The ultimate preventive maintenance checklist for servers

Ensuring that your servers are optimized and healthy requires a program of regular maintenance. Heres a checklist of 25 key tasks you can perform to keep your servers in peak condition.

1.

Visually inspect servers for error indications. Most of the popular server-class hardware systems have intuitive lights, LEDs, or other indicators that provide basic status information. Amber, orange, or red indicators may signal failed or prefailed components or disconnected devices. Green generally indicates good status.

2. 3. 4. 5.

Update antivirus package definitions. Ensure that your antivirus engine is up to date with the current standards for your package. But be careful about updating scan engine and program versions for the antivirus package without preimplementation testing.

Perform a supplemental virus scan. A virus scan lets you verify the effectiveness of the installed antivirus package. However, its not a good idea to install multiple antivirus packages to accomplish the supplemental scan. Consider using Trend Micros free HouseCall scan online.

Perform/schedule disk defragmentation. Keeping hard disks defragmented can optimize disk I/O performance. Ensure that your scheduled defragmentation is being executed and that the schedule is in line with operational requirements of the system(s).

Inventory operating system service packs and updates. Use dynamic tools to assess the installed and currently available versions of operating system configuration. For Windows environments, a popular stand-alone tool is the Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer (MBSA). This tool can assess the operating system risks by its current mix of installed service packs and updates.

6.

Inventory critical application service packs and updates. The MBSA can help with this task. You can inventory SQL Server, IIS, Internet Explorer, Exchange Server, and other top-level Microsoft programs in the same fashion as the operating system reporting. Tools are available to inventory all installed software. Other tools can perform scans to assess risk levels (which may be resolved by service packs and updates of non-Microsoft packages) of installed systems and configurations. For example, GFI LANguard and similar products can perform interactive scans and offer reporting on existing configurations.

7. 8.

Test your backup and restore mechanism. Even if you have a reliable auxiliary system or confidence in your backup mechanism, ensure that your processes in place are familiar and that they execute correctly.

Review operating system logs. For Windows systems, review the event log for suspicious or unexpected entries.

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9.

Audit the active accounts. Review the user accounts and groups on the server (and critical applications) to ensure that theyre still needed. Look for accounts that are for individuals no longer using the system or temporary accounts that may have been used for implementing new features, training, or other reasons.

10. 11.

Check password integrity. Run scans or ensure that complex password configuration is enabled in alignment with your security policies.

Check the uptime. Check the uptime of the server(s) with the Windows Uptime Resource Kit tool or other similar mechanisms. Reconcile this with your server logs or what you expect to be the uptime. This can warn you of problems or security breaches that may have gone unnoticed during performance observations.

12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17.

Check available disk space. Ensure that all disk drives have adequate free space on the drive. A recommended amount of free space is at least 25 percent of the total drive size. Defragmentation tools may alert you that their effectiveness is compromised if less space is available.

Test UPS battery performance. Test the power protection mechanism to ensure that your battery runtime is adequate and that it can function.

Ensure that memory use is normal. Verify that your systems have adequate memory installed for the current usage, as system scope may have changed since implementation.

Run a cleaning tape. If your system has a direct attached tape, run the cleaning tape periodically (approximately once every 15 uses or whatever is recommended for the equipment) to ensure that the device is optimized.

Examine RAID configuration. If RAID is used, be sure the configuration is correct for your fault tolerance and performance requirements.

Examine your networking equipment connectivity. If you use managed switches or other networking equipment that can give you detailed information about each node, examine the nodes that your server(s) are connected to. Ensure that theyre not exhibiting faulty behavior (errors, retries, etc.).

18.

Inventory network configuration. Double-check your full networking configuration to make sure the desired protocols are running, the subnet mask and default gateways in TCP/IP are correct (if used), the WINS and DNS primary and secondary server entries are in the right order, and that other configuration issues are being handled correctly.

19.

Inventory Windows services. Examine the Windows services that are set to start automatically. Verify that the list of services is correct and that no unnecessary services are starting. Also look to see whether any services are set to Automatic startup type but arent running.

1995-2004 CNET Networks, Inc. All rights reserved. Tech Toolshed and its logo are trademarks of CNET Networks, Inc. Reproduction of this publication in any form is prohibited.

20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25.

Examine hardware configuration. In Windows systems, open the Device Manager and make sure no devices have unexpected status or are missing from the categories. The exclamation point icon indicates a failed, missing, or unconfigured device.

Examine the share inventory. The list of Windows shares should be those that are required for use in your systems. To see the list of shares, right-click on My Computer and go to System Tools | Shared Folders. Make sure there are no surprises here.

Test your contingency remote access mechanism(s). Ensure that your remote administrative access mechanisms are operational. Examples are PCAnywhere, Terminal Services, VNC, HP iLO management port, and a contingency modem.

Assess the scheduled tasks configuration. Ensure that scheduled tasks have the desired configuration. Also look for the SMS or Advertised Programs configuration to see whether any other system is pushing applications and configuration to this server.

Update the Windows emergency recovery disk. Have a current ERD for your system in case you need to enter some of the recovery tools or console.

Make a hardware profile. This profile will populate the Last Known Good boot option on Windows systems with a mechanism to boot up with a profile you know is working. This can be handy if an important driver update fails. The default profile (Profile 1) is usually the only profile unless you add another.

1995-2004 CNET Networks, Inc. All rights reserved. Tech Toolshed and its logo are trademarks of CNET Networks, Inc. Reproduction of this publication in any form is prohibited.

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