Chapter 2: Capacity and Availability Management 19

One area where you can guard against problems is database errors. Database errors can be caused by a number of factors, but they are typically hardware related. You will be able to minimize these by doing the following:

Ensure that your hardware is on the Hardware Compatibility List

Checking Event Viewer for database-related errors

Periodically running the Information Store Integrity Checker (isinteg.exe) on the database to check for errors

Part of your maintenance program should also include routinely searching the Microsoft Web site (www.microsoft.com/exchange) for any issues that need to be resolved by patches and/or service packs. The patches and service packs will be tested and recorded as part of your change-management program, which is covered in more detail in Chapter 3.

Minimizing System Recovery Time

To recover from failure in an Exchange 2000 environment as quickly as possible, you need to be thoroughly prepared. You will need the following:

Available hardware

Complete configuration information

A recent, working backup

An effective disaster-recovery procedure

Fast access to support resources

Staff availability to perform the restore

System recovery is covered in more detail in Chapter 5.

Performance Tuning

When you tune for performance, you are aiming to reduce your system’s transaction response time. Performance tuning can take a number of forms, including the following:

Balancing workloads between servers

Balancing disk traffic on individual servers

Using memory efficiently on servers

Upgrading hardware

The most effective factor in improving performance comes from upgrading the hard- ware on your servers that are running Exchange. However, regardless of the hardware, there are a number of software changes that you can make to maximize the efficiency of Exchange 2000.

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Microsoft 1 manual Performance Tuning, Minimizing System Recovery Time