System Monitor interface

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Applies To: Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2003 R2, Windows Server 2003 with SP1, Windows Server 2003 with SP2

System Monitor interface

When you open Performance, a toolbar appears and the graph view area displays the same set of counters as the system overview query in Performance Logs and Alerts. System Monitor begins charting counter values in this graph area immediately. By default, data is updated automatically. Switch to manual update by using the Freeze Display button in the toolbar. Use the Update Data button to collect each sample on demand. One collection is made per click. To remove all data from the display, click the Clear Display button.

The names and associated information for the counters you select are shown in the legend beneath the graph, as follows:

  • Computer on which System Monitor is running

  • Performance object

  • Performance counter

  • Performance object instance. Note that by default counter instances are listed by name and numerical index. This index appears after the instance name, represented by a number sign (#) and a number. This index makes it easier to monitor multiple instances, for example, when you are monitoring threads of a process.

    To turn off the index display, right-click the graph, click Properties, and clear the Allow duplicate counter instances check box. By default, process and thread instances have a #n appended (where n is an integer). To append the process ID instead, create a DWORD value called ProcessNameFormat under the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\PerfProc\Performance subkey and set its value to 2. Likewise, to append the thread ID instead, create a DWORD value called ThreadNameFormat under the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\PerfProc\Performance subkey and set its value to 2. To turn off any of these options and return to the default, set the value of the appropriate DWORD to 1.

    Caution

    • Incorrectly editing the registry may severely damage your system. Before making changes to the registry, you should back up any valued data on the computer. For more information, see Registry Editor overview.

  • Graphical properties of each counter.

Note

  • To match a line in a graph with the counter for which it is charting values, select a counter in the legend and double-click a position in the line. When highlighting is in effect, the bar or line representing data for the selected counter changes color to black for most background colors. If chart lines are close together, try to find a point in the graph where they diverge. Otherwise, System Monitor may not be able to pinpoint the value you are interested in.

Above the legend columns is the value bar, where you see the last, minimum, maximum, and average values for the counter that is currently selected. These values are calculated over the time period and number of samples displayed in the graph (reflected by the Duration value), not over the time that has elapsed since monitoring was started. The Duration value in the value bar indicates the total elapsed time displayed in the graph (based on the update interval). The movement of the timer bar across the graph indicates the passing of each update interval. Regardless of the update interval, the view will show up to 100 samples. System Monitor compresses log data as necessary to fit it in the display.

You can define the following attributes of the graph:

  • Type of display, with options for graph, histogram, or report.

  • Background color of the details pane and of the data-display area.

  • Size, type, and style of font used to show text in the display.

  • Color, width, and style of line used to chart data.

Note

  • Default key settings in Microsoft Word may conflict with the CTRL+H combination used for System Monitor highlighting. You may need to change these to support highlighting when the System Monitor control (Sysmon.ocx in the system_root\System32 folder) is used in Microsoft Word.

Clicking Object, Counter, Instance, or Computer in the counter legend sorts entries in ascending or descending order for that category. For example, to sort all counters by name, click Counter.

For more information, see Quick reference to System Monitor settings.