Question

SBS 2003 Slowdown After Sending Attachments To Many People

Asked by: compsol1993

Hello,

We have a SBS 2003 R2 server.  When a user sends a message with a large attachment to multiple people, the internet slows to a crawl.

Today we had a user send a message with a 3 MB video attachment to 30 people.  Our internet slowed to a crawl for 2.5 hours.  

Wireshark showed that during the slowdown, SMTP traffic was continuously flowing on the network.  As soon as the slowdown ended, the SMTP traffic also stopped.  Also during the slowdown, pulling the network cable out of the server, instantly brought speed back to everyone.  As soon as I plugged it back in, the slowdown started right back up.

I looked in the Exchange queue and this particular message was still trying to go out to different domains during this time..

I know this isn't normal, is there a setting on our server that I should look at, to keep this under control, or does anyone have any other suggestions?

Thanks

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Asked On
2009-08-03 at 08:33:29ID24621849
Topics

Exchange Email Server

,

Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP)

,

SBS Small Business Server

Participating Experts
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Points
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Comments
6

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Answers

 

by: alanhardistyPosted on 2009-08-03 at 08:53:36ID: 25005521

You can change the settings on the server to send large attachments out after hours, so that this does not slow down the system during the day.

Open up the properties of the SmallBusiness SMTP Conenctor and click on the Delivery Options Tab.

Select the 'Use different delivery times for oversize messages' check box and enter a size on the box such as 2048 (2Mb).  Setup your custom schedule (click customize and select the times that suit your busienss) to allow these messages to go out after normal working hours.

This will delay all messages over 2Mb to go out according to your custom schedule.

 

by: compsol1993Posted on 2009-08-03 at 08:59:28ID: 25005604

Ok, thanks for the advice.

I guess my question is then, why is this causing such a slowdown.  We have multiple other SBS's, and we do not see a slowdown that affects all internet traffic.

Thanks

 

by: alanhardistyPosted on 2009-08-03 at 09:05:40ID: 25005688

If you are sending 3Mb to 30 people, that is 90Mb.  How fast is your outbound internet connection (in Kb)?

If your internet is 512kb, then it will take about 30 minutes to send them out.

2.5 hours is a little slow and it may be that your outbound internet connection is having problems.

 

by: compsol1993Posted on 2009-08-03 at 09:09:44ID: 25005742

It makes sense they would take a long time to send, but what I don't understand is why it hogs 100% of my bandwidth.  When these are sending, nothing on the network can use the internet unless I pull the plug on the server.

Thanks

 

by: alanhardistyPosted on 2009-08-03 at 09:13:53ID: 25005796

If it is sending lots of data on the outbound leg, then inbound traffic will slowdown because it has to send acknowledgements out to say that it got the packet and please send the next - if it cannot due to the outbound leg being clogged, it will slow down the internet.

 

by: MesthaPosted on 2009-08-03 at 12:09:10ID: 25007496

Exchange is very poor at handling large messages and will use everything available to send the message. Therefore the behaviour that you have seen is to be expected. Not really a lot you can do other than the second SMTP connector to send out of hours, as Exchange doesn't support QOS.

Simon.

20120131-EE-VQP-002

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