Get started with NetBlade for Windows: install, first scan, first dashboard

In twenty minutes you will have NetBlade installed, the background agent running, your first network scanned and turned into a site, and a dashboard you know how to read. Everything else in these articles builds on this: until a scan has run, NetBlade touches nothing and shows nothing.

Before you start

A PC with Windows 10 version 2004 or later, or Windows 11. A desktop or laptop that is switched on during working hours is ideal, because the agent only works while someone is signed in to it.
The PC connected to the network you want to look at. NetBlade sees the networks it can reach from where it sits.
A Microsoft account signed in to the Microsoft Store on that PC, for the trial and the subscription.
No password for anything yet: the first scan needs none.

1. Install NetBlade from the Microsoft Store

NetBlade for Windows is distributed through the Microsoft Store only, where it is coming soon: the steps below apply from the day it is published (this site says so on the Download button). Installing, updating, renewing and uninstalling all go through the Store, like any other Store app.

Open the Microsoft Store and search for NetBlade.
Press Install.
Open NetBlade from the Start menu.

Note: Uninstalling the app makes Windows delete its data folder, database included. If you only want to stop using it for a while, let the subscription lapse instead: your data stays on the PC.

NetBlade for Windows has no free tier. The first time you open it, every section shows the Subscribe to NetBlade page with the two plans and their price in your currency: €6.99 a month or €49.99 a year, or the equivalent where you live.

Pick the monthly or yearly plan and press Start.
Complete the purchase in the Store window that opens.

The 7-day free trial belongs to the subscription and is run by the Store: it applies only to your Microsoft account’s first subscription, and the Store charges at the end of the trial unless you cancel before. You cancel at any time from your Microsoft account, in Services & subscriptions. Payment, renewal, receipts and refunds are handled by the Store; NetBlade never sees your payment details and has no server of its own. The app simply asks the Store whether the licence is active.

A few things worth knowing now:

If you already subscribed on another PC with the same Microsoft account, press I already have a subscription and the app asks the Store again.
Later, the subscription state is in Settings, under NetBlade Pro, with a Subscribe button.
Without an active subscription only Settings stays open and the background agent stops. What you collected is not deleted: it comes back as soon as you subscribe again.

3. Understand the agent

NetBlade starts by itself when you sign in to Windows and stays in the notification area even when its window is closed. That background part is the agent. It is what runs monitoring, scheduled scans and deep reads, the daily check against the vulnerability feed, alerts and scheduled report emails.

The promise, stated the same way inside the app, is this: it runs while you are signed in to Windows. Not before sign-in, and not on a locked machine nobody has signed in to. The Microsoft Store does not allow Windows services inside an app, so the agent is a startup task in your user session.

Set it up once:

Open Settings.
Under Behaviour, look at The close button. Hides the window keeps the agent working when you close the window; Quits the app stops it until your next sign-in. For a PC that should keep watching, choose Hides the window.
Under The agent, read its state, for example «Running. Last check at …», and make sure it starts at sign-in. Use Start at sign-in if it does not.
To bring the window back later, click the NetBlade icon in the notification area. Its menu also has Open NetBlade and Quit.

Warning: If automatic start is turned off in Task Manager, under Startup apps, the app cannot turn it back on. Settings will say «Turned off in Task Manager. Only you can turn it back on there, under Startup apps.»

Tip: The Dashboard shows the agent’s state as a chip next to the page title, for example «Agent running». Click it for details and a shortcut to Settings.

4. Run your first scan

A scan finds who answers on the network, using parallel ping and the Windows ARP table. It needs no credentials and changes nothing on the devices.

In the menu open Network and discovery, then Scan.
In Where to scan, keep This network (…). The brackets show the network the PC is on.
Press Scan and wait. Cancel stops it.
Read the results: IP, NAME, MAC, VENDOR, TYPE and REPLY time for every host that answered.

The scanned network becomes a site, recognised by its gateway’s MAC address. The devices found go into the catalog, under Inventory, then Devices. The manufacturer comes from the IEEE registries bundled with the app, and random MAC addresses (the ones phones make up) and virtual machines are recognised as such.

Note: You can also scan A range I type, with From and To. A range outside the network the PC is connected to is scanned but not stored: a site is recognised by the gateway in front of it, and NetBlade cannot tell it apart from another network using the same addresses.

5. Name the site and ask the devices what they are

In the menu open Sites.
Press Rename and give the site a name you will recognise, for example the customer’s or the office’s.
Press Identify every device. NetBlade asks each device what it is, without a password: its name in DNS, its NetBIOS name, UPnP and mDNS, its web page, its certificate, public SNMP. It also checks the main ports.

Identification gives devices a better name and type, and it is what enables the network checks (Telnet open, Remote Desktop reachable, SNMP answering its factory community and so on) on the To fix page.

Tip: If NetBlade guesses a type or name wrong, open the device, press Edit… and fix it. A name and type you set are locked: no scan overwrites them.

6. Read the dashboard

Open Dashboard; it is also the page that opens at start-up. Press Refresh to recalculate. From top to bottom:

Devices: how many are known and how many are answering now.
Machines read: how many have been read in depth with credentials. Right after a first scan this is close to zero, and that is expected.
To fix: how many open problems, and how many of them are being exploited right now.
Watched: targets on the Monitor page and whether they answer.
Compliance: how many baseline checks fail.
The coverage line. It says how many devices have been read in depth, how many were identified without a password, and how many credentials are on file. Read it every time: everything else on the page is only as true as those readings. A device nobody got into cannot report a problem.
Worth doing first: the top of the To fix list. All N → opens the full list.
The last seven days: new devices, devices that stopped answering, ports newly open, programs installed, updated or removed, defences switched off, new findings, machines that became unreadable.
Sites: one row per site, with devices, online, read, to fix and last scan.
What is out there: device types, Windows domains, sites, devices with no type, devices not seen for a while.
The app itself: the agent, the last scheduled scan and the vulnerability feed.

Note: A quiet week and a week nobody looked at read the same. That is why the page shows the agent’s last run: check it before trusting a quiet week.

7. Let the site rescan itself

In Sites, turn on the AUTO switch for your site.
In HOW OFTEN, choose Every 15 minutes, Every hour, Every 4 hours or Once a day. For a small office, Every hour is a good start.
Leave IN DEPTH on No, only who is there for now. You will change it once credentials are in place.

The agent only rescans the site the PC is connected to at that moment. A laptop that leaves the office stops scanning that office until it comes back.

Check that it worked

Sites lists your site with a name, network, gateway, device count and a recent LAST SCAN, and says «This PC is on this network now.»
Inventory, Devices shows the devices found, with Only what is answering and Search every field… to narrow the list.
Settings, The agent shows «Running. Last check at …» with a recent time.

If something goes wrong

«No local network found. Are you connected to anything?» The PC has no active network adapter with an address. Check the connection, then scan again.
The subscription page says the Store did not answer with the prices. Check the internet connection and that NetBlade was installed from the Microsoft Store, then try again.
The agent shows «Turned off in Task Manager». Open Task Manager, go to Startup apps and enable NetBlade.
The agent «has not run since …» although the app is open. Quit NetBlade from its notification-area icon and open it again.
A typed range found hosts but no site appeared. The range is not on the network this PC is connected to. Sites are created only from the network the PC sits on.
Fewer devices than expected. Some devices ignore ping and are silent until spoken to; others are beyond a router, where their MAC address cannot be seen. Scan again during working hours, when PCs and phones are on.

Before NetBlade can tell you anything about programs, updates and defences, it needs to read your Windows PCs. Continue with Prepare your Windows PCs for agentless inventory. For a page-by-page reference, see the NetBlade for Windows guide.

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