I really don't know what Windows 2008 or more h/w would bring to the table,
but for the file system performance itself, it might be worth running a
defrag -- at least the analysis portion -- to see what the file system and
MFT fragmentation looks like. Advanced defrag tools can also defrag the
MFT, that might help speed up performance (by how much, I couldn't say...
75 million files is a lot no matter how you slice it).

Best regards,

Andy Raibeck
IBM Software Group
Tivoli Storage Manager Client Product Development
Level 3 Team Lead
Internal Notes e-mail: Andrew Raibeck/Hartford/IBM@IBMUS
Internet e-mail: storman AT us.ibm DOT com

IBM Tivoli Storage Manager support web page:
http://www.ibm.com/support/entry/portal/Overview/Software/Tivoli/Tivoli_Storage_Manager

"ADSM: Dist Stor Manager" <ADSM-L AT vm.marist DOT edu> wrote on 2011-02-25
14:34:46:

> From: "Prather, Wanda" <wPrather AT ICFI DOT COM>
> To: ADSM-L AT vm.marist DOT edu
> Date: 2011-02-25 14:38
> Subject: Re: Windows servers with a kazillion files and Win2K8...
> Sent by: "ADSM: Dist Stor Manager" <ADSM-L AT vm.marist DOT edu>
>
> Thanks for the reply and the reference; I'll read that.
> It's a 32 bit system.
> Do you think adding RAM will help with the issues navigating the file
tree?
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ADSM-L AT VM.MARIST DOT EDU] On
> Behalf Of Storer, Raymond
> Sent: Friday, February 25, 2011 2:22 PM
> To: ADSM-L AT VM.MARIST DOT EDU
> Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Windows servers with a kazillion files and
Win2K8...
>
> Wanda, is this a 32 or 64 bit system? An NTFS file system will
> support about 4 Billion files on a single volume http://
> technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc781134(WS.10).aspx . If you
> are having performance issues with this and you can switch it to a
> 64bit platform and add loads of RAM, I would do it.
>
> Ray
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ADSM-L AT VM.MARIST DOT EDU] On
> Behalf Of Prather, Wanda
> Sent: Friday, February 25, 2011 2:03 PM
> To: ADSM-L AT VM.MARIST DOT EDU
> Subject: [ADSM-L] Windows servers with a kazillion files and Win2K8...
>
> I have a site with an application that generates kazillions of tiny
> files that are stored forever.
> I've already yelled about it, but it's a purchased, customer-facing
> black-box app that they really can't change.
> (Naturally, when it was bought umpty years ago, nobody thought about
> the problem reaching this size or what the ramifications would be.)
> Every day the app creates more files.
>
> They have multiple Win2K3 servers that already have multiple luns
> containing over 35M files each, one is over 75M files.
>
> We are using journaling to back them up successfully (most days).
> But it's a struggle just to expand the file tree with Windows
> explorer, and there are exposures on the days when the journal gets
> overrun (takes 72 hours for TSM to scan the filesystem and
> revalidate the journal).
>
> Looking for anything that might help save our bacon.
>
> Has anybody had experience with this issue and Win2K8?
> Does Win2K8 do any better than Win2K3 at handling huge numbers of
> files in 1 NTFS directory?
> Upgrading the OS is something application-independent we might be able to
do.
>
> Thanks for any insight!
> W
>
>
> Wanda Prather  |  Senior Technical Specialist  | wprather AT icfi DOT com<
> mailto:wprather AT icfi DOT com>  |  www.jasi.com<www.jasi.com%20> ICF
> Jacob & Sundstrom  | 401 E. Pratt St, Suite 2214, Baltimore, MD
> 21202 | 410.539.1135
>
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