What tool can be used to monitor network performance and analyze bandwidth?

A network analyzer or bandwidth monitor is specifically designed to assess and monitor network performance. These tools can gather data regarding network traffic, analyze bandwidth usage, and help identify potential bottlenecks within the network. They provide insights into how much bandwidth is being used, which applications are consuming it, and the overall health of network performance. By visualizing traffic patterns and offering detailed reporting, users can optimize their networks for better performance and efficiency.

The other options do not serve the primary function of monitoring network performance. A firewall primarily focuses on controlling incoming and outgoing network traffic based on predetermined security rules, rather than analyzing performance metrics. A web server’s main role is to host websites and serve content to users over the internet, without directly monitoring network bandwidth. Similarly, a proxy server acts as an intermediary for requests from clients seeking resources from other servers, and while it may log some traffic data, it does not analyze network performance in the way that a dedicated network analyzer would.