Network diagnostics · AS5651

MACROMIND Looking Glass

Two tests, one for each direction of the connection. Run both before opening a ticket and support can find the problem in minutes instead of days.

AS5651 — MACROMIND Cloud. For network diagnostics only.

Why two tests?

Internet routing is asymmetric: the path your packets take to reach us is usually not the path our packets take to reach you. A test in one direction can look perfectly healthy while the fault sits in the other. Measuring both is what turns "the connection is bad" into a specific router on a specific hop that a carrier can act on.

NetDiag is a small program that measures the connection from your machine to the MACROMIND datacenters in Orlando and Miami, then produces a report you can send to support. Nothing to install, no administrator rights, and it makes no changes to your computer.

  • A control group first. It also tests Cloudflare, Google and Quad9. If those lose packets too, the problem is likely your own connection rather than our network — and the report says so plainly.
  • Every gateway and router in Orlando and Miami at the same moment, so one site can prove the other was healthy.
  • Each hop along the path is pinged directly rather than inferred. That separates real packet loss from routers that simply rate-limit ping replies — the difference between a ticket a carrier acts on and one they close.
  • A plain-language assessment: what was measured, what it means, what to do, and how much confidence to place in it.
If the problem comes and goes, run it while the problem is happening. That run is the one that counts as evidence. A clean test taken an hour later proves nothing.

Download

Windows
Graphical versionnetdiag-gui.exe · 9.1 MBCommand linenetdiag-client.exe · 2.7 MB

Windows will warn you before running it. These programs are not code-signed, so SmartScreen shows "Windows protected your PC" — choose More info, then Run anyway.

macOS
Graphical version · Apple Siliconnetdiag-gui-mac-arm64 · 8.9 MBCommand line · Apple Siliconnetdiag-client-mac-arm64 · 3.0 MBCommand line · Intelnetdiag-client-mac-intel · 3.0 MB

Not sure which chip you have? Apple menu › About This Mac. Make the file executable with chmod +x <file>, and allow it under System Settings › Privacy & Security on first run. There is no graphical build for Intel Macs yet.

Linux
Graphical versionnetdiag-gui-linux · 9.6 MBCommand linenetdiag-client-linux · 2.9 MB

Make the file executable with chmod +x <file> and run it from a terminal. The graphical version needs a desktop session; on a headless server use the command line one.

Every build speaks English, Portuguese and Spanish. It opens in your system language; add -lang en, -lang pt or -lang es to override it.

How to use it

  1. Download the version for your system and run it.
  2. Optionally type your name or company, so support can identify the report.
  3. Wait. A full test takes about 2 to 4 minutes; the quick test about one minute.
  4. Press Export report. Two files are written next to the program — a .txt and a .json. Send both to support.
What the report contains, so you know before you send it: your computer's hostname, the local and UTC time of the test, the network path from your machine to our datacenters including the addresses of the routers in between, and the measured latency and packet loss. No personal files, no credentials, no record of anything else you do on the machine. Nothing is written to disk until you press Export, and both files are plain text — open and read them before sending if you want to.

The Looking Glass runs the command from <strong>our</strong> router, so it shows the return path: how our network sees you. This is the half that NetDiag cannot measure from your side.

How to run it

  1. Pick the router in the datacenter where your service is — Orlando or Miami. Testing from the wrong site measures a path that has nothing to do with your problem.
  2. Choose the command. Ping answers "does it get there, and how consistently"; traceroute answers "which way does it go, and where does it stop".
  3. In the parameter field, put your own public IP address. It is already filled in with the address you are connecting from — change it if you want to test a different endpoint.
Reading the two together. If the Looking Glass reaches you cleanly but NetDiag showed loss, the fault is most likely on the path towards us. If the Looking Glass shows loss towards you while NetDiag looked fine, it is the return path. If both are clean, the problem is probably not in the network between us — and that is a useful answer too.
Error:
Output
Sending this to support
Attach the two NetDiag files and paste the Looking Glass output, with the time of the test and your IP address, to support@macromind.net. If the problem is intermittent, tell us the exact times you saw it — that is what lets us line your evidence up against our own graphs.