Wonderware Intouch 2017 (17.3) poor performances

Hi!

We are currently updating our Intouch 2012 (v10.5 and v10.6) and Intouch 2014 (v11.1) to Intouch 2017 (v17.3).

We were using workstations as nodes and WinServer2012 as NAD server, with centralized DAS (v10.5 & v10.6). Now, we are using HP ThinClient as nodes, and two WinServer2016 (with load balancing) as NAD/DAS server (v17.3).

We are exposed to very poor performances with both Intouch Maker & Viewer (at least 40% slower than workstations).

I did many tests, like getting more RAM and/or CPUs. It didn't help significantly. I also try to disable firewall, anti-virus, defender, etc. I even tried a empty WinServer2016 OS (I mean, only Windows). I also made a VMWare WinServer2016 machine hosting on a PC (instead of network infrastructure).

While I was doing my tests, I noticed that the problem disappears if the RDS (Remote Desktop Service) is disable, and reappears as soon as RDS is enable. Since I got 15 clients, spread in 2 servers with load balancing, I can't let RDS disable.

Wonderware is investigating the problem for 4 months now, and didn't come with a solution.

I search a lot on internet, tried some technotes, posts, etc. Nothing!

Hope you guys can help us !!!

P.S. I already tried what described in those topics
http://www.plctalk.net/qanda/showthread.php?t=54736
http://www.plctalk.net/qanda/showthread.php?t=87603

I bet I'll switch to FactoryTalk View SE !

What, and go from one bad platform to even worse! Factory Talk is garbage. I'd take wonderware any day over it. But I would use ignition over both.

I believe Wonderware is the only platform that supports NAD...
Have you tried a standalone computer that is not NAD dependent?

I agree with Phrog30. Scripting, managing, etc is way better with Wonderware. I have done NAD applications with RDS servers. The set up that I normally implement is 2 dedicated Primary + secondary servers with DAS and a RDS server to handle the clients. Didn't have a issue with loading. (Also they were Windows 2012R2 Intouch 2014R2)

If you want to convert to a different platform, leave 1990 behind and upgrade to Ignition!

Phrog30 said:

What, and go from one bad platform to even worse! Factory Talk is garbage. I'd take wonderware any day over it. But I would use ignition over both.

Click to expand...

If it wasn't for the lack of support, we'd keep Wonderware.

NetNathan said:

I believe Wonderware is the only platform that supports NAD...
Have you tried a standalone computer that is not NAD dependent?

Click to expand...

Yes, we did it with a Workstation and it was fine (no RDS). We also try a server without NAD nor RDS, it was OK too. But as soon as we enable RDS, which is necessary for multiple users, performance drop by 40%

bdossantos said:

I agree with Phrog30. Scripting, managing, etc is way better with Wonderware. I have done NAD applications with RDS servers. The set up that I normally implement is 2 dedicated Primary + secondary servers with DAS and a RDS server to handle the clients. Didn't have a issue with loading. (Also they were Windows 2012R2 Intouch 2014R2)

Click to expand...

This is exactly the setup we have. We have the problem with Intouch 2014R2 with WinServer 2012R2. Wonderware told us to upgrade to Intouch 17.2 or 17.3 with WinServer2016, so we did. It didn't change anything except we got problem with SQL requests.

I am not sure if this is your problem, but Wonderware has issues with multiple network cards. Solving connectivity issues in the past, I was told that Wonderware's DA/OI will only connect through the first network card (binding order).

Recently, one of my sister sites had connectivity issues that would cause the application to run slow, and every 45 to 90 minutes they would close the app, and reload it. Eventually it was trace back to the network cards not being in the correct order.

Most likely not your issue but worth a check.

I finaly found what was causing the poor performances. It is the "TSFairShare".

After working with the Windows team we found that the Remote Desktop Services feature was rewritten in Windows Server 2012, specifically around how the available resources on the server are pooled to allow multiple users to log into the machine at once. As part of this pooling a functionality called TSFairShare was introduced to manage how resources are divided up. This setting allows you to tune the pooling behavior and has resolved performance issues for a couple of our Dynamics GP customers. It's just that setting, which can be configured using the following steps, that you can attempt to address performance issues you are seeing over remote connections.

Click to expand...

https://community.dynamics.com/gp/b/dynamicsgp/posts/tuning-remote-desktop-services-2012-for-microsoft-dynamics-gp

The disable TSFairShare :
1. Start Regedit.exe.
2. Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\TSFairShare\Disk.
3. Change the value of EnableFairShare from 1 to 0 (zero).

By doing this, we retrieve the speed and performance that we had with WinServer2008 (Intouch 10.6).

Thank you all for the ideas!

and Thank You for the follow-up.

drbitboy said:

and thank you for the follow-up.

Click to expand...

+1