Slow Performance on newer G4 - Server 3 - OS 9

[StuckInThePast]

FileMaker Server 3

18 Databases

15 Clients

We have used Server 3 on a G3 233 MHz PowerPC running OS 9.0.4 with 96M RAM for several years. It was very stable and presented no problems. Records were returned very quick for the most part. This server began having issues and we replaced it with a newer server.

The newer server is a G4 350 MHz running OS 9.2.2 with 224M RAM. It was a fresh install of OS 9.0 with 3 updates to 9.2.2.

After installing Server 3 and opening the correct databases, we notice terrible lag between screens and pulling data. I read somewhere that there were issues with Server 5.5 on OS 9, but could not find any information on Server 3. Does anyone have any suggestions on what could be slowing everything down? I figured a better Mac with more RAM and processor speed would make performance a bit better. Are there settings somewhere in OS 9 that could be changed to increase performance?

Upgrading to a newer version of FM Server is not an option.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks in advance,

Joe

[Kurt Knippel]

Well the only newer version of Server is v7 and that needs a whole system update.

Your specific problems likely lie in 2 areas: OS version and Disk speed.

I have found that OS 9.04 (stripped down to only essential extensions) is best for Server. Anything higher has alot more overhead for user experience functionality that you do not want or need on your server.

It is possible, in fact highly likely, that you went from a speedy SCSI drive in the G3 to a slow ATA drive in the G4. Filemaker is all about disk access. Get yourself a fact ATA drive 7200 - 10000 RPM with an 8 or 16MB cache. I found that Western Digitals 10000RPM 16MB cache drive is an excellent performer for a server.

You can also consider maxing the RAM and using RAMbunctious to create a persistant RAMdisk and host all the databases from there. Finally get Peek-a-boo to allow you to set your processor priorities so that Filemaker Server always has the highest priority and lower the priority that Finder gets. Both RAMbunctious and Peek-a-Boo are from Clarkwood Software.

[StuckInThePast]

Thank you for your suggestions. I am looking into them right now.

The drive that is in the older G3 is an EIDE 4.3G UDMA/33 WD drive.

http://www.westerndigital.com/en/library/legacy/EIDE/79-880111-003.pdf

Before I reformat and install OS 9 again, I will try out the Peek-a-boo and RAMbunctious software and see if it makes a difference.

A little update. I installed the Peek-a-boo software, set everything to Low priority then set FileMaker Server 3 to High. I then raised the minimum memory allocation for the server from 60M to 120M. After restarting FMS 3, it seems to be working nicely. Granted I only tested with 4 clients, but it is a vast improvement over what it was.

Thank you very much for the suggestions!

[Kurt Knippel]

Way too much RAM allocation to the Server. Set it down to 40MB. Filemaker is a disk based server, not RAM based. Setting that much RAM will just require Filemaker Server to manage it, causing lower performance.