Why might you receive unreadable trap messages from NPM?

• A. The device MIBs are not in your MIB database or it uses SNMPv3 and has not been added as a monitored node for authentication
• B. The Orion Web Console is offline
• C. The SNMP port is closed on the device
• D. The device uses a non-standard MIB format

Answer: (A)

Traps rely on MIB definitions to translate OIDs into human-readable names. If the device’s MIBs aren’t in the NPM MIB database, the trap payload can’t be decoded, so you see unreadable or numeric data. In SNMPv3, traps also require proper authentication setup; if the device uses SNMPv3 and hasn’t been added as a monitored node with the correct credentials, NPM can’t interpret the trap, which also results in unreadable messages. Ensuring the vendor MIBs are loaded and the device has SNMPv3 credentials configured will allow NPM to decode and display traps properly. Other scenarios either prevent traps from arriving or don’t inherently cause unreadable traps.