Tag Archives: free tools

Blue Screen Your SQL Server On-Demand

Posted on March 9, 2017 by johnsterrett | Leave a comment

These days I do a lot of testing with SQL Server. When I am testing new features or helping clients implement SQL Server High Availability solutions I want to have several tests including blue screens.

Simulating blue screens actually might be much easier than you think. For example, you can use Not My Fault from the system utilities to create blue screens whenever your heart desires.

Do you really want to push that Crash button?

Just remember, if you use Not My Fault and click on the Crash button, It Aint My Fault .

Instantly after clicking on the crash button you should see the following blue screen.

SQL Server Blue Screen on Demand

SQL Server Performance Tuning with Free Tools!

Posted on January 14, 2013 by johnsterrett | 4 comments

The following is a recording of my Performance Tuning for Pirates session recorded by UserGroup.TV at SQL Saturday 125 in Oklahoma City. I recommend that you check out UserGroup.TV as they provide some great content for free. It was an honor to be selected for this recording. I hope you enjoy the video. If you have any questions and need some help feel free to contact me.

If the video doesn’t render correctly above try watching the video here (UserGroup.TV) or here (SQL PASS Performance Virtual Chapter).

Links to all tools and scripts plus reference material can be found at my SQL Server Performance Tuning with Free Tools page.

4 Comments

Posted in SQLServerPedia Syndication

Tagged free tools, performance tuning, sqlpass, SQLSaturday, video

Stress Testing Stored Procedures with Free Tools

Posted on July 12, 2012 by johnsterrett | 2 comments

I currently have a presentation named Performance Tuning for Pirates. This presentation goes over using several free tools to help you with your performance tuning process. Today, I am happy to share my first video going over these tools.

Using SQLQueryStress to stress test Stored Procedures

SQLQueryStress by Adam Machanic (blog | twitter) is one of my favorite tools for doing a quick stress test against a user object like a stored procedure. This tool can actually be used to do stress testing on T-SQL queries but I usually use it for compiled objects like stored procedures. I love this tool because it allows you to save and load configurations to quickly redo tests. It also allows you to use a dataset for input parameters and allows you to add additional stress with configuring iterations and threads.

Note: It also comes in handy when you need to mock up some stress for demos.