An Enterprise Guide To Windows XP's Built-In Tools

Market Wire, 20050229

Microsoft Windows XP is the first operating system that combines the major advantages of Windows NT with the ease of use and flexibility of the Windows 9x series. Windows XP offers the best of two worlds: Windows 2000 & Windows Me. Microsoft Windows XP is available in two different versions: the Home and Professional editions. Each version has exactly the same operating system with a few minor feature differences. The professional edition adds some extra business-oriented features over the Home edition with the support of SMP systems, Active Directory and IIS Web server.

XP Professional, the enterprise version of Windows XP, comes with several built-in tools, including back up software, a firewall, disk maintenance tools, system management utilities, and more. Most of these tools are more than adequate for the mobile or home office user; however, in some situations you may be better off using a third-party product. In addition, although many of these tools may work for enterprise deployment, most were not designed for that. For example, the Task Manager is quite valuable, as can be the performance tool. However, the firewall is a little basic, as are the backup and defrag tools. Both lack the functionality that large sites require.

Then there are a whole range of new utilities and applications included with Windows XP Professional that have never been experienced in the enterprise before -- Windows Media Player and CD Burner are two good examples. In addition, Windows XP comes with a major interface overhaul which is built around the Luna interface. The most visible changes from the Classic Windows 9x/Me/2000 look are a new color scheme, rounded window corners, and far fewer icons on the Desktop.

So let's look at XP Professional and its built-in tools. By knowing the strengths and weaknesses of each, you will be in a better position to evaluate which tools have value and which tools have no business in an enterprise setting.

MONITORING TOOLS

Windows Task Manager

Windows Task Manager can be useful in diagnosing system slow downs and other problems. Accessed via CTRL ALT DEL, Task Manager now has five tabs: Applications, Processes, Performance, Networking, and Users. Two of these tabs are particularly useful. The Applications Tab tells you which applications are running and allows you to disable the applications you do not need. The Performance Tab graphs memory and CPU usage. Keep an eye on this tab after loading XP to see if you have enough CPU power, physical memory or a large enough paging file. The Performance tab can also help you spot things like programs that are hogging memory or improperly coded programs that may be the cause of memory leaks. Overall, this is an excellent tool if you are debugging a specific desktop or server.

Firewall firewall is certainly a big improvement over not having a firewall. It blocks incoming traffic and is particularly useful for home users or small businesses. I checked it out on Gibson Research's ShieldsUP utility and it came out as very secure. Therefore, this firewall is probably all you need at home.

As it blocks only incoming traffic, however, enterprises will want to add defenses that are more robust. At the very least, however, employees could temporarily use this firewall on their laptops to add some measure of mobile computing protection. If you are looking for an alternative try McAfee's Personal Firewall.

Performance Tool

XP's built-in performance tool is a combination of the old System Monitor combined with Performance Logs and Alerts. You can collect or view real-time memory, disk, processor, network, and other activity in graph, histogram and report form. You can con-figure the logs to monitor this data and send alerts if your values go beyond a specified threshold. You access the performance tool via the control panel by double-clicking on Administrative Tools and Performance. If you have upgraded to XP from an older machine, this tool can help you observe whether the old CPU and memory are up to the task or need an upgrade. However, when using the performance tool, be aware that you may end up draining system resources if you try to keep track of too many metrics at once.

Again, home users, road warriors and some small businesses can probably get by with using the performance tool. A well-priced upgrade for small and mid-sized operations is WebNM by Somix Technologies Inc. It utilizes polling techniques to create a centralized performance database where you can see what is happening across the network and detect the cause of system slow downs.

Disk/File Management Tools

XP comes equipped with the widest range of system management tools of any Windows operating system to date. This including a built-in quota system, a backup system, and defragmentation and disk clean up tools. Compared to NT, it is filled full of all kinds of utilities and programs.

Quotas Professional has a built-in quota system that lets you limit the amount of storage a user can use on an NTFS volume. When a user exceeds the pre-set limit, that individual and/or the administrator are notified. Alternatively, you can set it so the file cannot be saved until other material is deleted (be careful, as this option might not be popular with users). You can access this utility through My Computer. Select a drive and click on File > Properties. Basically, the utility alerts you when you are starting to fill up your disks and places limits on disk usage per user. This feature should be more than adequate for a home or mobile user.