Help: Device types

There are a number of device types available in DomainScan, as seen in the picture to the right.

There are two reasons for this differentiation – usability and technical.

On the usability side; it’s easier to identify similar devices if they’re marked as being the same type.

The technical reason is that DomainScan differentiates on how to scan a device based upon the device type.

Automatic device type conversion

Computers and Network devices will be upgraded automatically to being a server if DomainScan detects that the device is in fact a server.

Due to the fact that WMI is not normally present on non computer/server types, DomainScan will not use this interface when scanning. However, DomainScan will, once in a while, try to probe the WMI interface to see if the interface is present.

This is needed for computers or servers that are initially created as network devices, due to the device being offline upon creation, which causes DomainScan to create the device as a Network device.

The differentiation is described in the table below.

Device types up

Device type	WMI	SNMP	Audit	Created by DomainScan, if:
Computer	Yes	Yes, if WMI fails	Yes	A desktop Operating System (Like Windows XP) has been detected or if the device name is present in a Device list DomainScan may upgrade this to a server type if server conditions are detected
Server	Yes	Yes, if WMI fails	Yes	A Server Operating System (Like Windows Server 2003) has been detected
Virtual Server	Yes	Yes, if WMI fails	Yes	The device is detected as being a virtual (either a cluster instance or a virtual installation)
Network device	Yes	Periodically	No	This is the default type, which is assigned if the none of the above types could not be matched DomainScan may upgrade this to a computer or server type if the WMI interface becomes available
Printer	No	Yes	No	(One has to assign this role automatically)
Router	No	Yes	No	(One has to assign this role automatically)
Switch	No	Yes	No	(One has to assign this role automatically)
Hub	No	Yes	No	(One has to assign this role automatically)