Server Optimization
Server Optimization – Server Software
for Maximum Server Optimization
Because servers are the hubs for all company activity, when they slow or crash or
require too frequent downtime, it results in a huge impact on productivity.
Server optimization has two important overall objectives: minimizing
downtime and increasing efficiency. High traffic, typical of most servers, will
bring about a loss of performance quickly when a server has an underlying issue.
The problem is that system management
and monitoring tools may only narrow the cause down to a range of possibilities.
There are a number of technical articles in the Microsoft Knowledgebase that delve
into the particulars of diagnosis and how to pinpoint the source of poor performance.
Many issues of slow performance in servers such as SQL come about from I/O bottlenecks.
Possible solutions often do not state defragmentation of NTFS files, because the
effects of fragmentation are commonly underestimated.
Read about the key considerations for increasing windows system performance »
Why should I optimize my servers?
We see IT managers and system administrators regularly evaluate
Diskeeper® data performance software and then buy
volume licenses for their networks because they see an immediate resolution
to their I/O bottlenecks. V-locity®
VM accelerator does the same with VMs.
For example, we had two cases where a SQL administrator discovered the Average Disk
Sec/Read was very high on their database servers. Per a Microsoft Knowledgebase
article any disk read longer that 50ms represents a serious bottleneck. Both administrators
discovered 200ms and 300ms delays – well into the serious end of the scale.
The Knowledgebase article suggested possible solutions but the one not explicitly
stated was to defragment. Both administrators ran Diskeeper and quickly increased
the read speed to 15 and 30ms. A tremendous improvement in performance!
Employing some or all of the other appropriate solutions now that the volumes are
kept fragment-free will bring these SQL servers into optimal ranges. A clue that
you should evaluate a file I/O optimization is when you read or hear a recommendation
to increase I/O bandwidth, such as adding more disks.
Example: your SAN vendor tells you to add another controller or array. If there
is substantial fragmentation, Diskeeper will typically provide better results, as
it actually fixes the issue giving you maximum server optimization rather than masking
it – and it’s a whole lot cheaper.
Read
more about how to improve SAN storage performance »
Download a free trial of Diskeeper Server or V-locity
for maximum server optimization »