- 7 minutes to read

Monitoring Disk Usage

Proactively monitor disk usage on your Windows Servers with the Nodinite Windows Server Monitoring Agent. This guide shows you how to set custom thresholds, receive actionable alerts, and leverage real-time metrics to prevent outages and ensure optimal performance.

✅ Real-time monitoring of physical disks
✅ Customizable thresholds for performance and alerting
✅ Actionable alerts and Remote Actions within role-based Monitor Views to resolve issues fast
✅ Visualize disk usage with charts and dashboard widgets

Disk items as Resources
Example list of monitored Disks in a Monitor View.

Monitoring Features

  • Automatic Discovery - The Nodinite Windows Server Monitoring Agent uses WMI to automatically discover your physical Disks. Sharing insights is easy within Nodinite using Monitor Views.
  • State Evaluation - Based on user-defined thresholds (fixed or percentage)
  • Category-based Monitoring - Organize different types of Disks; monitored Resources are grouped by Categories.

State Evaluation for Disks

Monitored Disks are displayed within Nodinite as Resources. For example, if you have 3 physical Disks, you will have 3 Resources in Nodinite.

  • Resources - The name of the Resources comes from the type of monitoring and volume label:
    • Free space for C: => Free space C:\
    • Free space for D: => Free space D:\
  • Categories - All monitored Disks belong to one of the following Categories:
Category Description
Disk Ensure the Disk is operational and the free space is within user-defined monitoring thresholds

Categories
List of Disk-related categories as a filter in a Monitor View.

  • Applications - The Application name is the Display Name from the configuration of the monitored Windows Server:
    Application Path Example
    Example of Application naming pattern.

Each item (presented in Nodinite as a Resource), is evaluated with a state (OK, Warning, Error, Unavailable).

From within Nodinite, you can reconfigure the state evaluation on Resource level using the Expected State feature.

Note

Depending on the user-defined synchronization interval set for the Windows Server Monitoring Agent, there might be a delay before Nodinite Web Client/Monitor Views reflects the change. Click the Sync All button (or use the dropdown for individual agent selection) to force Nodinite to request a resynchronization.

Sync
Option to force Nodinite to request a resynchronization with the monitoring agent.

Monitoring Disks

For each Disk, the monitored state evaluates as described in the table below:

State Status Description Actions
Unavailable Service not available Service not available If the server can't be reached and evaluated either due to network or security-related problems, or if the specific Disk does not exist Review prerequisites
Error Error state raised Error state raised The Disk has too low free disk Details, Disk Chart, Edit
Warning Warning state raised Warning state raised The Disk has too low free disk Details, Disk Chart, Edit
OK Online Online The Disk is accessible and is within user-defined monitoring thresholds Details, Disk Chart, Edit

Actions for Disk

The following Remote Actions are available for the Disk Category:

Actions

Disk Details

New 6.4.0.0

View comprehensive disk information including current usage, capacity details, historical statistics, and monitoring thresholds. Click the Action button and select the Details menu item within the 'Control Center' section.

The Disk Details page displays:

Disk Overview:

  • Total Capacity - Total disk size in GB
  • Used - Currently allocated disk space (GB and percentage)
  • Free - Available disk space (GB and percentage)
  • Status - Current evaluation state (OK, Warning, Error, Unavailable)
  • Last Sample - Timestamp of most recent data collection
  • Status message: "Disk space is within configured thresholds." (or appropriate warning/error message)

Disk Statistics:

  • Average Free - Mean available space across sample window (GB and percentage)
  • Lowest Free - Minimum free space recorded during sample window (GB and percentage)
  • Highest Free - Maximum free space recorded during sample window (GB and percentage)
  • Samples - Number of data points collected
  • Sample Window - Time range for statistical analysis (e.g., "Single sample", "1.5 minutes")
  • Latest Sample - Timestamp for most recent data collection
  • Oldest Sample - Timestamp for earliest data in sample window

Recent Samples:

Historical disk usage data showing recent measurements in a table:

  • Timestamp - When each sample was collected
  • Total - Total disk capacity (GB)
  • Free - Available space at sample time (GB)
  • Used - Allocated space at sample time (GB)
  • Free % - Percentage of free space
  • Used % - Percentage of used space

Monitoring Thresholds:

  • Group default / Disk-specific override - Indicates whether using global (Group default) or disk-specific configuration
  • Monitoring - Whether disk monitoring is Enabled or Disabled
  • Evaluation Type - Percentage or Fixed (MB) threshold evaluation
  • Warning Threshold - Minimum free space before warning alert (displays "Not monitored" if disabled)
  • Error Threshold - Minimum free space before error alert (displays "Not monitored" if disabled)
  • Duration - Time threshold must be exceeded before alert triggers (displays "Not configured" if not set)

Volume Attributes:

Detailed file system and volume characteristics:

  • Drive Letter - Volume identifier (e.g., C:, D:)
  • Label - User-friendly volume name (e.g., "Windows", "Data")
  • File System - Disk format (NTFS, ReFS, FAT32)
  • Serial Number - Volume serial number for identification
  • Capacity - Total volume capacity (GB)
  • Used - Currently allocated space (GB and percentage)
  • Free - Available space (GB and percentage)
  • Block Size - Allocation unit size
  • Drive Type - Storage type (Fixed, Removable, Network, Unknown)
  • Max Filename Length - Maximum supported filename length
  • Disk Quotas - Quota management status (Enabled/Disabled/Unknown)
  • Compression Support - Whether volume supports compression
  • Encryption Support - Whether volume supports encryption
  • Compression State - Current compression status (Enabled/Disabled/Unknown)
  • Indexing Enabled - Whether file indexing is enabled for search
  • Boot Volume - Indicates if this is the system boot volume
  • System Volume - Indicates if this contains Windows system files
  • Dirty Bit - Indicates if volume requires check disk (chkdsk) scan
  • Automount - Automatic mounting status

Physical Disks:

Hardware information table for the underlying physical disk(s):

  • Model - Disk model name and index number
  • Manufacturer - Hardware manufacturer
  • Media / Interface - Disk type (Fixed hard disk media, SSD) and connection interface (IDE, SATA, NVMe)
  • Capacity - Total physical disk capacity
  • Firmware - Firmware version
  • Partitions - Number of partitions on the disk
  • Geometry - Physical disk geometry:
    • Bytes/sector
    • Sectors/track
    • Tracks/cylinder
    • Heads
    • Cylinders
    • Total sectors
  • Identifiers - Unique disk identifiers:
    • Device ID (e.g., \\.\PHYSICALDRIVE0)
    • PNP ID - Plug and Play device identifier

Note

The Details view provides comprehensive diagnostic information without requiring RDP access to the server. Use the refresh button to update data on demand. Monitor multiple disks independently with specific threshold configurations per volume.

Edit thresholds

You can manage the alert thresholds for a selected Disk Resource by clicking on the Action button and then clicking on the Edit thresholds menu item within the 'Control Center' section.
Edit thresholds Menu Action
Edit thresholds, using the 'Edit' action.

Next, click the option to present the modal.

Edit thresholds modal (6.1.1.0)
Example of the 'Edit thresholds' modal.

Metrics

You can view statistics about the selected Disk instance by clicking on the Action button and then clicking on the Disk chart menu item within the 'Control Center' section.

Disk Chart Menu Item
Show Disk statistics, using the 'Metrics' action.

Next, click the option to present the modal.

Disk Performance Counters
Example of Disk usage statistics.

This modal is designed to be used as a Widget in the Dashboard.

Widget on Dashboard
Disk statistics example as a Widget on the Dashboard.

Configuration Reference

Use the Remote Configuration to manage the Disk configuration.

Disk

Click the Disk tab to manage Disk-related Monitoring options.
Disk Tab
Example of the 'Disk' tab.

The global values, used for Monitoring if not superseded by Specific configuration, are:

  • Evaluation Type - Evaluation Type used for free disk space
    • None - No evaluation is performed
    • Percentage (default)
    • Fixed
  • Percentage
    • Warning Limit % - The minimum amount of free disk space in percentage before the Warning alert is triggered
    • Error Limit % - The minimum amount of free disk space in percentage before the Error alert is triggered
  • Fixed
    • Warning Limit (MB) - The minimum amount of free disk space in Megabytes before the Warning alert is triggered
    • Error Limit (MB) - The minimum amount of free disk space in Megabytes before the Error alert is triggered
  • Description - User-friendly short description for this configuration.

Specific Disks

You can override the global values with Specific settings.

Add a specific disk to monitor:

Add specific disk

Specific Disk

Next Step

Add or manage Monitor View

Windows Server Monitoring Agent
Resources
Monitoring
Monitor Views