supports the latest versions of:
- Microsoft Edge®
- Mozilla Firefox®
- Google Chrome®
- Apple Safari®
Mobile phone browsers are not supported.
Remote Control
Remote control connections require the following software on the computers that initiate connections:
- .NET Framework 4.5.2 on Windows devices
- Oracle Java 1.8 versions that include Java Web Start
Report Manager
To use Report Manager with N-able N-central, ensure the you upgrade to the latest version of Report Manager.
Automation Manager
Automation Manager requires .NET Framework 4.5.2 and PowerShell 3.0 to run AMP-based services with N-able N-central.
SNMP Community String
On HPE ProLiant Generation 9 or older Physical Servers, when monitoring the N-able N-central server using SNMP, the community string used for SNMP queries to the server must use N-central_SNMP, not public. SNMP is only enabled on HPE ProLiant Generation 9 or older Physical Servers. All other installs do not enable SNMP on the N-able N-central server.
Supported Operating Systems
This section describes the supported operating systems for N-able N-central.
Windows Agents
- Microsoft .NET Framework 4.5.2 (or later)
Windows Server 2022
- Windows Server 2022 Standard
- Windows Server 2022 Datacenter
- Windows Server 2022 Datacenter: Azure
Windows Server 2019
- Windows Server 2019 Datacenter
- Windows Server 2019 Standard
Windows Server 2016
- Windows Server 2016 Datacenter
- Windows Server 2016 Standard
- Windows Server 2016 Essentials
- Windows Storage Server 2016
- Windows Server 2016 MultiPoint Premium Server
- Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2016
Windows Server 2012
- R2 Datacenter
- R2 Essentials
- R2 Foundation
- R2 Standard
- Datacenter 64-bit Edition
- Essentials 64-bit Edition
- Foundation 64-bit Edition
- Standard 64-bit Edition
- Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2012
- Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2012 R2
- Storage Server 2012 Enterprise 64-bit Edition
- Storage Server 2012 Express 64-bit Edition
- Storage Server 2012 Standard 64-bit Edition
- Storage Server 2012 Workgroup 64-bit Edition
Windows 11
- Microsoft Windows 11 Enterprise & Professional
- Microsoft Windows 11 Education editions
- Microsoft Windows 11 Pro for Workstations
Windows 10
- Microsoft Windows 10 Enterprise & Professional
- Microsoft Windows 10 Education editions
- Windows 10 Pro for Workstations
Windows 8 and 8.1
- 8.1 Enterprise
- 8.1 Professional
- 8 Enterprise
- 8 Professional
Windows 7
- Microsoft Windows 7 Enterprise & Professional
- Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate
macOS Agents
- 12.0 (Monterey)
- 11.0 (Big Sur)
- 10.15 (Catalina)
- 10.14 (Mojave)
- 10.13 (High Sierra)
- 10.12 (Sierra)
Linux Agents
Independent Agents are required for 32-bit and 64-bit Linux OS installations.
The probe performs an SSH connection a Linux device. To discover a Ubuntu/Debian OS device, the
device must have openssh installed.
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux/CentOS 8 (64-bit)
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux/CentOS 7 (x86_64 and i686)
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux/CentOS 6 (x86_64 and i686)
- Ubuntu 20.04 LTS (64-bit)
- Ubuntu 18.04 “Bionic Beaver” (x86_64)
- Ubuntu 16.04 “Xenial Xerus” (x86_64 and i686)
- Debian 8.7/Ubuntu 14.04 “Trusty Tahr” (x86_64 and i686)
AV Defender
Workstation Operating Systems
- Microsoft Windows 11
- Microsoft Windows 10
- Microsoft Windows 8, 8.1
Tablet And Embedded Operating Systems
- Windows 10 IoT Enterprise
- Windows Embedded 8.1 Industry
- Windows Embedded 8 Standard
- Windows Embedded Enterprise 7
- Windows Embedded POSReady 7
- Windows Embedded Standard 7
- Windows Embedded Compact 7
- iOS 12.0 or later
Server Operating Systems
- Microsoft Windows Server 2022
- Microsoft Windows Server 2019 Core
- Microsoft Windows Server 2019
- Microsoft Windows Server 2016
- Microsoft Windows Server 2016 Core
- Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2
- Microsoft Windows Server 2012
For Microsoft Windows Embedded Standard 7, TCP/IP, Filter Manager, and Windows Installer must all be
enabled.
Patch Manager
Workstation Operating Systems
- Microsoft Windows 11
- Microsoft Windows 10 version 1607 and later
- Microsoft Windows 8.1
- Microsoft Windows 8
- Microsoft Windows 7
Server Operating Systems
- Microsoft Windows Server 2022
- Microsoft Windows Server 2012
- Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2
- Microsoft Windows Server 2016
- Microsoft Windows Server 2019
The following operating systems are not supported with N-able N-central patch manager:
- Microsoft Windows XP
- Microsoft Windows Vista
- Microsoft Windows 10 Home Edition
- Microsoft Windows Server 2003
- Microsoft Windows Server 2008
- Microsoft Windows 11 Home Edition (Monitoring status is supported)
Windows Update Agent
The minimum version of the Windows Update Agent (WUA) needs to be greater than 7.6.7600.320. The base NT build version of Windows should be 6.1 or later. Older versions of the base NT build cannot upgrade past version 7.6.7600.256 of the Windows Update Agent.
Automation Manager
Workstation Operating Systems
- Microsoft Windows 11
- Microsoft Windows 10 (32/64-bit)
- Microsoft Windows 8.1 (32/64-bit)
- Microsoft Windows 8 (32/64-bit)
- Microsoft Windows 7 (32/64-bit)
Server Operating Systems
- Microsoft Windows Server 2022
- Microsoft Windows Server 2019
- Microsoft Windows Server 2016 (32/64-bit)
- Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2 (32/64-bit)
- Microsoft Windows Server 2012 (32/64-bit)
Disk Encryption Manager
| Hyper-V Server 2012 R2 | Hyper-V Server 2016 |
| Windows 7 Enterprise | Windows 7 Home Premium |
| Windows 7 Professional | Windows 7 Ultimate |
| Windows 8 Enterprise | Windows 8 Pro |
| Windows 8 Pro with Media Center | Windows 8.1 Enterprise |
| Windows 8.1 Pro | Windows 8.1 Pro with Media Center |
| Windows 10 Education | Windows 10 Enterprise |
| Windows 10 Enterprise 2015 LTSB | Windows 10 Enterprise 2016 LTSB |
| Windows 10 Enterprise for Virtual Desktops | Windows 10 Enterprise LTSC 2019 |
| Windows 10 Pro | Windows 10 Pro Education |
| Windows 10 Pro for Workstations | |
| Windows Server 2008 R2 Enterprise | Windows Server 2008 R2 Datacenter |
| Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard | Windows Server 2008 R2 Foundation |
| Windows Server 2012 Datacenter | Windows Server 2012 Essentials |
| Windows Server 2012 Foundation | Windows Server 2012 R2 Datacenter |
| Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials | Windows Server 2012 R2 Foundation |
| Windows Server 2012 R2 Standard | Windows Server 2012 R2 Standard Evaluation |
| Windows Server 2012 Standard | |
| Windows Server 2016 Datacenter | Windows Server 2016 Datacenter Evaluation |
| Windows Server 2016 Essentials | Windows Server 2016 Standard |
| Windows Server 2016 Standard Evaluation | |
| Windows Server 2019 Datacenter | Windows Server 2019 Essentials |
| Windows Server 2019 Standard | Windows Server 2019 Standard Evaluation |
| Windows Server Datacenter | |
| Windows Small Business Server 2011 Essentials | Windows Small Business Server 2011 Standard |
Port access requirement
N-central Server
Supported operating systems for remote control
The availability of remote control connections will vary depending on the operating systems of both the client and target devices. The table below outlines the operating systems and their compatibility with various remote control types.
Licensing and Customer Support
Agent/Probe Installation Software
N-able N-central 2023.8 uses the 7-Zip file archiver for installing agents and probes. 7-Zip is free software redistributed under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation. For more information, see http://www.7-zip.org.
Customer Support
Contact N-able to activate your N-able N-central server.
| Web Page: | http://www.n-able.com |
| Technical Support SelfService Portal: | https://success.n-able.com/ |
| Phone: | Toll Free (U.S./CAN): 1-866-302-4689 International: +800-6225-3000 Local: (613) 592-6676, select option 2 for support |
Download release notes
For a PDF version of the latest release notes, or to view historical release notes, please use the following link:
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