[sims] SIMS SQL 2008 - How much memory do you have allocated?

[Max_Power]

Morning all,

 

Done the SQL 2005 to SQL 2008 migration yesterday.

 

Just wondering what kind of memory settings people use to get decent performance out of their server?

 

SIMS is currenly running on a server 2003 standard OS which obvioulsy has all kinds of different memory settings such as PAE in boot.ini etc. I know we could do with upgrading to get better performance but we are moving to a new virtualised network in the summer of 2011 and therefore were trying to hang off buying a new server just for 6months use.

 

I'm therefore wondering what kind of memory allocation people have for the server within the server properties option in SQL Management console? or has anyone any other "tricks" for getting better performance out of their server?

 

Thanks

[matt40k]

Depends, how bigs the database, is the server just SIMS\SQL, how much RAM have you got.

[Max_Power]

Hi Matt,

 

Our database is only about 1.9GBs - there is 10GBs RAM in the server but obviously server 2003 standard doesnt make use of all that properly.

 

edit* the server is also only used for SIMs nothing else

Edited October 27, 2010 by Max_Power

[matt40k]

Are you running server 2003 x64?

[Max_Power]

Thats the problem, currently only running x32

[matt40k]

You might as well remove 6gb worth of sticks and use them as chop sticks, you'll get more use out of them until you upgrade to x64\enterprise.

[AWicher]

I was debating if to post a constructive comment like that but restrained myself. So hats off to you, lol

[Max_Power]

hahahaha just wonderful inheriting a network.

[matt40k]

Think going 64bit is really the only option, you could upgrade to enterprise, but I think that's just crooked. Once you've gone 64bit, you could enable AWE and set something stupid like 5GB min for SQL.

[Max_Power]

I knew that was gonig to be the answer i would get - but to migrate to enterprise for just 6 months (which would actually be less by the time i can do the migration because school are back next week) it would be surely quite pointless?

 

Ill just do it the right way in summer.

 

Been in this "new" job a litte while now, but still finding little things like this every so often which makes life so much more difficult.

[vikpaw]

Summer is 8 months away. You could install a "bad" virtualisation option like VMWare server onto the current server and then do a test install, see if you get better performance from it. Even switch to the virtualised version if it worked out better. Since you got 6GB doing nothing, might as well utilise it a little and split the CPU power.

 

* I say "bad" in as much as it's installed on top of another OS rather then hyper-visored, i ran a few servers like that for a while, at least you get the benefits of things like snapshots to undo failed upgrades etc. Only 1 snapshot on VMWare server though, but at least its free.

[karls5]

Hi

 

We are currently running Sims on Win 2008 64-bit with SQL 2008 virtually on Xenserver, we have 7GB of Ram allocated and 8 cores set.

 

We have a problem that Ram used max's out once a week or so resulting in the server hanging around 9am when when most staff will be logging on to sims. Have done a quick google this morning and saw AWE mentioned.

 

How do you if this is already set? Don't know too much about the inner workings of SQL

 

Thanks

[localzuk]

Hi

 

We are currently running Sims on Win 2008 64-bit with SQL 2008 virtually on Xenserver, we have 7GB of Ram allocated and 8 cores set.

 

We have a problem that Ram used max's out once a week or so resulting in the server hanging around 9am when when most staff will be logging on to sims. Have done a quick google this morning and saw AWE mentioned.

 

How do you if this is already set? Don't know too much about the inner workings of SQL

 

Thanks

 

AWE is related to 32bit OS's, not 64bit as it is for enabling memory outside the 32bit OS's normal operating limits.

 

What size is your SIMS database?

[karls5]

According to the SQL Management Studio Sims is 14.5GB (ldf is 10GB and mdf 4.5) and FMS is 4.5GB (ldf 3.9 and mdf 600mb)

[vikpaw]

According to the SQL Management Studio Sims is 14.5GB (ldf is 10GB and mdf 4.5) and FMS is 4.5GB (ldf 3.9 and mdf 600mb)

 

Whoa! That's huge. you need to get some advice and run some shrinkage tools. if the system manager backup doesn't shrink that ldf, then you might have to do it manually. same on FMS.

 

Dealing with files that large can't be good, unless you really have that much data in the system constantly being accessed and updated. check out some of the other threads where jinnantonnix gives advice, or contact support.

[dwhyte85]

The ESS Upgrade Utility on the site (Capita Education Support Services) has a shrink tool on the application for both FMS and SIMS, as I re-call you had to detatch through the dbupgrade utility first.

 

The other thing is, are you holding the files on the OS partition and quickly running out of space rather than using a data partition with plenty of free space?

Edited December 5, 2010 by dwhyte85