Re: Alocated Memory Error (SQLSERVR)

I suspect that this starting with an update is coincidental. I'm far from a
SQL guru, but my understanding is that the MSDE instances are designed to
grab available RAM for performance reasons, similar to the way Exchange does
it. The procedures in the KB and Susan's blog are designed to avoid this
behavior for instances like Monitoring, where performance is not as critical
and you don't want it grabbing all that RAM.

I just reference that particular KB because I find it concise and easy to
follow. The procedure works fine for other MSDE instances - I've actually
done it with Monitoring - you just substitute the name of the instance in
question for "MSFW" in the KB steps.

I can't explain why you're seeing this on just one of several similarly
configured servers. As Norm says, it seems like this comes up somewhat
frequently, but it's definitely not a universal problem or we'd see it a lot
more. Either that or most boxes do it but most users don't notice. I know
that the only reason I ever looked into it myself was the allocated memory
alerts, and those were actually caused by an improperly configured alert
threshold rather than an error in MSDE configuration.


"somebody" <somebody@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:EiSzg.2671$sy2.2220@xxxxxxxxxxx
Thank you both for your suggestions and open discussion.
FWIW I am not using sbs 2003 premium, just the standard edition.
And I have other machines of the same hardware and configuration at a
couple of other location that seem to also have three sqlsrvr services
running but non ever going about 200mb of memory usage. This one is
unlike the others. And though I am going to try the suggested fix I still
don't understand what created this issue when other systems that I
installed in the same (and generic) way do not have this problem. It
seems to have started after the installation of a critical update (which
just makes me wonder which is worse, to ignore a critical update intended
to close a security hole or the apply the update that is suppose to fix
it... ugh).
Thanks again.

"N. Hughes" <quadrantcomputerNOSPAM@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:O9EqPbbtGHA.2260@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Thanks for your comments Dave. That long link was to an archive in Yahoo
Groups, but yes, your link is to the original doc and is faster and
simpler!
I'll let you know how I go - just off to the site now (it's Wed. morning
in Melbourne!)
Cheers
Norm Hughes

"Dave Nickason [SBS MVP]" <gwdibble@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in
message news:ug51ZKbtGHA.2020@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
I can't get anywhere with the link you posted, but Susan's blog does have
a procedure that's very similar to the one I use. It might be this one,
or just search her blog for "allocated memory alerts."
http://msmvps.com/blogs/bradley/archive/2005/05/22/48500.aspx

If I remember correctly, Susan has actually done it, so the method she
blogged is proven to work satisfactorily. I think her procedure and the
one in the KB I posted are very similar, and the only reason I refer
people to the KB is that it's MS documentation and may be simpler. I've
done the one in the KB twice, so we know they both work. I think the
two procedures are just different ways of using osql to get to the same
result, and I'm confident that whichever you use will work
satisfactorily.

The one kicker is that MS is apparently unwilling to give a firm number
on what you should throttle the RAM to. They point to obvious reasons -
everyone runs differently configured hardware and software, so YMMV.
From the blog, it looks like Susan chose 100 mb. I chose 128. We're
both happy, so I think that's a good neighborhood to try. As I said, I
think it's important to document anything like this in case you get an
unpleasant surprise.

On your observation that this is becoming more prevalent, IMO as people
try to limit RAM usage by the MSDE instances, we should all post what we
do and how it works out for us. Maybe we can get a consensus going as
to what specific numbers to recommend. I chose 128 almost from thin
air, and it's only because I've been using it for 4 or 5 months that I'm
willing to put that number out there as a possibility for someone else
to use.


"N. Hughes" <quadrantcomputerNOSPAM@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:uhKb2uatGHA.2020@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
I've had this issue on one site which runs SBS 2003 Premium with SQL
Server 2000 SP4, but ISA is not installed. The memory problem on my
client's server (2Gb RAM) seems to be due to the SQLAgent$SBSMonitoring
and MSSQL$SBSMonitoring instances. The gradual grabbing of RAM by these
instances is excessive and not related to the Alerts configuration. It
seems to be coming more and more prevalent, at least judging by NG
posts. Changing the SQL Enterprise Manager memory settings does not
work. Susan Bradley posted what I hope is a fix, will be onsite to test
it today.
http://www.sbsarchive.com/search.php?search=sql+memory&op=1&ts=2&mo=1&srchmonthe=7&srchmonths=4&srchyeare=2006&srchyears=2006&subject=R:%20[sbs%20list]%20High%20mem%20usage%20on%20SBS%202003

Thanks to Daryl Maunder of the Melbourne SBSUG for advising me of this
link.

Dave, you might like to comment further?
Regards
Norm Hughes

"Dave Nickason [SBS MVP]" <gwdibble@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in
message news:eiOrPIatGHA.4748@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
I'll give you the short answer and please feel free to post back if
you have questions.

- See http://blogs.technet.com/sbs/archive/2006/06/07/433707.aspx. If
you think the alert is misconfigured, fix that and give it a while to
see what happens (ignore the part about this happening when adding ram
since the same guidelines apply anyway). If you're not familiar with
this site, I recommend bookmarking it for future reference - these are
the top SBS gurus at MS support.

- If the above isn't your answer, open Task Manager and view the
Processes, with the PID column showing. Get the PID for the SQL
instance in question. Open a command prompt and type "tasklist /svc"
without the quotes. Find that PID and note which instance of SQL is
the culprit (for example, SBSMONITORING, MSFW).

- You can throttle the instance to use less RAM following the
procedure in the following KB. If the instance whose ram usage you
want to throttle back is not MSFW, substitute the correct instance
name in place of MSFW when following the steps. Use a memory
threshold you consider to be practical - I've used 128 MB for MSFW and
monitoring. SharePoint and WSUS haven't used an unusual amount of RAM
so I've left those in their default configurations. Please carefully
note any changes you make in case of unintended results.

You may experience high memory usage on an ISA Server 2004-based
computer that logs messages to an MSDE database
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/909636/en-us


"somebody" <somebody@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:2wLzg.7636$L31.4664@xxxxxxxxxxx
I have a fully patched SBS 2003 installation that has a problem with
SQLSERVR demanding more memory the longer the system stays active.
When I reboot it start out normally (like other SBS 2003 servers I
help support) but over time it grows to 900mb of total system memory
and critical errors are reported to me about the same.

I don't use exchange server (we use pop mail provided by our ISP and
which is collected by outlook directly - not using pop-connector or
shared exchange server address book or anything exchange related).
However my daily status report is sent out from the server and I
think that uses exchange server to send the daily report.

How can I track down the cause of this error before it becomes a
problem. I haven't had any problem come of this, but that is likely
due to the many recent Windows updates that require restarts about
every other week... if I left this server running for a long time I
fear it will run out of memory.

Thank you!













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