Preference for batch sizes

[Stephe Campbell]

We are seeing a real slow down in mail delivery here since yesterday. We are
receiving about 50% more mail, but our system can't seem to keep up. Our
normal mail count is probably about 35K-50K a day. Spam percentage is about
85-90%.

I have noticed the last two days a high rate of mail in incoming beginning
around 10pm until midnight. When I look at my average load, it seems to be
dropping linearly from 3 down to .6 or something like that. (Can servers get
tired and need a rest?). Large incoming batches were always handled fairly
quickly before this period, and I'm not sure if we're just slow or are
receiving a lot of new mail, but based on complaints, mail is slow.

I have two questions:

Would smaller batches of mail be better? I have this set to 100 normally,
and am testing 50 at the moment. I am guessing that smaller batch sizes may
take less time to process and get them through faster as a batch, but
overall processing of total email may be the same or slightly slower.

I have Max Children set to 5. Top shows 8-9 MailScanners running. Is this a
problem or could it be multiple parents/children. This machine is pretty
much maxed out when this happens. Maybe lower the Max Children, or increase
the Queue Scan Interval from 5?

Any help and suggestions would be appreciated.

Thanks.


Steve Campbell
campbell at cnpapers.com
Charleston Newspapers