At least once a week, someone on the Performance team will get a customer call concerning hangs or resource depletion on their file server. The file server in question is used for user home folder storage and users are accessing Outlook Personal Storage...

From time to time, customers will call in to report "performance problems" that they are having when copying large files from one location to another.  By "performance problems", they mean that the file isn't copying as fast as...

As promised - here's the long awaited post on the infamous /3GB switch. At least once a week we have this discussion with a Systems Administrator somewhere who has this set in the boot.ini file on all of the servers but doesn't know why. Maybe someone...

In previous posts we've discussed the basics of memory management including an overview of kernel and user memory , pool resources as well as the /3GB switch .   Continuing our discussion of memory management, we are going to examine an issue...

A common issue we work with is Printer Redirection issues with Terminal Services on Windows Server 2003. Although printer redirection seems fairly simple on the surface, the issues that we work on can get somewhat convoluted. So today we're going to look...

The page file is one of those pieces of the operating system that administrators know that they need to have - but they can't always explain why they need it, or how to accurately size it.  Since Windows 95, Windows-based operating systems have used...

Following up on our Memory Management 101 post, we're moving on to a discussion of Pool Resources and Pool Resource Depletion. First of all - what are Pool Resources? When a machine boots up, the Memory Manager creates two dynamically sized memory pools...

Perhaps one of the most frustrating issues to troubleshoot is a system that sits at the “Applying Computer Settings …” screen for what seems like forever before (eventually) getting to the point that you can log in. Interestingly, although...

Today we are going to briefly go over the basics of some concepts that can be pretty confusing even at the best of times - Sessions, Desktops and Windows Stations. So let's dive right in ... A session consists of all of the processes and other system...

Tabbed browsing is a new feature in Internet Explorer 7. One question we are frequently asked by administrators is - "How do I control the tab behavior for my users to present a consistent experience?" We are also asked the same thing by developers who...

Happy New Year!  We're starting off 2008 with a significant post regarding changes to Remote Administration in Windows Server 2008.  OK, it's not quite as dire as the title makes it out to be, but this is quite a significant change.  If...

In our last post, we talked about Pages and Page Tables.  Today, we’re going to take a look at one of the most common problems when dealing with virtual memory – the Page Fault.  A page fault occurs when a program requests an address on a page...

At the end of 2007 we talked about Bugchecks and why they happen .  Today we're going to talk about the Crash Dump files themselves - the different types of dumps, how the dumps themselves are generated and why you will need a correctly sized page...

Today we are going to discuss two new Vista performance enhancements, SuperFetch & ReadyBoost. We will also be discussing Vista RAM usage since these all work together. First, SuperFetch is an enhancement of the Prefetcher that you have probably...

Day Seventeen and we're still going strong.  Only ten days left until launch day!  Continuing on with Terminal Services, today's topic is Terminal Services printing in Windows Server 2008 - and more specifically Terminal Services Easy Print...

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...

Good Morning AskPerf! My name is John Dickson, and I am a Support Escalation Engineer on the Performance team in Texas. Today we are going to discuss a scenario that is a common one as companies continue to deploy Windows Vista in their environment. How...

It's Day Two of our series of Windows Server 2008 posts. Only twenty-five more days to go till the big launch. Today's topics are Startup Processes and Delayed Automatic Start for System Services. In previous versions of Windows, during system boot...

One of our common issues is troubleshooting application crashes (for example, the Print Spooler or a third-party application). These crashes usually result in the infamous Dr. Watson error. First, let's discuss terminology. A crash is when something experiences...

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...

Hello AskPerf readers. I am Edwin Rocky and this time I am back with some interesting information about the “Allow Logon through Terminal Services” group policy and “Remote Desktop users” group. I am sure many of you are already familiar this GPO and...

Memory Management issues make up a considerable portion of the support incidents that we handle. At some point during the support incident we invariably engage in a discussion of Memory Management, Memory Tuning, the use of the infamous /3GB switch and...

Troubleshooting issues with the SVCHOST.EXE process can be a very frustrating experience for server administrators.  Whether the issue manifests as High CPU or the SVCHOST.EXE process crashing, there are some challenges that make the troubleshooting...

Welcome back folks! It’s Day Eight. We’re just over one-third of the way through our series and there are only two more weeks until launch day! Raise your hand if you’ve ever had to deal with a Print Spooler crash. Keep your hand up...

Welcome to the twenty-second day of our series. Only a few more days until Launch Day. We'll be sticking with Terminal Services through the end of our series. Today's topic is Terminal Services RemoteApps, a new feature in Windows Server 2008. RemoteApps...