Browse by Tags

Hi all, Some of the most difficult issues we face here on the Performance Team are WMI related issues. WMI is very pervasive, and when it breaks, you can experience a myriad of symptoms that are often very difficult to troubleshoot and fix. Here are a few examples of the symptoms that can occur, and...

APPLICATION COMPATIBILITY TOOLKIT (ACT) Description: Description: The Application Compatibility Toolkit (ACT) enables software developers, independent software vendors (ISVs), and IT professionals who work in a corporate environment to determine, before rolling out within the organization, whether...

Good Morning AskPerf!  Today we’re going to wrap up our series on Task Scheduler Changes in Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008.  If you haven’t read my previous posts on Task Scheduler, I highly recommend reading those first.  The two posts are: Task Scheduler Changes in Windows Vista...

Today’s post is actually from my personal troubleshooting experiences last week.  I have been playing with Windows 7 quite a bit recently.  I upgraded my primary work system, my laptop and my home system to the Windows 7 build that was released at PDC in October .  Last weekend, I decided...

Hello AskPerf Readers. My name is Mick Bailey, and I am a Support Escalation Engineer on the Performance team in Texas. Recently I was working with a customer on an issue concerning print notifications for Windows Vista, and I thought that the information might be useful to some other folks out there...

Get hands-on with virtualization – FREE! Attend the event that lets you touch, talk about, and experience Microsoft virtualization solutions.  Hear from Microsoft virtualization experts on how Microsoft uses virtualization in its own data centers.  Dive into robust hands-on labs and gain a...

Hello AskPerf readers!  My name is Don Geddes, and I am a Support Escalation Engineer on the Performance team.  Over the last couple of months, we’ve been getting quite a few calls on a new popup dialog box that occurs when connecting to a web site that hosts Terminal Services connections or...

On September 24th, Mark Russinovich will be hosting a Virtual Roundtable on Windows Vista Performance. Mark and a panel of industry experts will be discussing several issues related to Windows Vista including: Overall OS Performance Common Misconfigurations Boot times Applets Disk Performance...

Over the last couple of weeks, we have had some customers asking about support for ClearType in a Terminal Services session.  Now, if you’re not sure what exactly ClearType is, the ClearType information page on the Microsoft site has information on the basics of ClearType.  In a nutshell though...

Hi there, this is Mark with the Windows Performance Team. This post is a quick introduction to a new performance tracing tool called XPerf. Moving forward with Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008, this powerful tool will hopefully be utilized more often. XPerf is part of the Windows Performance Toolkit...

The Server Message Protocol (SMB) is the file sharing protocol used by default on Windows-based computers. Although file sharing and network protocols are primarily supported by our Networking team, it is important to understand how SMB works given its importance to network activities. SMB 2.0 was introduced...

Following on from our last Two Minute Drill, today's topic is the RELOG.EXE utility.  RELOG.EXE creates new performance logs from data in existing performance logs by changing the sampling rate and / or converting the file format.  RELOG.EXE is not a new tool - it is however one of those tools...

Something many of our readers have asked for is a quick overview of new and useful tools and features in Windows. Today we are launching a new series, called our “Two Minute Drill” – these will be brief posts that provide a high-level view of tools and features. We have already published several posts...

Today we are going to talk about the new Reliability Monitor feature in Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008. In a nutshell, the Reliability Monitor shows you your system stability history at a glance and lets you see details on a day-by-day basis about events that impact reliability. Reliability...

Although the bulk of Group Policy Processing and Troubleshooting is handled by our Directory Services team, we often collaborate on these issues - mainly when the issue relates to a user logging in and not being presented with their desktop environment as they would expect.  Instead they are simply...

Welcome back.  After our series of posts on Windows Server 2008, today we're going to switch gears a little bit and look at WMI Logging.  We often get calls from customers regarding WMI issues beyond the Permissions or Impersonation Rights problems that we've discussed in previous posts. ...

Are you still undecided about Windows Vista?  Unsure about deployment?  Running into some roadblocks?  This is the event for you! Microsoft Technical Fellow and desktop guru Mark Russinovich will be hosting an interactive virtual roundtable—broadcast LIVE over the Internet on Wednesday...

It's Day Twenty-Three of our series.  The Launch Event is just a couple of days away.  Following on from yesterday's post on Terminal Services RemoteApps , today we're going to be providing a very brief overview of the Architecture of Terminal Server Web Access and the Web Connection Client...

Day Eighteen is upon us.  We are two-thirds of the way through our series of posts.  Today we'll be doing a brief overview of the new Remote Desktop Connection (RDC) Client 6.x.  We've discussed several new features in Terminal Services for Windows Server 2008.  Many of these features...

It's Day Nine of our Windows Server 2008 series.  We're one-third of the way through our series.  Today we will continue on with our look at printing in Windows Server 2008.  Our topic today - XML Paper Specification (XPS) Support. The XML Paper Specification (XPS) defines an open document...

Day Three of our series of posts in preparation for the Windows Server 2008 Launch and the countdown continues.  If it's a weekend for you, I hope you are enjoying yourself.  Only twenty-four more days to go till Launch Day.  Today's post - Windows Service Hardening. Windows Service Hardening...

It's been a while since we posted something on Application Compatibility and Windows Vista. A question I get from quite a few customers when discussing application compatibility is, "What is the Program Compatibility Assistant used for?" Today we are going to cover some common installation and runtime...

Following on from our posts on the Basic Troubleshooting Toolkit and Basic Debugging of an Application Crash , let's talk about actually capturing Application crash dumps and failures. Most administrators are familiar with the Dr. Watson for Windows tool that has been around since the days of Windows...

Windows XP introduced a new feature called Remote Assistance that enabled XP users to help each other over the Internet. Helpdesk personnel were able to view and even share control of their network users machines using Remote Assistance. However, with the launch of Windows Vista, Helpdesk staff ran into...

Although Windows Vista is generally compatible with applications written for Windows XP, Windows Server 2003 and their associated service packs, some compatibility issues are inevitable due to new innovations, security tightening, and increased reliability. Getting some older applications running on...