Question

ASP Session Timeout and CPU maxing out

Asked by: Mannezman

I'm running an ASP/SQL DB application i created.  The number of users has tripled to about 30 people and we're really maxing out the server's resources.  we recently split the applicaitno up so SQL is on one server and we're using IIS on another server.  For a day everything was fine.

But then on the IIS server, we started maxing out the processor because W3WP.exe keeps spiking up and using 90% or more of the CPU.  The problem recently is that when it spikes up it keeps the processor maxed out for hours even when everybody stops using the system.  

Not being an expert in server management and performance tuning, I've been poking around online trying to find solutions.  I ran across a bunch of posts of other people using Windows Server 2003 who've had this same problem.  The repeated solution was to change my IIS pool properties so that Maximum Number of Worker Processes was set to 4 instead of the default 1. That seemed to solve it, at least in testing.

But when 30 people logged back on, suddenly all session variables stopped working.  So people were constantly not able to access pages that involved session variables.

I checked IIS, and session timeout is set to 20 minutes.  I added "Session.Timout = 45" to all of my pages, but it doesn't seem to actually be working.

Finally I moved the Maximum Number of Worker Processes from 4 back to 1 and session variables seem to be working. But now I'm waiting for the CPU to max out.

I've searched through my IIS books and through Experts Exch but I just can't figure out what I'm doing wrong.  

My questions are:

1.) Does increasing the Maximum Number of Worker Processes affect session variables functionality?  Is there to increase the Maximum and not kill the session?

2.) Is there another function I can do to prevent W3WP from overloading my system other than working with the Maximum Number of Worker Processes?

3.) I've run in to a lot of tools I can install to monitor IIS to try to find out why the ASP code might be causing hang ups, but everything I've found assumes I'm already an expert in IIS and server performance, and I'm neither.  Does anyone know of a good tutorial I could use?  I really want to find a way to track which ASP pages are causing the problem.  But I scroll through logs of everything that happened today and can't tell what is actually creating the issue.  I know I'm a neophyte at this, but I can't figure out where to get the instruction I need.

Thanks in advance for any help and please be patient if I have additional questions, I'I'm new to all this.

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Asked On
2009-08-21 at 07:01:38ID24671359
Topics

Microsoft IIS Web Server

,

Active Server Pages (ASP)

Participating Experts
2
Points
500
Comments
5

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Answers

 

by: cjinsocal581Posted on 2009-08-21 at 07:42:39ID: 25152300

IF you have Outlook WEb Access enabled, check this MS tech item:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/900243

 

by: rgc6789Posted on 2009-08-21 at 10:51:31ID: 25154139

It is my experience that this type of issue normally is a result of coding and not server. I have iis servers handling 1500 concurrent connections without issue.

So, a few questions for you.

1. What kind of application is it?
2. Can you find a relation between the pages being accessed and the beginning of your problems?
3. What is the hardware configuration of your web server? RAM in particular.
4. When you look at task manager, is the amount of RAM used (max) more than the physical amount of RAM in the machine (an indication that you are paging)?
5. Are your updates up to date?

 

by: MannezmanPosted on 2009-10-09 at 16:39:16ID: 25539696

rgc6789,

Sorry for taking so long to return to the question, other clients got in the way.

We sort of solved the problem - we moved IIS to one server and left the DB on the other.  That helped somewhat with speed.  But if you're running 1500 users without constant trouble, then there is something that is still wrong if I'm having major speed issues with only 30 users.

1.) Type of application - I'm running a SQL database using ASP pages to interact with it.  

2.) Relationship of Pages to problem - I can't figure out which pages are causing the speed problem.  I've been through a lot of the logs and tools in IIS, but I wonder if you know the best way to find this data.  Suggestions?

3.) Hardware - it's not a new server, but we've souped it up a lot (I'm referring to the original server here because I'd like to move the full application back to the original server if possible).  It's a Pentium 4, 3.6 gigs of memory.

4.) Sorry, I wasn't able to answer this question, i have to monitor them while they are in the office.  I can get back on this one next week.

5.) yes, i think the updates are up to date.


 

by: rgc6789Posted on 2009-10-09 at 17:03:14ID: 25539791

First, I have a celeron that has handled 1200 concurrent connections and ran at 70% cpu. My heaviest client right now has 3 load balanced web servers because at Christmas time they will run 3-4000 concurrent connections and I don't like to see the webservers run over 50% - which they won't. The two newer servers are dual core machines and with 1500 connections on them they will still run below 50%.

The application is ASP/SQL 2005 and every page is DB driven. What version of Windows/SQL are you using?

That said, we can start to determine where the problem is now that the applications are separate.

First, take a look at the basic preformance values such as CPU, memory, etc. on each machine while you are experiencing the slowness. this will allow us to determine if the SQL or IIS is the culprit. Though this won't be 100% accurate, it's a good start. I know you said the ASP is going to 90%, but is the SQL server maxing out also?

There are so many issues this can be it is hard other than starting broad and working inward. Some of the things it can be:

* Hardware errors
* Heavy data manipulation by ASP. For instance, a query that returns all rows in a table and then ASP filters them or work with them in some other way.
* Poor index creation (though this would result in heavy CPU on SQL).
* Poor query creation (though this would result in heavy CPU on SQL).
(I see the above two issues all the time on successful sites. The site was created 4-5 years ago and they had sales of a few dollars a day. The poor design didn't matter. Now, sales are 10's of thousands and the problems have compounded exponentially.)
* Poor ASP coding not closing connections or connection pooling disabled - though 30 concurrent connections aren't really enough to magnify these.

 

by: MannezmanPosted on 2009-10-20 at 12:29:36ID: 25617562

RGC6789

THANK YOU for the tips.  I'm going to the clients' office this week so I'll be able to monitor both servers and see what happens.

I did have a question fo you on one thing you said, just to make sure I'm not really making a mistake in my code :
"Heavy data manipulation by ASP. For instance, a query that returns all rows in a table and then ASP filters them or work with them in some other way"

I have a lot of queries that access lengthy tables (like a query that looks at their client list which is 100,000 records long).  When I write the SQL query in my ASP, I have it look at the table and find all records that match whatever the criteria is.  This results in recordsets anywhere from 1 to several hundred depending on the criteria the user uses.  I'm assuming that what you were referencing in the above quote would be a different type of SQL query - like a recordset that included the full table and then as I loop through it I choose what is displayed and what is not.  Am I right in interpreting your quote that way?

Thanks for all the help so far.  I'll come back to the question once i have some data.


20120131-EE-VQP-002

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