Essentials for Office 365 2.14 - Performance Optimization Guide

Scripts and Schedules

Scripting and potentially scheduling operations provide essential benefits to a migration and backup plans but they also have the added benefit of minimizing resource consumption.  If the software’s user interface is not being rendered, refreshed with a progress bar or status, caching elements and everything else that comes with displaying a view, then that is less resources that are being consumed on the host.  Less resources for a visual presentation means that more resources can be used for the operation.  Please remember the previous section where issues may arise if too many concurrent instances or parallel operations are running.

Azure Turbo Mode (migration only)

When performing a migration into SharePoint Online or OneDrive for Business in Office 365, the use of the Azure Turbo Mode option can provide a measurable (in most cases) performance increase for minimal configuration time and effort.  Please review the Azure Turbo Mode sections of the Essentials User Guide to learn more about what it does and how it is configured

Migration and Backup Options (less can be more)

Like most people who are presented with a series of checkbox options, I tend to check them all, unless of course there is a cost associated to them.  However, when trying to squeeze out every last bit of optimization from a backup or migration you should be aware that the more options included, the more operations and processing that takes places and unfortunately the longer it will take to complete.  Therefore, it is important to understand all the available options, what they are designed to do and whether or not they are critical to the success of your project.  If they are not, then you may consider leaving a few unchecked (as much as this may pain you to do so).

Here is a small list of a few options that can take a considerable amount of time to complete:

•Design and Master Page customizations (migration)

•Include All Mailboxes or Include All OneDrive for Business sites (backup)

•Include All Versions (migration and backup).

•Item level permissions (migration or backup)

•SharePoint Designer Objects (migration)  

Frequently Asked Questions and Scenarios

Here is a collection of questions and scenarios that users have sent us over the years.

Q:  How many copies of Essentials for Office 365 can I run at one time?  Is there a performance benefit?

A:  You can run as many copies (instances) as your host system can support, however it is important to understand the host’s limitations (CPU, memory, hard disk space, network bandwidth) before running additional instances.  While it can provide a performance increase, the preferred approach would be to run parallel operations within the same, single instance of Essentials as resources can be conserved and allocated as required.

Q:  Does running more than one copy of Essentials for Office 365 cause instability?

A:  It can if the host computer runs low on system resources.  When Windows runs low on resources (memory, disk space, etc.) this software like any other can become unstable or unresponsive.  If you plan to run multiple, concurrent instances please be conscious of the resource availability on the host.

Q:  For memory allocation, how much is enough?  How much is too much?

A:  For maximum performance, as much as you can allocate using the following guidelines.  Do not exceed 50% of the total physical memory in the host.  If the host machine has 8GB of total memory, do not allocate more than 4GB to Essentials.  And remember, if you run 2 instances of Essentials configured with 4GB of memory, then you may actually consume a total of 8GB which is 100% of the host’s total resources.  

This can and probably will lead to instability.

Q:  How many parallel operations can I run in a single instance?  Is there a performance gain from this configuration?

A:  Similar to running several copies of Essentials, a performance gain is certainly possible.  Multi-threaded operations like these are the preferred method since the software can better handle the resource consumption of the host.  You still need to be conscious of the total resource availability, however the software will not consume more than what it has been configured.