SMS: Software Inventory Processing Degrades Foreground Performance on Win95 & Win98 Clients (228276)

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256986 Description of the Microsoft Windows Registry

SYMPTOMS

If an on-demand virus scanner is running when Systems Management Server software inventory (SINV) executes, performance of the foreground applications may degrade significantly for the duration of the inventory scan. To reduce the severity of the problem consider the following suggestions:

Carefully choose which files will be scanned on-the-fly by the on-demand virus scanner. Some types of files are less susceptible to virus infection than others, and it may be possible to scan those on a scheduled basis rather than on demand.
Carefully choose which types of files SINV will scan for inventory. The more overlap between the files scanned for inventory and the files scanned for viruses, the more work the virus scanner will have to do.
Review the scanning options for the virus scanner. It may allow for scanning on "run" separately from scanning on "open", and so on. It may also have options for fast scans versus full scans, or options for yield times.

When considering changes to your virus scanning implementation, always follow the guidelines of your corporate virus/security policy and consult the vendor of your virus scanning software for advice.

CAUSE

This occurs because as SINV opens each file to read its header information, the virus scanner scans it. Scanning a file for a virus signature is a processor-intensive operation. Because SINV may open several hundred files in a short period of time, the virus scanner may become CPU bound as it attempts to scan them all.

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed this to be a problem in Systems Management Server version 2.0. This problem has been corrected in the latest U.S. service pack for Systems Management Server version 2.0. For information on obtaining the service pack, query on the following word in the Microsoft Knowledge Base (without the spaces):

S E R V P A C K

MORE INFORMATION

WARNING: If you use Registry Editor incorrectly, you may cause serious problems that may require you to reinstall your operating system. Microsoft cannot guarantee that you can solve problems that result from using Registry Editor incorrectly. Use Registry Editor at your own risk.

To specify the sleep interval, create a DWORD value called Reserved in the following registry key on each client computer:

   HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\SMS\Client\Client Components\Software Inventory Agent\

Set this value to the desired time in milliseconds (ms). The default is 1 ms and the maximum is 500 ms. You may need to adjust this value for your specific environment. Start with a small value and work up until you get acceptable foreground application performance.