A system administrator wants to assure that a server is responsive. Which of the following networking tools should the administrator use to verify network connectivity?

arp displays and manages the local ARP cache mapping IP addresses to MAC addresses and does not test connectivity to a remote host.

netstat displays active TCP/UDP connections, listening ports, and routing tables on the local machine but does not test connectivity to a remote server.

ipconfig displays the local machine's IP configuration including address, subnet mask, and default gateway but does not test connectivity to any remote host.

Ping sends ICMP Echo Request packets to a target IP address or hostname and waits for ICMP Echo Reply packets in response. A successful reply confirms end-to-end IP connectivity, while timeouts or unreachable errors indicate a connectivity or routing problem. It is the most direct and universally used tool to verify that a server is responding on the network.