N-Central Log Collection Utility v6.3

Date: May 14, 2025
Author: Zach Snow – The Mirazon Group

We're excited to announce the release of N-Central Log Collection Utility v6.3, a powerful, purpose-built PowerShell tool to assist MSPs and IT professionals in gathering and compressing diagnostic logs from N-able N-Central environments with maximum efficiency.

Whether you're troubleshooting with Support or documenting system state, this utility gives you clean, structured, complete logs—all in one archive.

🔧 What’s New in v6.3

NOTE: Logs located in:
C:\Source\mirazon-script-logs\N-Central-Log-Collection
You may want to change your output file path to something else.

✅ PME Diagnostics Collection (New!)
Automatically runs PME.Diagnostics.exe
Waits for output, validates file, retries intelligently
Bundles PME logs into archive under /PME_Diagnostics/

✅ Full Directory Structure Preservation
Maintains full log paths (e.g., C:\Program Files... becomes C_\Program Files\...)
Great for replication of environment during troubleshooting

✅ Optimized Native Compression
Uses PowerShell's built-in Compress-Archive
Advanced pre-processing of large log files
Up to 60% space savings depending on log content

✅ Robust Logging & Summary
Generates a log and summary .txt file with:
Directory list
Sizes before/after compression
PME diagnostics status
Archive location

✅ Exit Codes for Automation
Exit codes (0–6) make integration with RMM or automation platforms simple
Example: 1 = Directory Creation Failure, 5 = Partial Success

🔍 Why This Matters
MSPs are often tasked with providing timely diagnostics to support teams. Previously, this meant manually locating dozens of log directories across different products. This utility:

Saves hours of manual log gathering
Ensures consistency and completeness
Reduces friction during escalations and ticket handling
Whether you’re working with AV Defender, PME, Take Control, or legacy agents, this utility has you covered.

📥 How to Get Started
Download the script from developer.n-able.com or https://developer.n-able.com/n-central/recipes/n-central-log-collection-utility

Run it as Administrator on the affected endpoint
Collect the .zip file and send it to support (or archive internally)

📌 Example Output
HOSTNAME-n-central-logs-20250514.zip – compressed archive
HOSTNAME-n-central-logs-summary-20250514.txt – summary of all collected data
PME_Diagnostics/ – folder containing PME logs if collection succeeds

📎 Additional Notes
Retains archives for 30 days, auto-cleans older files