XADM: JET Retry Hotfix Makes Repair (ESEUTIL /P) Very Slow

ID: Q197060

The information in this article applies to:

Microsoft Exchange Server, version 5.5

SYMPTOMS

After you apply the fix detailed in the following Microsoft Knowledge Base article, running repair (ESEUTIL /P) is considerably slower than before the fix was in place.

Q192333 XADM: JET Will Now Retry 16 Times on -1018 Error

CAUSE

The second phase of repair is to scan every page in the database. During this scan, the Exchange Server database engine expects to encounter un- initialized pages. Un-initialized pages are zeroed out pages that have not been used yet. When an un-initialized page are encountered, a -1019 error (JET_errPageNotInitialized -- Blank database page) is generated in the Windows NT Application Event log, but repair is expecting that error.

However, when the hotfix Ese.dll (in the article listed above) sees an un- initialized page, it retries the read 16 times. Retrying the reads for each un-initialized page in the database slows the scanning phase considerably.

RESOLUTION

To resolve this problem, obtain the latest service pack for Exchange Server version 5.5. For more information, please see the following article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

Q191014 XGEN: How to Obtain the Latest Exchange Server 5.5 Service Pack

The English version of this fix should have the following file attributes or later:

Component: Exchange Database Engine


   File Name   Version
   ----------------------
   Ese.dll     5.5.2416.0

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed this to be a problem in Microsoft Exchange Server version 5.5.

Additional query words: hang defrag

Keywords : exc55sp2fix
Version : WinNT:5.5
Platform : winnt
Issue type : kbbug