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  • #2112341

    Why is initial access slow on network?

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    by jim_kinee ·

    I have recently added a Windows 2000 w/SP1 system to an NT4.0 w/SP6A network. When opening a file by double clicking in explorer the file takes an unusually long time to open (30 seconds or more for a 20K file). When opening a similarly sized file through the application the file opens almost immediately (as it should). It does not matter what the application is as the problems exist using MS Office, TIFFs or Adobe Pagemaker files.

    The Server and the W2K system are using TCPIP. All other machines on the LAN are NT4 or W95 using TCPIP and do not experience the same problem.

    What could be causing the problem?

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    • #3887874

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by ab3_tek ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      I have experienced the same problem assuming you meant that you experience a slow down when opening files accross the network. This only happens with my Win2k machines and not the NT 4.0 and 95/98 machines. I have tried using Netbeui and thisdid not speed things up. Also I have issues with my Win2k machines not showing up in My Network Places even on other Win2k machines. I hope you find a fix.

    • #3887873

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by ab3_tek ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      I have experienced the same problem assuming you meant that you experience a slow down when opening files accross the network. This only happens with my Win2k machines and not the NT 4.0 and 95/98 machines. I have tried using Netbeui and thisdid not speed things up. Also I have issues with my Win2k machines not showing up in My Network Places even on other Win2k machines. I hope you find a fix.

    • #3887871

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by jim_kinee ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Point value changed by question poster.

    • #3878209

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by tankplanker ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      I’ve tried this on my 2000 pc (its not yet running sp1) and I get noticably faster load times if I turn of the preview option in the explorer window. You can do this by going into (in explorer) tools, options, general, view classic windows folders. Make sure you reboot between each test!

      Hope this helps,
      Brian

      • #3832119

        Why is initial access slow on network?

        by jim_kinee ·

        In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

        A difference between slow and unacceptable. I tried this and it does not help in this instance. Thanks.

    • #3878207

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by tankplanker ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      I’ve tried this on my 2000 pc (its not yet running sp1) and I get noticably faster load times if I turn of the preview option in the explorer window. You can do this by going into (in explorer) tools, options, general, view classic windows folders. Make sure you reboot between each test!

      Hope this helps,
      Brian

    • #3878206

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by jimbb ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      I can’t say I have dealt with something like this before, but is it possible that looking up a name is slowing down things? In other words, is opening a file from “G:\something” faster than opening it from “\\server\share\somewhere”? In that case name resolution (WINS, DNS) might have something to do with it?

      • #3832113

        Why is initial access slow on network?

        by jim_kinee ·

        In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

        Everything works fine on the local machine. It is when it accesses “non-executables” on the network.

    • #3878000

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by optimiser ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Hi Jim.
      I had this problem once and found out that the real culprit was Virtual Memory and not the network. Try increasing your pagefile size. If you have 8gb Hard Disk, and 128mb RAM, then you can have pagefiles on 2 disks. On the drive where NT is loaded, the minimum should be 138mb (of course this will be less if the NT drive is less than 2gb). The next drive should have ample space to have a pagefile of 1gb. Be careful however. Check your hard disk space before increasing the pagefile size. It may slow down your system if the pagefile is too big in comparision to your disk space. One more thing. Do not scatter your pagefiles all over. Ideally, you should not have more than 2 pagefiles.
      All the best! And do let me know if it works.

      • #3832114

        Why is initial access slow on network?

        by jim_kinee ·

        In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

        Paging files is set to 384MB to 778MB. There is 6GB free. And everything is partitioned as one drive.

    • #3887036

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by jon_siegel ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Optimiser is correct. I have 2k running side by side with my nt4 and win98 machines on a shared network, and I was having slowdowns when accessing files on the various machines NOT 2k. I am using 2kPro, if that makes a diff, and as soon as the page file sizes were sorted out, rather than letting the OS take care of it, the problem essentially evaporated.
      Be careful to set your page file sizes according to the available space on your drives, and do try to never go over 15% of the total drive space.
      Just my opinion.
      let me know how this works out.

    • #3865962

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by brian ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      I can’t remember the details off hand, but I do remember there being an issue when running a mixed Win2k/NT4 environment where a WINS server is necessary for the two to communicate properly….might be worth a look.

      • #3832116

        Why is initial access slow on network?

        by jim_kinee ·

        In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

        WINS is running on the NT4 server. Also pointed to a different server running WINS. Still no luck. Thanks.

    • #3832744

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by colang ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      It seems your client has to broadcast to find the server with the shared files.
      If there is a wins server in the lan try to check client wins configurations otherwise install wins service on a server.
      Try to open network neighbors; if it is slow too then try to estabilish who is the master browser in that network.
      Disable browsing service on win2k client or set it to “non browser”. It has to NOT become browser.
      Good Luck

    • #3831566

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by Anonymous ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Jim- COULD it be basic DOS. IF all the OS’s mentioned are standing on DOS ( not sure abt 2K0 then it may be a problem of allocationto pper and lower Memory. Did 2K depart from the group?
      Dave at 81 yrs!

    • #3831631

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by noeljones ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Jim – In Explorer, your PC needs load and open the application before it loads your file. When you already have the application open, it need only load your file.

      • #3832118

        Why is initial access slow on network?

        by jim_kinee ·

        In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

        This doesn’t only happen when you double click a file. If you sincle-click certain files the system seems to wait to cache the info.

    • #3832028

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by tschmuki ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Are you using offline folders? I have the same behavior on a large offline folder (about 2G). I had to disable the offline folder and manually cleaned up the client cache directory (SystemRoot\CRC).

    • #3830826

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by yammiman ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      From my understanding, when a WIN2K system is added to an NT4.0 network, it defaults to being the master browser regardless of what was set on the NT boxes. This causes a slowdown in the determining on the network who the master browser actually is. To fix the problem, determine what box you want to be the master browser and set the other box to be a backup. It is recommended to use the WIN2K box to be the master browser.

    • #3831017

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by a.r.h. ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Adding Win2k means that dns is used for both internal and external file requests. Win2K is trying to find the host using dns. Is the win2k station set to use WINS? Even if it is, DNS has priority because it assumes the Win2k server is running dynamic dns. I think explorer makes different requests than most apps (especially win2k explorer!) so it is get lagged out looking for dns entries. Try a hosts file on the local machine to see if that speeds it up or make a dns entry in your local zone.

    • #3830282

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by slogmeister ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      I think Yammiman is right. Check your event logs on your NT server and see if there are massive amounts of browser elections going on. They may not be able to decide who is the master browser or not. There is a registry entry that will stop a machine from requesting to be the master browser, but I don’t remember what it is. – It should be easy enough to find off Microsoft’s site. Tr y it.

      – Jason

    • #3829505

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by paradis ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Several suggestions:

      The name resolution issues probably aren’t the reason for the slowdown; they would cause initial access to a remote machine to be slower, but once a connection is open, windows does not resolve the name again, it caches the address. I’d check them anyway, though, because NT and 2k DO use different name resolution mechanisms by default (DNS for 2k, WINS for NT4)

      As for the explorer problem, try disabling Web View if it’s on; Web View contains a preview pane that will attempt to display a preview of the currently selected file. Since opening a file from explorer also selects it in the explorer window, the system will attempt to load the file it it’s associated app AND generate the preview at the same time, thus slowing access.

      Aside from that, there will be a speed difference between using the open dialog and using explorer, since explorer must either load the associated application or communicate with it via DDE to open the file, depending on whether the app supports using DDE to control an existing instance.

      For apps that do not support DDE, windows executes a new instance of the application and passes it the filename on the command line; for apps that support DDE and specify this in the registry, Windows checks if the app is loaded; if not it executes it. When the app is running, windows opens a DDE connection and instructs the app to open the file

      Since the open dialog for an app is part of the application, the name of the file to openis passed (in-process, quickly) from the dialog to the app, and avoids the (slow) interprocess communication required for DDE and/or the (even slower) creation of a new process.

    • #3829504

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by paradis ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Several suggestions:

      The name resolution issues probably aren’t the reason for the slowdown; they would cause initial access to a remote machine to be slower, but once a connection is open, windows does not resolve the name again, it caches the address. I’d check them anyway, though, because NT and 2k DO use different name resolution mechanisms by default (DNS for 2k, WINS for NT4)

      As for the explorer problem, try disabling Web View if it’s on; Web View contains a preview pane that will attempt to display a preview of the currently selected file. Since opening a file from explorer also selects it in the explorer window, the system will attempt to load the file it it’s associated app AND generate the preview at the same time, thus slowing access.

      Aside from that, there will be a speed difference between using the open dialog and using explorer, since explorer must either load the associated application or communicate with it via DDE to open the file, depending on whether the app supports using DDE to control an existing instance.

      For apps that do not support DDE, windows executes a new instance of the application and passes it the filename on the command line; for apps that support DDE and specify this in the registry, Windows checks if the app is loaded; if not it executes it. When the app is running, windows opens a DDE connection and instructs the app to open the file

      Since the open dialog for an app is part of the application, the name of the file to openis passed (in-process, quickly) from the dialog to the app, and avoids the (slow) interprocess communication required for DDE and/or the (even slower) creation of a new process.

    • #3851523

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by dcyr ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      I experienced the same problem and found it to be a problem generated by using some of the NT4 system policies. Specifically, I had drive letters that were mapped via a system policy. When I attempted to access the file via explorer, it took 3 timesas long. I removed that portion of the system policy and mapped drive letters through a logon script, and then the problem vanished. Have you considered watching the traffic with netmon? It may reveal something completely unrelated. Another tack to take is to open the file in explorer via my network places instead of a mapped drive.

    • #3852511

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by goodwin2000 ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Are all the file associations correct in explorer? I’ve seen this on my job a couple of times where openiong a file through explorer would hang or err out due to incorrect file association information. Yet would open fine through the Application it was designed in, i.e. Excel.

      Have you tried reloading just Explorer to see if the Explorer.exe may not be corrupt for some reason.

      Hope this helps

    • #3850704

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by tjmitch ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      I see many have tried to answer so here’s my two cents. One of the interesting things about win2k is that it will temporarily disconnect shared drives and resources until they are needed. There is a registry settng you can modify under the lanman service. I am fuzzy on the exact key but a search on technet would fix this. I think the default is 900 seconds of no packets before it disconnects. This can be changed to 85,XXX seconds. It’s worth a test in your environment.

    • #3851260

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by jws1951 ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      You say the Server is running TCP/IP but what about the client? As you know the client sets the protocol and if you have a stack of them in the protocol list it will wind its way down through the stack until it finds a compatible protocol. check and see if IPX is also listed. remove everything except TCP/IP. this just happend to me yesterday at a client site and it increased the resolve speed

    • #3851102

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by emrahalpa ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Maybe an answer…
      Are you using Norton Antivirus 7.0X on the same machine? I had the same case on my machine with Win2000/sp1. Then I upgraded to Norton Antivirus 7.5 and everything worked fine.
      This is something Technet also wrote about. According to it, SP1 has made this problem, and SP2 was supposed to solve it.

    • #3851061

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by jdfcomputer ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      When attempting to open a file across a network from explorer, Windows incorrecly send the application level in the network protocols as “explorer”. If you are attempting to open a word file the system will not open the file until the correct application is identified by your computer and resubmited the request across the network to retreive the file contents. Try launching the file from explorer while you have the appropriate application open in a minimized window if the load time decreases.

    • #3837324

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by dc88228 ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Try forcing new Browser elections. First, try using Browser monitor (NT Resource Kit) to determine which machines are the Browsers. Next, go and shutdown these machines (this force new elections). Now try performing your exercise to see if the problem persists.

    • #3837789

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by nagazaki ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      A simple solution : hosts file

      go to winnt\system32\drivers\etc
      and add a line to the hosts file like this one

      10.0.0.1 myW2Ktooslowserver

      Don’t forget the carriage return at the end

      This should increase the connection speed directly after rebooting the computer.

      Do the same for each server if needed.

    • #3839695

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by cajundon ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Have you been to Windows Update for any updates or patches for W2K? Like all Microsoft OS it is not compatible with all computer systems, and all of the bugs have not been detected yet. Also check with Microsoft Support Knowledge Base, for any articles about your problem. The Knowledge Base will be the first source of any problems, but not necessarily a solution for it yet.

    • #3837215

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by louhall01 ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      The first thing I would check is Name resolution. Windows 2000 uses primarily DNS for name resolution. The previous clients are probably resolving the name of the server that offers the resource via WINS which will resolve netbious names. The previous clients would have to register themselves via Dynamic DNS for the W2K machine to properly resolve their name. I would give the 2000 machine the IP address of a WINS server.

    • #3845282

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by shivakumar ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Hi Jim ,

      First let us know one thing when did the problem which u had mentioned was happened while opening the files through network or in the same system ? Which system gives the above mentioned problem windows 2000 ,winnt or win95 ?.

      If it happens while opening the file through network ( from the network drive or from the server) then the problem might b with the ethernet card or a protocols , what ever it is please check the following aspects in your system .

      1.Check the free space in your C: drive and keep minimum of 150 MB free space (to avoid virtual memory problem) .

      2.Check the service pack (try to install the service pack once again)

      3.Uninstall unwanted softwares from your PC.

      Regrds
      Sivakumar

    • #3846827

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by seb ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Could be your virus checker. Depending on the type of file is depending the virus checker will scan it before opening.

    • #3844811

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by spn ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Hi there, a thought how much memory does your WinK2 computer have? Remember Double clicking a file in explorer it will have to open the Application first then the file.
      Also the appliction you use can slow down the computer initial.ESSPECALY ON A NT PLATFORM(excuse the spelling)

      Try opening a large file with a progarm like paint/notepad/wordpad.see if there is a difrance in speed.

      I don’t realy have enoph info but I suspect memmory is the problem.

      Goodluck
      SPiNner

    • #3844812

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by spn ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Hi there, a thought how much memory does your WinK2 computer have? Remember Double clicking a file in explorer it will have to open the Application first then the file.
      Also the appliction you use can slow down the computer initial.ESSPECALY ON A NT PLATFORM(excuse the spelling)

      Try opening a large file with a progarm like paint/notepad/wordpad.see if there is a difrance in speed.

      I don’t realy have enoph info but I suspect memmory is the problem.

      Goodluck
      SPiNner

    • #3844771

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by eddie_lek ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      hi jim
      Check the free space in your C: drive and keep minimum of 150 MB free space (to avoid virtual memory problem) .

      For win2000 u need that amount of memory for using almost everythings.

      good luck 😛

    • #3845647

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by ivesphil ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      In the Windows 2000 Operating system it will default to a very small swap file, to enhance your network speed and access, depending on the size of drive, increase the swap file to at least 256 to 512 meg. This change will be very noticable, since the default is 96.

    • #3844654

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by coretek ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Check your DNS settings on the client, if this points to a non existing server then your W2K client will take approx 20 seconds to role over to WINS or local lmhosts file.

    • #3844516

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by printermanager ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Try to launch the file from explorer while you have the appropriate application open in a minimized window .

      You can move it to the task bar. automaticaly the application run. Drop it then.

    • #3844369

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by timp999 ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Try using Tracert from the new machine to the file server. you may be going out onto the internet nad back in to the file server, instead of going through the local system. I’ve seen other networks with this problem.

      Run tracert from a DOS Prompt, syntax is “tracert domainname”. Domain name can be either text or an IP address. I’d recommend trying both since your DNS may pass the numbered packets through but route the text-string packets out to a foreign DNS for resolution. (Trust me, I’ve seen it). If this is the case start looking at your DNS.

      Good luck,
      Tim

    • #3855259

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by jdawk ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Dhcp or static IP ?
      Network file or local?

    • #3855251

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by jdawk ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Are you checking the event viewer?

      Is there any Samba or Unix/Linux on your network? If so active directory is your problem…is this a workstation or App. Server?
      Manually put in the gateway address..
      If u are using dhcp ..manually type your
      DNS in the DNS suffix ( for this connection)
      chk both boxes on the bottom there in the seetings too.
      Finally, chk the box APPEND parent suffixs
      now go to your run line and
      make sure you type CMD to get to a command prompt (CMD) is way better then just typing command ( No DOS)
      run nbtstat -RR
      also netstat -s -n -e
      this will show the packets and other need network info
      use the command line utilities nbtstat to list the netBIOS name table.
      What permissions are running on the NT servers? Get the 2000 box ip address and host name. Do you have Admin tools ?..packet sniff
      Find out how the NT servers see it on the network. It might think its a BDC.
      Remember, 2000 boxes enter the network as Domain Controllers…There is no PDC or BDC
      Active Directory runs the show in a tree
      Heiarchy…

      compare it with another box…

      Are you fimilar with active directory.
      Is this the only 2000 box on the network?
      2000 trys to take over..They conflict with my Unix NIS servers all the time. (If its a server)
      It sounds like it is…
      again
      command line utilities will tell u everything at this point…
      Active directory is tricky..
      try demoting it if all else fails
      Di

    • #3854641

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by ianduke07 ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      I assume that it is the new workstation that you are having the problem with.
      One of the standard test is the round trip network time from PC to PC. Go to one of the Workstations that does not have the problem and open the command prompt (dos box).Type Ping (Computername or IP address), where Computername is another workstation that does not have the problem. Look at the round trip time, shown in milliseconds. Next repeat this but this time ‘Ping’ the workstation that is giving you the problem. If there is a substantial difference in the times then it is nearly always caused by a hardware problem.
      If the network card in your new system does not have drivers specifically for win2k then a close alternative will have been selected. This isalmost certainly the problem. Try to get the correct driver from the card manufacturer, or if not available you will have to experiment with the ones provided in win2k.

    • #3854174

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by ahmedmeer ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      Hi Jim,

      There could be many reasons behind this problem,So the first way to tackle this issue is trace the actual thing which is causing this, so first thing is to go to task manager and see if system idle service is occupying max cpu time or not, if not which is that program/file occupying the cpu time and then you can from there…..

      thanks

      Meer

    • #3854161

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by jmstitt ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      I think this may be your answer. I recently upgraded (yes, I call it an upgrade) from five Novell 3.1 servers to Windows 2000. I also had 1 NT server that was used as a file server. I experienced the exact problem you describe. I tried UNC mapping of share directories, trying access from different subnets, adding protocols, different NICS, hubs, switches, reterminated cables and even rebuilt the server. None of those things help to speed up the initial access. The funny thing was that thespeed accessing the NT machine and Novell servers was optimum. The problem was in Name resolution. Any W2K station took forever to resolve the name. I was first clued into the problem after I started mapping drives as a test using the computers IP address instead of its netbios name (\\192.168.0.1\myshare). The speed problem would disappear. After that, I installed a multihomed WINS server and had all the servers update their WINS information automatically. Also, I added a hosts file to all W2K workstations in the directory c:\winnt\system32\drivers\etc. I am going to add an LMhosts file to WINS later, so I don’t have to added to each workstation anymore. Also, I have also noticed that a clean install of W2K pro on client stations is necessary for maximum network access. Upgrading the machine doesn’t seem to have the same affect. I hope this helps

      • #3699799

        Why is initial access slow on network?

        by jim_kinee ·

        In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

        I haven’t been back to this site for the past month or so. I passed this message along to the local coordinator thee and he says things have cleared up a bit although there are still a few issues. I will see what else is wrong next trip back. My thanks to all who submitted suggestions.

    • #3699768

      Why is initial access slow on network?

      by jim_kinee ·

      In reply to Why is initial access slow on network?

      This question was closed by the author

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