Monitoring CPU and CPU Cores
Proactively monitor CPU and CPU Core 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 ensure optimal performance and prevent outages.
✅ Real-time monitoring of all CPUs and CPU Cores
✅ Customizable thresholds for performance and alerting
✅ Actionable alerts and remote actions to resolve issues fast
✅ Visualize CPU usage with charts and dashboard widgets
Learn how to monitor the utilization of your CPUs and CPU Cores and get alerts when the percentage used is too high over time
This page describes how Nodinite monitors CPUs using one or more role-based Monitor Views. Nodinite evaluates state based on user-defined thresholds, either global or specific. For managing CPUs, remote commands are available as Actions to help you swiftly resolve reported problems. The implemented Remote Actions are detailed on this page.
Example list of monitored CPU-related items in a Monitor View.
Monitoring Features
- Automatic Discovery
- The Nodinite Windows Server Monitoring Agent uses WMI to automatically discover CPU-related items. Sharing insights is easy within Nodinite using Monitor Views.
- State Evaluation - Based on user-defined thresholds (percentage over time)
- Category-based monitoring - Organize different types of CPU-related items; monitored Resources are grouped by Categories.
State evaluation for CPU-related items
The monitored CPU-related items are displayed within Nodinite as Resources. For example, if you have 1 CPU with 4 cores, you will have 5 Resources in Nodinite.
- Resources - The name of the Resources comes from the count and index of the number of CPUs
- CPU => CPU Overall
- Core => CPU0, CPU1...
Warning
CPU Core Monitoring is not recommended for daily operations due to significant monitoring overhead and limited practical value. Enable CPU Core monitoring only for short-term troubleshooting or debugging specific performance issues. For production environments, use CPU Overall monitoring instead.
Categories - All monitored CPU items belong to one of the following 'CPU' Categories
Category Description CPU Make sure the CPU is running within user-defined monitoring thresholds CPU Core Make sure the CPU cores are running within user-defined monitoring thresholds 
List of CPU-related categories as a filter in Monitor View.Applications - The Application name is the Display Name from the configuration of the monitored Windows Server:
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.
Option to force Nodinite to request a resynchronization request with the Monitoring Agent.
Monitoring CPUs
For the CPU category, the monitored state evaluates as described in the table below:
| State | Status | Description | Actions | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Unavailable | Service not available | If the server can't be reached and evaluated either due to network or security-related problems | Review prerequisites | |
| Error | Error state raised | The 'CPU' is using too much resources for too long time | Details | |
| Warning | Warning state raised | Not yet implemented | - | |
| OK | Online | The 'CPU' is accessible and is within user-defined monitoring thresholds | Details CPU Chart Edit |
Actions for CPU
The following Remote Actions are available for the CPU and CPU - Core Categories:
- CPU Details New 6.3.x.x
- Edit thresholds
- Metrics
Remote Actions available for the CPU category.
CPU Details
New 6.3.x.x
View comprehensive CPU diagnostics including current usage, utilization statistics, processor specifications, and configured thresholds—all without requiring RDP access. Click the Action button and select the Details menu item within the 'Control Center' section.
Details action in the Control Center section.
The CPU Details modal displays the following information:
CPU Details modal showing comprehensive processor diagnostics.
CPU Overview - Current usage percentage, evaluation state (OK/Warning/Error), last sample timestamp, and threshold compliance status
Thresholds - Monitoring status (Enabled/Disabled), warning and error limits, duration thresholds, and description
Utilization Statistics - Average, peak, and lowest usage percentages across the sample window, with sample count and time range
Processor Information - Hardware details including CPU model, manufacturer, socket/architecture, core count, logical processors, clock speeds, cache sizes, virtualization support, and processor ID
Virtualization Column Values:
- Disabled - Virtualization extensions are not available to this server (either disabled in BIOS or nested virtualization not enabled for VMs)
- Firmware VT - Hardware virtualization is available but SLAT (Second Level Address Translation) is not enabled
- SLAT - Second Level Address Translation is available but firmware virtualization is not enabled
- Firmware VT + SLAT - Full virtualization support - this server can run Hyper-V, Docker, or other hypervisors
Note
Note for Virtual Machines: When monitoring VMs, this shows whether nested virtualization is enabled. VMs running on the same physical host may show different values based on their individual Hyper-V configuration (ExposeVirtualizationExtensions setting).
Tip
Use the Refresh button to update statistics on demand. The Details view eliminates the need for direct server access while providing comprehensive diagnostic information for troubleshooting performance issues.
Edit thresholds
You can manage the alert thresholds for the selected CPU/CPU Core Resource; simply click on the Action button and then click the Edit thresholds menu item within the 'Control Center' section.
Edit thresholds, using the 'Edit' action.
Next, click the option to present the modal.
'Edit thresholds' modal for CPU Monitoring.
The modal displays editable CPU (Overall) threshold fields at the top. Below that, the CPU Core thresholds accordion is expanded by default, showing the current CPU Core threshold configuration.
CPU Core thresholds accordion section.
Note
If your monitoring group contains more than one Windows Server, a notification appears at the top of the modal indicating that threshold changes will apply to all Windows Servers in the group.
Notification displayed when monitoring group contains multiple Windows Servers.
Metrics chart: Metrics
You can view statistics about the selected CPU instance by clicking the Action button and then the CPU Chart menu item within the 'Control Center' section.
Show CPU statistics, using the 'CPU Chart' action.
Next, click the option to present the modal.
Example of CPU usage statistics.
This modal is designed to be used as a Widget in the Dashboard.
CPU statistics example as a Widget on the Dashboard.
Monitoring CPU Cores
Warning
Not Recommended for Production - CPU Core monitoring generates significant monitoring overhead and provides limited practical value for daily operations. This feature should only be enabled temporarily for specialized troubleshooting or debugging scenarios. For production environments, rely on CPU Overall monitoring to track server performance.
Monitoring CPU Cores is a more fine-grained monitoring option compared with CPU Monitoring. All monitoring options are the same, so the previous documentation above for monitoring CPUs covers this topic.
Configuration
Use the Remote Configuration to manage the CPU and CPU Core configuration.
CPU tab
Click the CPU tab to manage CPU Monitoring options.
Example of the 'CPU' tab.
There are multiple options for Monitoring the CPU. Two major subcategories exist:
CPU
- Enable CPU Monitoring - When checked, enables the Monitoring of the 'CPU Overall' usage. Otherwise, Monitoring is disabled.
- CPU Warning Threshold % - When the CPU usage exceeds this threshold for more than the configured number of seconds (CPU Duration), the evaluated state is 'Warning'.
- CPU Error Threshold % - When the CPU usage exceeds this threshold for more than the configured number of seconds (CPU Duration), the evaluated state is 'Error'.
- CPU Threshold overrun duration - The maximum allowed duration breaching the threshold (seconds).
CPU Core
Important
CPU Core monitoring is disabled by default and should remain disabled for production environments. Only enable CPU Core monitoring temporarily for specific troubleshooting scenarios where per-core diagnostics are required. Disable it immediately after completing your investigation to avoid unnecessary monitoring overhead.
- Enable CPU - Core Monitoring - When checked, each Core in the CPU(s) will be monitored individually for this Windows Server
- CPU Core Warning Threshold % - When the CPU Core usage exceeds this threshold for more than the configured number of seconds (CPU Core Duration), the evaluated state is 'Warning'.
- CPU Core Error Threshold % - When the CPU Core usage exceeds this threshold for more than the configured number of seconds (CPU Core Duration), the evaluated state is 'Error'.
- CPU Core Duration - The maximum allowed duration breaching the threshold (seconds).
If you enable CPU Core monitoring, each Core will be monitored as a separate Resource in Nodinite. For example, a server with 1 CPU and 4 Cores will have 5 Resources monitored. Check the 'Enable CPU - Core monitoring' option to enable this feature.
Example configuration for enabling CPU Core monitoring.
Next Step
Related Topics
Windows Server Monitoring Agent
Resources
Monitoring
Monitor Views