[sims] Memory RAM 93% (44.4GB)

[coolhands]

In task manager the memory is running continuously at 44.4GB out of 48GB available. Any advice that I can pass on to out IT to reduce RAM? I know the memory can be limited in SQL server management studio (our is currently 2147483647 (in MB) in the 'maximum server memory' box so I guess it's never been limited?)

 

(Also is the database size excessively large?)

 

reson I'm asking is I was asked to run patch 22573 as part of this ongoing transaction deadlocked error issue (20647 ran ok) and it fails as it times out. Suggestion from our support company is to get IT to improve the RAM usage. I'm just pondering how they can do that though (haven't asked them yet)

 

 

Edited October 3, 2024 by coolhands

[Alastairb25]

Old adage was 20% free for OS

Brent Ozar states 4gb or 10% free, whichever is greater

 

We have 20647 and 22573 to run after an upgrade

Generally would run these more regular, say once a term but ESS only seem to release them for specific issues

 

Transaction deadlock can be all sorts of things, seen it before when Attendance Officers tend to run Edit Marks

Edited October 3, 2024 by Alastairb25

[3s-gtech]

How big is your DB? You want it to fit entirely in RAM ideally, to reduce swapping. You can then limit SQL usage around those size boundaries (minimum above the DB size, max should leave 4-8GB for the OS alone), allowing for some expansion and knowing you'll need to run the re-index patch occasionally.

[coolhands]

thanks. How can I find the size of the database please? Is it the '49838'MB shown in this pic (which is right click, properties of the sims database shown on the left)? But if that is, and it's 50GB then it is already bigger than the available RAM

 

Edited October 3, 2024 by coolhands

[bobsmith]

how many years of records have you got in there? that's pretty huge. (mine was 10Gb for a school of 1400)

[coolhands]

Hmm sims was new install here in 2018, data was migrated into it from CMIS though. 2000 students. What can I do do reduce the size then, I know I can do the archive attendance marks, but anything else? Doubt if that will have much effect. Solus primary ldf size is 38Gb; mdf 50MB. sims.mdf yes appears to be 50.1GB looking in program files>SQL server folder. So do I need to get it 10GB below the available RAM size?

[bobsmith]

following your DPO's guidance and in line with your school's retention policy (that's a mouthful) you'd be deleting students from your MIS that have reached the end of their retention period.

 

also look at your DMS size - bet there's loads of documents in there that are past the retention limit too.

 

I'm no longer current on SIMS - but a couple of years ago it was 10Gb-ish for the OS and then enough RAM to comfortably hold the database. Being a VM made it fairly easy to allocate it.

[3s-gtech]

You've found the MDF and LDF.

50GB is way too big. Re-index and adjust the logging, amongst other things. You need more RAM than DB size ideally, and you can't just keep allocating RAM.

Edited October 3, 2024 by 3s-gtech

[dmj]

I very much doubt all that is user data, most of it will be transaction logs IME

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sql/relational-databases/logs/manage-the-size-of-the-transaction-log-file?view=sql-server-ver16

[Alastairb25]

Simple Recovery model

If someone left Full on then you could have loads in log file that is not relevant