1. The owner must be set to a value. Any value is acceptable, as long as there is one. (i.e. John Smith, Sysadmin).

  2. The tag must be set to a meaningful value. (IcmpEcho to www.google.com).

  3. Leave the buckets-of-history-kept, distributions-of-statistics-kept, filter-for-history, hops-of-statisticskept, hours-of-statistics-kept, lives-of-history-kept, paths-of-statistics-kept, samples-of-history-kept, statistics-distribution-interval and other parameters related to probe history/statistics to their DEFAULT VALUE when creating the probe on the Cisco device.

  4. The probe frequency can be set to any number. However, keep in mind that this should be a reasonable value, such as 30, 60, 120, 240 or 300 seconds. Reports might seem a bit erratic if the probe frequency does not match the polling frequency: a “sawtooth” pattern may appear in the probe number of completed operations graph and packet metrics. This is normal but may be a bit alarming to a new user.

  5. The probe's life must be set to “forever”, as they will be used for performance and trending purposes.