Exchange Partition highy Fragmented

[jifitz]

This may be like pushing on a pull door. But here goes. I have an
SBS2000 installed on a RAID1 config. I am running Exchange. As
everyone knows Exchange shows up as really fragmented. Right now it
reads:

Volume fragmentation
Total fragmentation = 26 %
File fragmentation = 52 %
Free space fragmentation = 0 %

I know all about the ESEUTIL.exe. I have used it for at least once a
month for some time. The result I usually get is more free space. But
the space I have is highly fragmented. And the reason I am looking at
this is because when I would go into disk management it would hang the
server so bad I had to hard reboot it. It hung yesterday without
notice. I ran the Dell diagnostics both online and offline (from the
utility partition) both found nothing. Worst of all there is not a
record of any event in the logs each time this happens. The
fragmentation is the only thing I can think of. Can I safely defrag
the drive in safe mode?

Thanks in advance your help.
James

 

[jifitz]

I ran the eseutil /d/. Srank the database. Then I downed the server and ran defrag in safemode. 0% fragmentation. Server is screeming now. Thanks. B-)

 

[Zelandakh]

Lordy. You are a brave, brave man. That isn't something I'd want to do.

 

[58sniper]

Nor I.

Concerned as to why you're using eseutil once a month.

Pat Richard, MCSE MCSA:Messaging CNA
Want to know how email works? Read for yourself -

http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc2821.txt

 

[anawrocki]

As far as I am concerned, periodic offline DB maint on exchange is a must.

We backup and perform this opperation monthly, have done so on all versions of Exchange for last 5 years. Reclaims space and maintains performance. Have never had an issue, but have adverted potential issues in that DB inconsistencies have been found and repaired. Drives work less, and theotetically last longer.

 

[jifitz]

anawrocki (MIS) 18 Sep 06 11:29
As far as I am concerned, periodic offline DB maint on exchange is a must.

We backup and perform this opperation monthly, have done so on all versions of Exchange for last 5 years. Reclaims space and maintains performance. Have never had an issue, but have adverted potential issues in that DB inconsistencies have been found and repaired. Drives work less, and theotetically last longer.

Thanks for the support. I just want to say that I did not just blindly defrag the drive without one backing everything up and two getting confirmation from others who have done the same with success. The key is to do the online defrag first to clean up the database and the offline defrag the clean up the rest of the drive. I will also agree that my performance has drastically improved for this server.

Thanks again to all.
James