Visual Basic Programmer

Access Database Programmer.
Visual Basic.Net Programmer.
Microsoft Office Programmer.

Visual Basic Programing
Access Database
Microsoft Office
VB.Net & SQL Server

nev@NevVB.com.au

Sydney, Australia
(612) 9453-0456

Contact Information

18/05/2012

CIAView: PC Performance Tuning

Manual

Introduction

You have just bought a new computer – but at times it goes inexplicably slow. What is the cause of the problem? CIAView can help determine the underlying causes.

CIAView is an easy to use application. It measures the essential ingredients of tuning – CPU (Central Processing Unit) usage, Disk reads and writes, Memory activity, Network traffic and System response time.

CIAView will help identify exactly what is happening behind the scenes. You will be able to easily pinpoint the CPU and Disk hogs.

This note describes the terms used, how to interpret the results, and the functionality provided. This is needed to effectively tune your Client/Server system.

There is no secret formula to tuning, rather a need for continuous attention to the many details of system performance.
There are no "Magic Numbers" to watch out for. For example, a process with a high CPU usage may be running at maximum efficiency. This could be desirable under one circumstance (overnight), but undesirable under another (at peak user time).

For an example of CIAView in action, see a Screen Shot of CIAView.

Server Information

Label	Explanation
Computer	The name of the Server computer
Version	The Windows Operating System Version
CPU - Processor Number	The Number of logical processors of the Server processor
CPU - Clock Speed	The speed of the Server processor in MHz
Networked Computers	A Dropdown list of all the computers and Servers configured in CIAView. The list is derived from the file 'Computers.txt'. See the details in the CIAView Setup page.
Physical Memory	The Total Physical Memory currently used and Physical Memory currently available.
Virtual Memory	The Total Virtual Memory currently used and Virtual Memory currently available.

Bar Charts

Label	Explanation
Disk I/O Summary	The percentage time that each Disk drive was busy Reading or Writing. The Reads are indicated with an "R", the Writes with a "W" and Idle time with an "I". Only non-removable Disks are shown.
Network Summary	The rate at which packets are received on the network is indicated with an "R". The rate at which packets are sent on the network is indicated with an "S".
Memory Pressure	The number of times per second that the Disk was read into memory is indicated by a "R". The number of times per second that pages were written to Disk is indicated by a "W".The number of soft faults per second that pages were retrieved from cache is indicated by an "F". A high Read or Write rate will degrade system performance.
CPU Activity Summary	The percentage time that all processes used the CPU (Central Processing Unit). High priority Processes are indicated by an "H". Medium priority Processes are indicated by an "M". Low priority Processes are indicated by an "L".

From this summary of the most important aspects effecting Server efficiency, it will be possible to assess all bottlenecks.
If the Server has multiple processors, the maximum CPU time that any process can take would be 100% of one processor – leaving the remaining processors available for use by the other processes.
It is easy to spot unbalanced Disk drives. Usually the system Disk is over used, and the rest under utilised. Also see the note on Improving Disk Performance
To reduce Disk contention, keep the system Pagefile, Operating System, Web data, ASP template cache, and Internet Information Services (IIS) log on separate physical disks.
Reducing the number of disk drives by using high capacity drives will increase contention and increase response times.

Active Processes

Label	Explanation
PID	The Unique identifier of the process.
Process Name	The Name of the .exe file
CPU%	The Percentage of time that the processor was used to execute instructions.
IO Reads	The Rate at which the process issued read I/O operations. This includes file, network, and device I/O operations.
IO Writes	The Rate at which the process issued write I/O operations. This includes file, network, and device I/O operations.
Page Faults	The Rate of page faults occurring when a virtual page is not in main memory. A high Disk I/O Read and Write rate may cause Page Faulting. Use File Streams to minimise the Disk activity.
Memory MB	The size of the Memory working set in MB used by the process.
Virtual MB	The size of the Virtual address space in MB used by the process.
Owner	The owner of the process or the account under which the process is running.
Domain	The Computer Domain that the process belongs to.
Description	The Description of the process. Where this is not available, the Executable Path is shown.
Response Time	The time in milliseconds to access the WMI counters. The Response Time shown is a good indication of system responsiveness.

Any bottleneck shown up in the Bar Charts for CPU usage, Disk I/O, Memory, Network traffic or System Response Time – can be easily correlated with an offending process or processes.

Menu Options

Label	Explanation
Refresh	Clicking this Menu item will cause CIAView to scan all counters. You can also use the Space bar to do a refresh.
Help: Website	You can access the CIAView and Payment, CIAView Manual, CIAView Setup and CIAView Help Webpages.
Help: Set Release Code	Use this option to enter the Release Code for a permanent version.
Help: Network Servers	This option will provide a listing of all your configured Servers. It will also create the Computers.txt file for you, and allow you to 'ping' any of your Servers.
Settings	The default scan interval can be changed from the default time of 15 seconds. The scan interval can range from 5 to 60 seconds.

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