[dba-SQLServer] SQL Server "locks up"

Francisco Tapia fhtapia at gmail.com
Wed Jun 10 09:47:51 CDT 2009


excellent,  I generally never put a page file on my db drive because I don't
ever want any bandwidth stolen from that partition, I also do not place one
on my transaction log drive.

my experience with ssd has been limited, but I have found that those drives
perform extremely fast but only on smaller files (smaller than 3-4gb).  if
most of your work files are less than 3gb i have found it to be super fast
:) almost like loaded in ram fast :).


-Francisco
http://sqlthis.blogspot.com | Tsql and More...


On Wed, Jun 10, 2009 at 5:58 AM, jwcolby <jwcolby at colbyconsulting.com>wrote:

> Francisco (and everyone trying to help),
>
> Thanks for pointing me back to the pagefile.  I had just rebuilt this
> server and the first thing I
> did was go in and set the page file size... to... 1200 mbytes.  Uhh....
> ooops.  That should be 12
> gbytes (12000 mbytes).  I had inadvertently left off a zero.
>
> This will very likely explain the whole problem.
>
> I upped that page file to 12000 mbytes and created a second page file on
> the same volume as the
> database is on.  If I shouldn't do that (same volume as the db) let me know
> but I have read
> somewhere to create multiple page files and let Windows take it's pick.
>
> BTW, I have a very fast 32 gig SSD which I am using only 8 gigs of (working
> disk for virtual
> machines).  I have read about issues using SSDs but have no direct
> experience using them for writing
> to - my VMs only read from the drive.  So I could even place a pagefile out
> on the ssd.
>
> BTW, I just did the same update hash fields operation on 50 million records
> in 21 minutes that it
> took 3.5 HOURS to do yesterday on about 28 million records.  The page file
> size error was definitely
> crippling the system.
>
> John W. Colby
> www.ColbyConsulting.com
>
>
> Francisco Tapia wrote:
> > But the issue that John is describing is that his entire system is locked
> up
> > for up to a minute.  I am thinking that the problem lies within the i/o
> > setup.  On my servers here (the massive systems) they are all setup where
> I
> > have my mirror drive on one card, and the page file on a 2nd channel on a
> > different set of drives.
> > my transaction log is an fiber channel on one volume, as is the database
> and
> > the tempdb.
> >
> > I am curious if you could move the pagefile over from the c drive to
> another
> > set of drives(if you have them) to test out this theory.
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > -Francisco
> > http://sqlthis.blogspot.com | Tsql and More...
> >
> >
> > On Tue, Jun 9, 2009 at 11:36 AM, David Emerson <newsgrps at dalyn.co.nz>
> wrote:
> >
> >> John,
> >>
> >> One area I have found this to happen is record locking.  If I have a
> >> table open and run a query that accesses the table then SQL seems to
> >> wait a long time (often until I close the table).
> >>
> >> David
> >>
> >> At 10/06/2009, you wrote:
> >>> All of them are in the same raid card. The OS is on a raid 1
> >>> pair.  The page file is on the C: drive.
> >>>
> >>> The database is all on a single raid 6, even the same volume.  That
> >>> is what the questions I was
> >>> asking were aimed at but I didn't really get much response on how to
> >>> spread things around so I just
> >>> did what I know.
> >>>
> >>> I have a set of 6 terabyte drives, which taken together gives me two
> >>> 2 tbyte volumes, raid 6.  I
> >>> find it difficult to imagine that the disk stuff would cause the
> >>> server to lock up tight when... I
> >>> am running a query (yes it is large) and I click on another database
> >>> to just look at the views
> >>> contained in that database, or open a stored procedure to see what
> >>> it looks like.
> >>>
> >>> It just seems like that should be instantaneous.  I have told SQL
> >>> Server to leave 3 gigs of ram
> >>> available (only take 5 of the 8 gigs).  It appears that SQL Server
> >>> does indeed respect that because
> >>> the size of the committed memory is only 5 gigs, and increases if I
> >>> go in and increase that number
> >>> while the query is running.
> >>>
> >>> So in theory I have 3 gigs available for the OS and other apps.  The
> >>> processors are idling.  And yet
> >>> it does not matter what I do, from look at parts of the databases to
> >>> trying to open Excel or Access,
> >>> it just takes 60 seconds or more to respond.
> >>>
> >>> I have no idea how to troubleshoot this, but the one constant is
> >>> that I do not have this issue
> >>> unless SQL Server is busy.
> >>>
> >>> John W. Colby
> >>> www.ColbyConsulting.com
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> Francisco Tapia wrote:
> >>>> Are these large queries?  What's your disk distribution setup like?
> >>>> Where is the OS disk what channel on your raid card, Where is
> >>> your Page File
> >>>> on what channel / Raid Card, where is your DB, what chan... well
> >>> you get the
> >>>> picture...
> >>>>
> >>>> If it's all processing via the same raid card I'm afraid you may have
> >> to
> >>>> troubleshoot that part.  There is absolutely no reason your server
> >> should
> >>>> hang while running a view, unless there are problems with the view, or
> >> the
> >>>> design on your I/O layout.
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> -Francisco
> >>>> http://sqlthis.blogspot.com | Tsql and More...
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> On Tue, Jun 9, 2009 at 4:56 AM, jwcolby
> >>> <jwcolby at colbyconsulting.com> wrote:
> >>>>> Why does SQL Server "lock up" when I am running a query and I try to
> >> do
> >>>>> something such as view the
> >>>>> design of a view on a completely different view?
> >>>>>
> >>>>> BTW SQL Server has been limited to 5 gigs out of 8 gigs total memory.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> It seems that SQL Server should be able to do things like this with
> >>>>> absolutely no hesitation.  Yet
> >>>>> when I am running a large query and I try to do anything else,
> >>> such as view
> >>>>> the tables or views,
> >>>>> view the SQL in a stored procedure etc., even in a completely
> >> different
> >>>>> database, the entire system
> >>>>> just locks up for a long time, as in a minute.  The odd part is that
> >> the
> >>>>> query isn't even using much
> >>>>> cpu.  I have a quad core and the total cpu usage in task manager says
> >> 0%,
> >>>>> yet I can't get anything
> >>>>> else to work.  Even something like saving a change to an Access
> module
> >> and
> >>>>> closing Access takes a
> >>>>> full minute.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> It is truly annoying.  I often have to do other things on the
> >>> machine while
> >>>>> queries run and it is
> >>>>> just impossible to get anything else done.
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