Using Windows Maintenance Tools on File Servers and Workstations

Article
05/17/2011

Applies To: System Center Data Protection Manager 2007

In general, you can continue maintenance on file servers and workstations protected by DPM using your regular maintenance schedule and the maintenance tools provided in the operating system. Those tools and any impact on data protection are listed in the following table.

Windows Maintenance Tools and Protected Computers

Windows Tool	Considerations
Disk Cleanup: Use to remove temporary files, Internet cache files, and unnecessary program files.	Running Disk Cleanup should have no adverse affect on performance or data protection.
Disk Defragmenter: Use to analyze volumes for the amount of fragmentation and to defragment volumes.	Before adding a volume to a protection group, check the volume for fragmentation, and if necessary, defragment the volume by using Disk Defragmenter. When protection is applied to extremely fragmented volumes, boot times on the protected computer might be slowed down and protection jobs might fail. It is recommended that you run Disk Cleanup before running Disk Defragmenter.
Chkdsk.exe: Use to check the file system and file system metadata for errors and to display a status report of its findings.	Before you run chkdsk /f on a protected volume, verify that a consistency check of that volume is not being performed. Running chkdsk /f on a protected volume while a consistency check is being performed on that volume can cause 100% CPU utilization. Run synchronization with consistency check after running Chkdsk.exe on the protected computer.

Disk Cleanup: Use to remove temporary files, Internet cache files, and unnecessary program files.

Running Disk Cleanup should have no adverse affect on performance or data protection.

Disk Defragmenter: Use to analyze volumes for the amount of fragmentation and to defragment volumes.

Before adding a volume to a protection group, check the volume for fragmentation, and if necessary, defragment the volume by using Disk Defragmenter. When protection is applied to extremely fragmented volumes, boot times on the protected computer might be slowed down and protection jobs might fail.

It is recommended that you run Disk Cleanup before running Disk Defragmenter.

Chkdsk.exe: Use to check the file system and file system metadata for errors and to display a status report of its findings.

Before you run chkdsk /f on a protected volume, verify that a consistency check of that volume is not being performed. Running chkdsk /f on a protected volume while a consistency check is being performed on that volume can cause 100% CPU utilization.

Run synchronization with consistency check after running Chkdsk.exe on the protected computer.

Using Windows Maintenance Tools on File Servers and Workstations

Windows Maintenance Tools and Protected Computers

See Also

Concepts

Additional resources