Hello, Just trying to get an understanding of running servers a bit better...

First off let me explain what i run on my windows 2003 standard server:
3 websites, (2 being total .net sites, and 1 "popular" asp site)
3 ftps (rarely in use 2 being private, 1 being an upload only with very limited permissions)
Mailserver for 2 domains

My cpu usage has been acting pretty strange the past 2 days.. Before in the past, if looking in task manager.. The only time it would spike is when a page is rendered.

Here is an example of what the cpu usage looked like before in task manager:
http://www.own-age.com/forum/images/inetinfo3(before).gif

Here is what it shows now:
http://www.own-age.com/forum/images/inetinfo1.gif
http://www.own-age.com/forum/images/inetinfo2.gif

up till 2 days ago.. it looked like the first picture shown.. only spiking when a page is loaded.. but now it seems as though its running something in the background when nothing has been changed in the system setup since its pretty much been setup a couple months ago.

The only thing showing usage is the inetinfo.exe process which I know is a part of IIS but can't figure out exactly what it actually does. (maybe mail/ftp services??)

any help would be much appreciated.

looking at all my log files I've run into an smtp log file that was 800 megs in size.. and growing quite rapidly. (it was stamped with today's date)

All the other log files were less then 2 megs in size... After Stopping smtp I noticed a huge drop in cpu usage.. Any suggestions on how to combat this problem now that I at least know that its incoming/outgoing mail that is causing it?

Sounds like SPAM.

First step: Stop using MS SMTP/POP3 services. Give MailEnable a try. Then lock down relay settings to prevent spammers from relaying from your box.

Also make sure your local user's arn't spamming, either.

Yea, I spoke with a Director of MIS for an airlines company and he's about 99% sure its caused by spam/relay

mailenable eh?

I'll give it a shot. thanks for the advice

yep, www.mailenable.com. It's a great free eMail server.

Also, on another note, perhaps this was the cause of your pagefile to become so large?

well I can't point my finger on it exactly, but as of right now..

But signs are leading to it..

Its strange how this started hitting me on 1 day.. Around 1am Central time is when i noticed it really start to happen and it was affecting my cpu usage a lot.. But now with mail enable running it looks like its supposed to.. I also upgraded ram anyway. (never can have too much ram)

here's a picture of the usage after fixed:
http://www.own-age.com/forum/images/inetinfofixed.gif

Now back to web coding