Slow screen drawing on Windows clients

Slow screen drawing on Windows clients

am 21.04.2008 12:19:05 von Twan

Recently we upgraded our FileMaker 6 files (FMP 6.5 + FM Server 5.5) to
the new FileMaker platform (FMP 9.0v3 + FMP Server 9.0.3.325).
Somehow the screen painting on the Windows XP client machines performs
very slow and the first time a layout is accessed, there is some
flickering of the screen, like all elements on the layout have te be
repainted. Why?

FileMaker 6.5 did never show this unwanted effect.
We're still in a test phase, so at the most 3 clients are simultaniously
connected.

Configuration of the machines:
FM Server: Windows XP SP2 / 2x2.0 GHz / 1.0 Gb RAM
FMP clients: Windows XP SP2 / 2.4 GHz / 1.0 Gb RAM

The effect is measured on all Windows XP machines (which are mostly
identically configurated), except on a single Mac client.

Is there a known fix for this or does somebody know how to fix it?

Twan

Re: Slow screen drawing on Windows clients

am 22.04.2008 03:49:39 von FastWolf

On Mon, 21 Apr 2008 12:19:05 +0200, "Twan" wrote:

>Recently we upgraded our FileMaker 6 files (FMP 6.5 + FM Server 5.5) to
>the new FileMaker platform (FMP 9.0v3 + FMP Server 9.0.3.325).
>Somehow the screen painting on the Windows XP client machines performs
>very slow and the first time a layout is accessed, there is some
>flickering of the screen, like all elements on the layout have te be
>repainted. Why?
>
>FileMaker 6.5 did never show this unwanted effect.
>We're still in a test phase, so at the most 3 clients are simultaniously
>connected.
>
>Configuration of the machines:
>FM Server: Windows XP SP2 / 2x2.0 GHz / 1.0 Gb RAM
>FMP clients: Windows XP SP2 / 2.4 GHz / 1.0 Gb RAM
>
>The effect is measured on all Windows XP machines (which are mostly
>identically configurated), except on a single Mac client.

I take this to mean the Mac client has the same problem.

>Is there a known fix for this or does somebody know how to fix it?

Here are a few suggestions:

* Make sure there isn't a script configured to run on opening the
file. (File--}File options...) If there is, try disabling it and see
if that helps. If it does, look the script over and see if there are
any bottlenecks in it. If it runs a find or sorts records, for
example, that might account for the issue you describe.
* If you have any summary fields on your layout they can take awhile
to recalculate, especially if your db has a lot of records.
* I *guess* FileMaker Server will run under Windows XP, but I
guarantee it will be a whole lot happier running under Windows 2003
Server or even Mac OS X. Windows XP was never intended to be a server
OS. For example, you could be running into the simultaneous TCP/IP
connections limitation (10 is the max) hardcoded into Windows XP SP2.

hope this helps

--
FW

FileMaker Pro Advanced 8.5 on Windows XP Pro SP2
FileMaker Server 8.0 on Windows 2003 Server R2