Newbie looking for indication of app load times 2

[mulawa1]

Hi everyone,

My first post but I've been lurking for several days.

I've been given the job of evaluating Citrix for use with our 200+ pc's.

I'm using a PIII 800 with only 128M RAM for testing. So far I've only looked at publishing an app then using a client browser on another pc to fire it up. Word 2000 takes almost 30 secs to be ready for use from the time I click the icon. There's a lot of disk activity on the server so I suspect my 128M is nowhere near enough.

At this stage I would value feedback from people who are using Citrix in a production environment with regard to load times.

And of course, any other comments would be most welcome.

tia

Cheers ... Peter

 

[Voyager1]

There are a couple of things you can do to increase performance. As you have mentioned, 128m is extremely minimal, even for testing. Even so, 30sec to load Word is outrageous! A couple of things to consider:

1. Your best bet is to have multiple disks on your Citrix server. Load the OS on one, and applications on the other. They should also be SCSI - IDE just doesn't have the performance for this environment.

2. Your swap file should be around 2X your physical RAM, and it should be located on a separate drive from the OS. You can even put it on it's own controller. You'll experience a major performance boost from this one thing alone.

3. Did you run the Application Compatibility Script after loading Office 2000?

4. Use of roaming profiles, particularly on a busy network can slow down the whole process.

5. Make sure your server is not loading any network protocols that are not in use. If you are a TCP/IP shop, don't load NWLink or NetBEUI - they will cause network traffic just because they are there.

Just some thoughts - perhaps CitrixEngineer or some of the others can add some ...

Hope this helps...

- Bill

"You can get anything you want out of life, if you'll just help enough other people get what they want" - Zig Ziglar

 

[mulawa1]

Thanks Bill for such a lengthy and useful reply - your use of the word "outrageous" is most encouraging! I'll be checking out your suggestions thoroughly - I hadn't even heard of the "Application Compatibility Script".

Cheers ... Peter

 

[mulawa1]

Hi again Bill,

I have checked the Microsoft site and it would appear there is no Application Compatibility Script for Office 2000 - it just requires you to use the mst file at install (which I had done).

I have another 128M on order - I'll post what difference that makes.

Cheers ... Peter

 

[mulawa1]

Unrelated question but - am I not able to edit my posts?

Cheers ... Peter

 

[Voyager1]

Check out

http://www.citrix.com,

in the Support area, and search for "Compatibility scripts". There is a new one there for Office 2000.

As far as I know, you can't edit a post after it has been posted. You can if you "Preview" your post first.

- Bill

"You can get anything you want out of life, if you'll just help enough other people get what they want" - Zig Ziglar

 

[CitrixEngineer]

Your original question sounds like some kind of resolving issue on the network. It may be worth running a tool such as Filemon

http://www.sysinternals.com

to see where the issue lies.


To add to Voyager1's list:

6. Don't run any more services than you need to on your Citrix servers. They're struggling enough with Terminal Services, so adding Exchange, Domain Controller, SMS or other services will create a severe overhead.

7. Roaming profiles can be trimmed down to around 1Mb, which shouldn't strain the network. This can be done by keeping all data out of the profiles - have mapped directories for user documents, and keep temporary files out of the profile by editing the environment variables.

8. Try to have all of your Citrix servers on the same switch/hub so that the Farm can communicate as closely to a single entity as possible.

9. Get into the habit of using a test server to try stuff out on first. This way you can be more certain that your production server will not give you nightmares.

10. Learn system policies.

11. If you can, have a separate server to handle File/Print services. This server should have its emphasis on the disk subsystem; ie RAID 5. It should contain terminal server uers home directories, roaming profile folders and application data.

12. Work with someone on this.

I say this, because I was thrown in at the deep end with 6 Citrix servers that I had to build and get running for 750 users. After 6 months of nightmares, my bosses finally agreed to get in a consultant to help with issues I had been unable to resolve myself, and a temporary contractor to help with the backlog.

That was my first experience of Citrix - and I'm still working with it!

I would recommend you get some assistance at an early stage, rather than wait for it all to go pear-shaped. Even if it's just a temp to help you get things set up. Two heads are better than one - even with Tek-Tips to help...

 

[mulawa1]

Progress Report:

Many thanks for such comprehensive advice - I certainly intend to investigate all avenues!

I have installed an extra 128M of RAM so now have 256M. Word load time has dropped from 30s to 10s.

Cheers ... Peter