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stevie_dee

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SBS2008 Server very slow - shows high I/O for SQL

HI

We have an SBS 2008 server which is running very slowly.

General network throughput is very poor (Web speed test shows 0,9mb where clients show 40mb)

Looking at Task Manager, it shows SQL with 6,000,000,000,000 I/O Read bytes and 3,500,000,000,000 I.O Write Bytes

Ive tried to narrow down which DB that is referring to, but cant work it out.

Can anyone shed any light?

Thanks

Steve
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Hypercat (Deb)
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SBS uses a SQL database for its monitoring and reporting services, and the Windows Internal Database for WSUS. I doubt very seriously that SQL I/O, which is local to the SBS server, would be causing network throughput to be slow.  Also, read and write I/O measurements are time dependent; IOW, they show the total read/write bytes since the last time the service was started.  If your server (or the sqlserver service) hasn't been restarted for a long time, then those totals wouldn't be that unusual.

When you say "web test speed" versus "client speed" could you describe exactly what kind of testing you're doing?
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stevie_dee

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Hi

We did a speedtest.net on the server and a few clients. On a 50mb UL and 10mb DL service.

Also, when copying a file from a client to the server, copy speeds fluctuate massively. Copying a 50mb file can be anything from 5 seconds to 2 minutes - on a 100mb network.
So, you get a significantly different speedtest.net result when you test from your server v. the clients, is that what you're saying?  Have you checked the physical connections from the server to your network - that is, the NIC card, cabling, switch and port that you're using for the server? I would suggest first the simple things - update the NIC card drivers, if they're old, change the cable from the server to the switch, use a different port on the switch if you have one available.  Also, if you have more than one switch, check the uplinks between the switches.
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tmoore1962

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All drivers and firmware have been updated, nics have been switched, new cables tried.

Drives are on raid 5 using 10k drives

16gb memory in the server, not overly high usage showing in task manager.

Moving the mouse around on the server also is very jumpy, showing something must be proccessing in the background maybe? Nothing in task manager shows overly high cpu. Network traffic shows a pretty constant 3-4%.

There's about 20 users on the domain uaing exchange and the applications on it.
Just not sure where else to turn!
Do you have antivirus/antimalware running on the server as well as workstations?

Check the running process and research anything that looks out of the ordinary.  If you have antivirus/antimalware running on the server be sure that it's being scanned regularly and check to see if anything has been found or there's any indication of a problem.  Also check to see if the scans are by any chance running during the daytime while the server is under a heavier load.  You don't want to have these sorts of background scans running during heavy use hours.