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Optimizing Windows 7 with Performance Monitor (part 2) - Utilizing Customized Counters in Performance Monitor & Managing Performance Monitor Properties

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2. Utilizing Customized Counters in Performance Monitor

You can add numerous counters from any of the subsystems within Windows 7. To access the configurable Performance Monitor window, select the Performance Monitor item in the left pane, as shown in Figure 8.

Figure 8. Customizable Performance Monitor window

Customizable counters are listed at the bottom of the Performance Monitor window. By default, only the % Processor Time counter is tracked for the local computer. The fields just above the counter list will contain data based on the counter that is highlighted in the list, as follows:

Last Displays the most current data

Average Shows the average of the counter

Minimum Shows the lowest value that has been recorded for the counter

Maximum Shows the highest value that has been recorded for the counter

Duration Shows how long the counter has been tracking data

Before we add counters to Performance Monitor, we need to discuss the three Performance Monitor views.

2.1. Selecting the Appropriate View

Click the Change Graph Type button on the Performance Monitor toolbar to see your data in one of three views, as shown in Figure 9.

Figure 9. Change Graph Type button

Line View The line view is Performance Monitor's default view. It's useful for viewing a small number of counters in a graphical format. The main advantage of line view is that you can see how the data has been tracked during the defined time period.

Histogram Bar View The histogram view, shown in Figure 10, shows the Performance Monitor data in a bar graph. This view is useful for examining large amounts of data. However, it shows performance only for the current period. You do not see a record of performance over time, as you do with the line view.

Figure 10. Performance Monitor histogram bar view

Report View The report view, shown in Figure 11, offers a logical text-based report of all the counters that are being tracked through Performance Monitor. Only the current session's data is displayed. The advantage of the report view is that it allows you to easily track large numbers of counters in real time. It is important to note that when you view data in real-time format, the data can appear skewed as applications and processes are started. It is typically more useful to view data as an average over a specified interval.

Figure 11. Performance Monitor report view

Complete Exercise 1 to add counters.

Exercise 1: Adding Counters

  1. In Performance Monitor, click the Add button on the toolbar, which looks like a green plus sign (+). This brings up the Add Counters dialog box.

  2. In the Add Counters dialog box, ensure that the Select Counters From The Computer drop-down list displays <Local Computer> so you can monitor the local computer. Alternatively, to select counters from a specific computer, pick a computer from the drop-down list.

  3. Select a performance object from the drop-down list. All Windows 7 system resources are tracked as performance objects, such as Cache, Memory, Paging File. Process, and Processor.

  4. Select the counter or counters within the performance object that you want to track. Each performance object has an associated set of counters. Counters are used to track specific information regarding a performance object. For example, the PhysicalDisk performance object has a % Disk Time counter, which will tell you how busy a disk has been in servicing read and write requests. PhysicalDisk also has % Disk Read Time and % Disk Write Time counters, which show you what percentage of disk requests are read requests and what percentage are write requests, respectively.

  5. Select <AII Instances> to track all the associated instances or pick specific instances from the list box.

  6. Click the Add button to add the counters for the performance object.

  7. Repeat steps 2 through 6 to specify any additional counters you want to track. When you finish, click OK.


After you've added counters, you can select a specific counter by highlighting it in Performance Monitor, To highlight a counter, click it and then click the Highlight button (which looks like a highlighter) on the Performance Monitor toolbar, or select the counter and press Ctrl+H.

To stop showing data for a counter, deselect the check box under Show for that counter, To remove a counter, highlight it in Performance Monitor and click the Delete button on the toolbar. The Delete button looks like a red X.

3. Managing Performance Monitor Properties

To configure the Performance Monitor properties, click the Properties button on the Performance Monitor toolbar, and the Performance Monitor Properties dialog box opens, as shown in Figure 12.

Figure 12. Performance Monitor Properties

The Performance Monitor Properties dialog box has the following five tabs—General, Source, Data, Graph, and Appearance. You can configure the following properties on each of these tabs:

General Tab The General tab of the Performance Monitor Properties dialog box, as shown in Figure 13, contains the following options:

  • The display elements that will be used: legend, value bar, and/or toolbar

  • The data that will be displayed: default (for reports or histograms, this is current data; for logs, this is average data), current, minimum, maximum, or average

  • How often the data is updated, in seconds

Figure 13. Performance counter properties General tab

Source Tab The Source tab, shown in Figure 14, enables you to specify the data source. This can be current activity, or it can be data that has been collected in a log file or database. If you import data, you can specify the time range that you want to view.

Figure 14. Performance counter properties Source tab

Data Tab The Data tab (the default tab, which is active when the Properties dialog box opens) lets you specify the counters that you want to track. You can add and remove counters by clicking the Add and Remove buttons. You can also select a specific counter and define the color, scale, width, and style that are used to represent the counter in the graph.

Graph Tab The Graph tab, shown in Figure 15, contains the following options, which you can apply to the line or histogram bar view:

  • Whether the data will scroll or wrap (line view only)

  • A title

  • A vertical axis label

  • Whether you will show a vertical grid, a horizontal grid, vertical scale numbers, and/or time axis labels

  • The minimum and maximum numbers for the vertical scale

Figure 15. Performance counter properties Graph tab

Appearance Tab The Appearance tab of the Performance Monitor Properties dialog box, shown in Figure 16, has options for customizing the colors and fonts used in the Performance Monitor display.

Figure 16. Performance counter properties Appearance tab

After you have set counters and viewed them in real time, you might be interested in collecting the data over time and saving it to a file so you can maintain a baseline of data for comparison. You do this in Performance Monitor by using data collector sets.
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