Server go-slow

jontyhunter · #1 September 9th, 2005, 04:19 AM

Hello,

We use a G5 1.8 tower with 768mb ram as a server (with Tiger server sotware installed) and have 13 macs (3 e-macs, 5 G5s, 4 G4s, 1 laptop) connected to it on a daily basis.

Over the past two days, the server has started running slow and our connection to it suffers as a result. For instance, running Illustrator on my mac and trying to save a file can sometimes now take a few minutes rather than be virtually instantaneous as it was before. Navigating through the finder windows on the server regularly brings up the spinning colour wheel for minutes at a time.

The only thing that has changed here in the office this week is having had a new printer intalled but no printer software was actually installed on the server. Could this be messing with the network in some way?

This is really starting to stress us out as it is badly affecting our workflow so any solutions or suggestions much appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

theed · #2 September 9th, 2005, 07:54 AM

I have some Finder issues like that which creep up over time. My enigmatic voodoo solutions include running a permissions fix, rebooting into safe mode and then back into regular mode, running disk repair utilities, and deleting all of the .DS_Store files.

I don't know which ones really help, but that's what I do and it does seem to help. There also seems to be a tendency for mac os x to stall while waiting for lookupd. Making sure that name stuff resolves can help, either with DNS or /etc/hosts, or NetInfo. ... Good luck.

jluchies · #3 March 31st, 2006, 11:39 AM

I work for a small company administering the computers. We have mostly macs running OSX 10.4.4 with a few OS9s and a couple of WinXP machines. We upgraded our mac server to OSX 10.4.4 server a couple of weeks ago. Almost immediately we experienced a slowdown for the whole network.

I fired up top and Apple File Services was at the top ... with 30 to 50% of the CPU cycles. That is the cause of the slowdown. I have been looking to resolve the issue, but have found only some cryptic references to avoiding Apple File Sharing Protocol (AFP). We have now turned that off on the server altogether, but still no fix.

I am pretty new to Macs, but competent at *nix. My boss doesn't know much about administrating the network either.

Please Help, and thanks.

J Luchies

Go3iverson · #4 March 31st, 2006, 09:39 PM

First and foremost, be sure your DNS is clean. With so many agents and auth. methods tied into that, improper DNS can eat up CPU cycles.

Nigel has some interesting AFP tuning tips on the AFP548.com site. You may want to take a peek at those.

For general server issues, there could be lots of things going on. I'd need more info.

Michael

sourcehound · #5 March 31st, 2006, 11:29 PM

I'll agree with Mike D. on this suggestion to look at DNS. Your server has more than enough resources to serve your clients with ease. Although Nigel's tips on tuning AFP are great, I don't think the key lies there, but possibly looking at your process list (use top or ps) to make sure some rogue isn't tying up your processor. Also, make sure you didn't enable the Software Update Service. That takes a few days to prime the pump and it can tie up your servers resources in the manner you described.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Go3iverson

First and foremost, be sure your DNS is clean. With so many agents and auth. methods tied into that, improper DNS can eat up CPU cycles.

Nigel has some interesting AFP tuning tips on the AFP548.com site. You may want to take a peek at those.

For general server issues, there could be lots of things going on. I'd need more info.

Michael

Go3iverson · #6 April 1st, 2006, 02:31 PM

It really is amazing how many folks don't realize that they have a non-working, or improperly configured DNS until they start adding in Mac OS X.

Kees Buijs · #7 April 1st, 2006, 06:06 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Go3iverson

It really is amazing how many folks don't realize that they have a non-working, or improperly configured DNS until they start adding in Mac OS X.

Although I did not have reverse backup working until today, I had none of those problems ever. So although it might cause somne problems to occur, sure it does not prevent a multi - server environment from working properly.

Although I have one problem when having os-x clients auto-mount volumes (by making them part of the login procedure. Then i get for the first (and only the first) a message that the volume is not found, even when specifying a ip-number.

If anyone knows why, please let me know.

Thx, Kees

Go3iverson · #8 April 1st, 2006, 07:55 PM

Could be an authentication issue. OS X Server uses DNS for lookups of resources, mount records, OD, kerberos, and many other authentication methods and services.

For example, building an OD without proper DNS can cause instabilities in the OD itself. You may not see it today. You may even see a KDC kick off and run, but I've seen it come back months later and show up with issues.