Microsoft KB Archive/130288

= PC NTMMTA: Using Performance Monitor with MMTA =

Article ID: 130288

Article Last Modified on 10/30/2006

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APPLIES TO


 * Microsoft Mail Multitasking Message Transfer Agent 3.2a
 * Microsoft Mail Multitasking Message Transfer Agent 3.2

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This article was previously published under Q130288



SUMMARY
This article describes how to monitor CPU utilization in Microsoft Windows NT when you run either the Microsoft Mail Multitasking MTA for Windows NT (NT MMTA) or the Microsoft Mail Multitasking MTA for OS/2 (MMTA).



MORE INFORMATION
If you run multiple instances of the MMTA, it may create a situation where the CPU cannot adequately service all processes running on that machine. You can detect this situation by using the Windows NT application Performance Monitor (found in the Administrative Tools group).

To detect this situation, first check the %Processor Time counter. %Processor Time is expressed as a percentage of the elapsed time that a processor is busy executing a non-Idle thread. It can be viewed as the fraction of the time spent doing useful work. Each processor is assigned an Idle thread in the Idle process that consumes those unproductive processor cycles not used by any other threads.

To monitor %Processor Time

 * 1) Run Performance Monitor from the Administrative Tools group.
 * 2) From the Edit menu, choose Add to Chart.
 * 3) Select the machine that External or Dispatch is running on from the Computer option.
 * 4) From the Object checkbox, select Process.
 * 5) From the Counter checkbox, select %Processor Time.
 * 6) Click Add. Then click Done.

%Processor time greater than 90 percent on average can indicate that the processor is being over utilized, and it can cause problems.

To further analyze this situation, it is possible to monitor an individual process' %Processor Time. Process - %Processor Time is the percentage of elapsed time that all of the threads of this process used in order for the processor to execute instructions. An instruction is the basic unit of execution in a computer; a thread is the object that executes instructions, and a process is the object created when a program is run. Code executed to handle certain hardware interrupts or trap conditions may be counted for this process.

To monitor individual External and Dispatch processes

 * 1) Run Performance Monitor from the Administrative Tools group.
 * 2) From the Edit menu, choose Add to Chart.
 * 3) Select the machine that External or Dispatch is running on from the Computer item.
 * 4) From the Object checkbox, select Process.
 * 5) From the Counter checkbox, select %Processor Time.
 * 6) From the Instance checkbox, select all the OS2 instances.
 * 7) Click Add. Then click Done.

The OS2 counter is the client side of every OS/2 application. There is an instance of OS2.EXE for each OS/2 application that is running. External will launch two processes of OS2.EXE because it is multithreaded, where Dispatch will launch only one.

Also, if the machine running External and Dispatch is also running other network applications, then monitor these processes. If any one process is taking an inordinate amount of CPU time, move that process to another Windows NT machine to improve External's performance.

Performance monitor might show 100 percent CPU utilization when SCHDIST.EXE is running. Schdist is running normally under Windows NT, and the Performance Monitor is giving an incorrect reading on CPU utilization.

Additional query words: 3.50 process

Keywords: KB130288

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