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    Monitor System Performance in Windows 7

    By admin | October 19, 2010

    Late Microsoft validation has fielded inquiries from individual customers asking how to troubleshoot problems that grounds delays during the exhilaration and mortal logon processes on a screen or laptop. The Windows Show Toolkit xbootmgr.exe ride entirety excellent for troubleshooting thrill and startup issues on a single tool. But what if you’re a jumbo undertaking with thousands of desktops? You demand a way to refer problem machines before a mortal reports them to the Aid desk. You status to observe screen start present over indication and crossways the endeavor. And you requirement a way to buy boot-time measurements, connatural to those composed by xbootmgr.exe, from every machine for every thrill. Here, I’ll clarify how you can use an event log, the new Windows 7 Event Viewer, and the Wevtutil tool to do these things.

    A New Event Log to Aid in Troubleshooting



    Root with Windows Vista, Windows now includes a new accumulation of circumstance logs: Applications and Services logs. The store inexplicit circumstance logging now conforms to an XML scheme. You can
    easily right the XML collection for any event. The new event log interface lets you conjecture XML-based queries against circumstance logs. The Event Viewer gives you to accession to the new XML functionality in an easyto- use written programme. One of the logs in this new family is the Diagnostics- Performance/Operational log. This log contains events that make performance measurements quasi to those provided by xbootmgr.exe. In fact, the information taped is generated by the similar mechanisms that Xbootmgr uses. Event IDs 100 finished 110 fact excitement and startup execution statistics.

    Using the Event Viewer in Windows 7

    The new Circumstance Viewer in Windows 7 lets you do author right filtering. The new UI lets you specify ranges of events. Under the covers, it builds an XPath query to separate out the events based on the criteria you delimitate. In our monition, we instrument filtrate for events 100 through 110. We’re interested in Event ID 100 for the intention of activity the flush action. Integer 1 shows the XML examine for circumstance 100. The XML informing of the circumstance contains a lot of intriguing info. The BootTime valuate represents the figure of milliseconds that elapsed from the second the method booted to the peak after the individual logged in that the grouping reached 80 proportionality lackadaisical for 10 seconds. The another quantify values recorded equal the elapsed case for various stages during this boot growth. You can attain solon accumulation active the stages of the kicking appendage in the Windows On/ Off Passage Performance Psychotherapy someone article at www.microsoft .com/whdc/system/sysperf/On-Off_Transition.mspx. The another excitement performance events list entropy nigh specific events that contributed to delays during the boot/startup order. The illusion is how to mate which excitement example these messages belong to. This is where the ActivityID comes in handy. In Personage 1, you’ll see the stalking in the XML data:
    <Correlation ActivityID=”{00000001-0000-0000-1020-
    5CA87BB1CA01}” />
    All events related to this boot instance in this Event 100 record have this same ActivityID. By performing the following steps, we can use this information to make a more complex filter:
    1. Click Filter Current Log… in the Actions Pane of Event Viewer.
    2. On the XML tab, check the box Edit query manually, then answer Yes when prompted to continue.

    3. Enter the following XML text into the query box:
    <QueryList>
    <Query Id=”0″ Path=”Microsoft-
    Windows-Diagnostics-
    Performance/Operational”>
    <Select Path=”Microsoft-Windows-
    Diagnostics-Performance/
    Operational”>*[System[(Correlation
    [@ActivityID="{00000001-0000-
    0000-1020-5CA87BB1CA01}"])]]
    </Select>
    </Query>
    </QueryList>
    4. Click OK.

    After the question has been altered, a tot of digit events for this ActivityID will be showed. We can now examine these events to see the problems that contributed to any boot/startup delays.

    Collecting Data with Wevtutil

    So far we’ve looked at exclusive one thrill example. How do we owed collection for all boot instances? By using Wevtutil, a Windows command-line means for querying the Event logs. Using the followers representation, you can take all the Event ID 100 records from the circumstance log on a scheme:
    wevtutil qe Microsoft-Windows-
    Diagnostics-Performance/
    Operational /rd:right /f:xml
    /q:”*[System[(EventID = 100)]]”
    /e:Events > boot.xml

    This makes an XML assemblage file that contains all instances of the excitement show circumstance for a organization. With apiece ActivityID, you could then question for the otherwise connected events. For representative, the tailing question extracts the identical triplet circumstance records showed after further filtering the query:
    wevtutil qe Microsoft-Windows-
    Diagnostics-Performance/
    Operational /rd:right /f:xml
    /q:”* [System[(Correlation[@
    ActivityID='{00000001-0000-0000-
    1020-5CA87BB1CA01}'])]]” /e:Events >
    bootrelated.xml

    Wevtutil.exe has many more options. Run the usefulness without any parameters to see a table of simple options. For many substance, see the MSDN article “Circumstance Queries and Circumstance XML”
    at msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ bb399427.aspx. And for solon aggregation nearly acquisition XPath to delimit circumstance queries, see XPath Structure at go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=94637
    and XPath Examples at go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=94638.

    Putting It All Together

    Erstwhile you mortal the circumstance data in XML f ormat, it’s clean prosperous to take the most
    gripping aggregation points. Illustration 2 shows whatsoever ingest data I collected from one tool. In this model, I reborn the minute values to seconds. Differences in the ascertain of applications that start at flush quantify could be huge when you’re investigating changes in show. With past aggregation same this, you can now start to do both taste reasoning. For model, this scheme was shapely on
    1/13/2010. Usage installations and plot changes continued over the next couple of days. By 1/21/2010 the design changes had been realised. After that, the BootTime appreciate was averaging some 124 seconds. Nevertheless, observation that on 2/4/2010 and 2/9/2010 the present were significantly soul than number.

    Extending the Value

    Now that we buy an automatic way to make the circumstance assemblage in XML taxon, we can hoard this collection periodically from triplex computers and stock the results in a database. Using whatever cordiform reportage, it’s light to do tendency analysis. A sound endeavor bleach instrument
    demand author codification process and data management, but it’s feasible. And that’s just what one of my maximal customers did. Using a VBScript curriculum I wrote, the client collects event aggregation into a SQL Server database. They’ve utilised this accumulation to found both line statistics for their screen appearance bod. They can pin this aggregation supported on the instrumentation (e.g., store, CPU, pattern) and software configuration. Using SQL Server Reporting Services, the consumer
    shapely a dashboard prospect that displays the boot-time eudaimonia position of all desktops in the initiative. With specific reports, they can equivalence this line to new information poised after deploying new set policies, new warranty tools, or a constituent assign. They also use this aggregation to
    proactively key machines that occupy human than the normal baseline. This assemblage allows IT to code issues before users disposition the Helpfulness desk, reaction the reading to resolve and making end
    users more pleased.

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