Quasar Scan user guide
System Requirements
Supported Platforms
| Quasar | Supported Platforms |
|---|---|
| Quasar Scanning Agent | All Windows desktop back to Windows XP All Windows Server back to 2003 Debian Linux 5.0 (Lenny) or higher Ubuntu Linux 10.04 or higher Suse SLES Linux 10 or higher RHEL/CentOS Linux 6 or higher |
| Quasar Database Agent | Microsoft SQL Server MySQL Microsoft Access files Postgres Oracle (connecting from Windows) Sybase ASE MongoDB SQLite files |
| Quasar Server | Microsoft Windows or Windows Server Versions currently under Microsoft support |
| Supported Web Browsers | Edge / Internet Explorer Google Chrome Safari Firefox |
Quasar Application Server System Requirements
The minimum system requirements for installations on a single server running the Quasar Web Client and Quasar Application Server are:
| Component | Minimum Requirement |
|---|---|
| Processor | 4 cores, 2GHz+ |
| RAM | 16 GB |
| Hard disk space | 46 MB for Quasar server installation. 100GB minimum recommended for data storage 500GB recommended for data storage |
| Operating System | Microsoft Windows or Windows Server Versions currently under Microsoft support |
Note: The data storage requirements are local filesystem sizes.
The initial deployment and scan requires approximately 1KB per CHD hit. There will typically be millions of hits per scan, depending on the number of hosts scanned and various filter settings.
The maximum available storage space affects the amount of raw data that can be collected at a time for the scan-collect-analyse-delete workflow. The result is that it affects how many hosts can be scanned concurrently and how many analysis phases need to be conducted to achieve your analysis goals.
For this reason, it is highly recommended that you make the storage resource as large as is reasonably practical.
Quasar Scanning Agent (Self-Scan) System Requirements
Where the Quasar Agent will only be scanning the hard drives of the host on which it is installed (a self-scan), the workload will mostly consist of files that will be ignored (e.g., non-document system files, DLLs, etc.) which results in a lower computational load and the ability to complete scans faster. Therefore, a lower set of system requirements is required for scans to complete in a timely manner.
The minimum system requirements for installing Quasar on an agent machine that will be self-scanning only the hard drives of the host on which it is installed (e.g., small servers, developer desktops) are:
| Component | Minimum Requirement |
|---|---|
| Processor | 1 cores, 1.4+ GHz |
| RAM | 256 MB |
| Hard disk space | 70 MB for Quasar Agent installation. |
| Operating System | See above |
Quasar Scanning Agent (NAS / SAN / File Server / Remote Scan) System Requirements
Where the Quasar Agent will be scanning files remotely, in particular, accessing large file servers (e.g., user home drives, business-unit document repositories), the workload will typically consist of files that will be scanned (e.g., documents, spreadsheets, etc.) which results in a considerably higher computational load, and slower scan completion. Therefore, a higher set of system requirements is needed.
Quasar fully supports parallelised operations for scan jobs, therefore, there will be a linear increase in scan throughput as more cores and/or Agent Hosts are added. For multi-terabyte filers, we recommend using a number of dual- or quad-core CPUs wherever possible.
Note: After a certain point, parallelisation will be limited by network throughput and/or induced load on the filer itself.
We recommend starting small and scaling up agent resources until you have reached a balance between timeliness and filer/network load.
| Component | Minimum Requirement |
|---|---|
| Processor | 2 GHz+, 4 Cores |
| RAM | 256 MB |
| Hard disk space | 70 MB for Quasar Agent installation 1 to 8 GB temp-file space |
| Operating system | See above |
Space Required
To install Quasar, approximately 140MB is required for the program files (if both the Server Agent and UI are installed).
Additional storage will also be required for:
- Logs (if enabled, this can require between several megabytes to tens of megabytes of space)
- Temp storage if a zip file is over 20MB (most zip files, if under 20MB will be unpacked in RAM for speed).
SQL DB Notes
Note: The contents of your SQL DB must be plaintext in order to perform a successful Quasar scan.
Databases with encrypted contents or application-specific encodings will not be accessible for scanning by the default scanner, and will require application support & setup at deployment time to be successful.