Internet Information Services exposes numerous configuration parameters that affect IIS performance. If you host one or more websites, IIS is definitely important to you. Improving IIS performance will ensure you’re able to load the fastest web pages for your users. It is capable of running websites at blazing speeds as long as you tune it properly.
IIS can be affected by a few different actions, some of which are more advanced than others. There are even several different application performance management systems that help simplify this process. Click here for more information on how to monitor your IIS performance. If you are unfamiliar with all this, do not worry. It covers everything, from the basics to advanced performance monitoring.
Read this overview highlighting the 5 easy ways you can boost your IIS performance.
- Disable IIS Logging
By default, IIS logs every request to the server in a logfile. One of the easiest ways to boost the performance of your IIS is to minimize or completely eliminate automated IIS logging. If disabling logging altogether is not possible, limit it to logging only the essential information. These files can consume a great amount of disk space and slow the performance.
- Tune the ASP Queue Length Value
It is important to limit the amount of times a server outputs the HTTP 503 busy server message to users. This busy message can be caused by a low ASP Queue Length value. You should analyze the queue whenever your server is experiencing unusually high levels of traffic, and this will help you determine a pattern of requests.
Tune the ASP Queue length as necessary until you create the best pattern for your server. More information on ASP limits can be found in the Microsoft reference guide.
- IIS HTTP Compression
Enabling HTTP compression under IIS will help provide a faster transmission time for compression-enabled browsers. In this instance, it doesn’t matter whether your content is in a local storage or a UNC resource.
The HTTP Compression setting can be reached under the specific Connections page in your IIS Manager. From there, select the compression feature and configure your desired options before applying.
- Use HTTP Keep Alive
The HTTP Keep-Alive feature isn’t as common, but it is highly effective. You can find this gem in the response header, and it will quickly boost your IIS performance. This feature will keep the client and server connection open for however long you specify. You can verify whether your server is using this feature by checking if the box is checked under HTTP Response Headers.
- Disable ASP Debugging
If you suspect bugs in your server, running ASP debugging mode is a quick way to locate potential problems. However, this mode uses a great deal of processing power. Disabling debugging mode will help boost your IIS performance. You can quickly disable ASP debugging by setting the property to false under Debugging Properties.
IIS Performance
Monitoring IIS performance is one of the many necessary parts of web administration. While you should monitor your performance to be sure there are no bugs or problems, you can also do several things to boost your response time and user speed. Many website visitors tend to drop the site if the page does not load quickly. Dropped website users will lead to dropped potential customers. It might take some fine tuning to find the best IIS properties for your server, but these actions will help improve your overall web performance.
