I just tried to find a free syslog server for windows and it took far too long to find anything legitimately free, and / or Open Source, and / regularly updated.

Imaging my surprise to find that tftpd32 has a syslog server (that I have used before and completely forgot about…) and it is free and open source. Further imagine my disappointment that it was not the first result when searching for “free syslog server windows.” Hopefully this will help move it up in Google’s results…

You can get it here: http://tftpd32.jounin.net/

Despite the name, tftpd32 is available in 32 and 64 bit varieties, and includes (as you might imagine) a tftp server, dhcp, SNTP, Syslog and dns serving capabilities. And it requires no installation – just unzip and run!

By default the DHCP, TFTP and syslog servers are enabled (this is the configuration you would want if you were setting up devices like Cisco switches) – I would highly advise turning off the dhcp. Also make sure the correct interface is selected. Set your computer’s IP address as the syslog server, and watch the messages flow: