Norton Utilities 2.0 for Windows NT

Norton Utilities boosts Windows NT performance

Since the early days of MS-DOS, Symantec's Norton Utilities has remained a favorite of PC users and systems administrators. The good news is that Norton Utilities is now available for Windows NT 4.0. The better news is that today's Norton Utilities replaces its old command-line utilities and single-function programs with more advanced features--features only dreamed of in its DOS ancestor. Bearing the Designed For Microsoft BackOffice logo, Symantec's Norton Utilities 2.0 for Windows NT is fully integrated into the Windows environment.

Installing Norton Utilities is effortless. You insert the CD-ROM, and(assuming you have the AutoPlay feature enabled) the installation programautomatically starts. You answer some simple questions, such as how you want thesoftware to install and whether you want components to start automatically whenyour system starts, and the copy process begins. Once the program completes thecopy process, you must reboot. The programs take only 20MB of disk space, so acomplete installation takes less than a minute when you select all the defaultoptions.

Norton Utilities for NT consists of six programs.

Ask the Doctor
Norton's core programs are Norton System Doctor and Norton Disk Doctor.These programs help you manage your system's performance.

Norton System Doctor employs sensors to monitor your system. For instance,they monitor the hard disk for viruses, fragmentation, and other problems.System Doctor categorizes sensors

into six classifications: memory, disks, system, Internet/network,performance, and information.

On startup, System Doctor opens a window displaying interactive charts andindicators. You select which indicators to view interactively by clickingSensors on the Menu bar. Each sensor classification has four or moresubclassifications. Selecting a subclassification opens an additional chart tomonitor. Paging file is a subclassification of memory, for example, andit monitors your paging file usage.

System Doctor alleviates problems by taking basic corrective action when itdetects a problem (as shown in Screen 1). For example, when it detectsthat a disk is too fragmented, the software automatically runs Norton SpeedDisk.

If your CPU utilization exceeds a preset limit, System Doctor displays analarm on the console and displays information about corrective actions that youcan manually implement to alleviate the problem. While working, you can minimizethe System Doctor window and continue to monitor your system's performance inthe background.

The Disk Specialist
Just as System Doctor diagnoses CPU problems, Disk Doctor diagnoses andrepairs common hard disk problems. Running Disk Doctor checks the partitiontable, file structure indexes, and security descriptors of all your hard disk'sfiles. When Disk Doctor encounters a problem, the software automatically repairsit (if possible) and alerts you that corrective measures were necessary.

The software will also optionally perform a comprehensive surface test ofyour hard disk to ensure that bad sectors aren't waiting to crash your system.Running Disk Doctor on a regular basis helps correct minor problems before theybecome major issues.

Speed Disk Paramedic
A system's performance problems stem from one of three sources--networkdegradation, CPU-intensive applications, and I/O bottlenecks. Norton Utilitiesmakes your disk subsystems more efficient by monitoring these three areas, butit automatically performs corrective actions only on the I/O bottlenecks.

Norton Speed Disk defragments the file system. (See Screen 2 foran example of defragmenting.) It takes noncontiguous files and rearranges theminto one large, contiguous file. Because defragmentation reduces the movement ofyour read/write heads, the disk's performance improves.

Norton Speed Disk performs several other simultaneous functions. Whiledefragmenting, you can compress your files with NTFS's built-in compression,which lets your hard disk store more data. Compression results in only a smalldecrease in performance when the system has to read and decompress the data toprovide it to a user program.

You can consolidate free space, or unused space, on your hard disk into onelarge contiguous chunk. On an NT system, the NTFS file system leaves a smallamount of space after each file to allow for growth. This NTFS feature resultsin megabytes of fragmented disk free space, which can severely reduce yoursystem's performance--especially if you have a full hard disk.

Getting the Info
Norton System Information is an excellent reporting tool that details thehardware and software installed on your computer. Launching System Informationopens a window with eight tabs: System, Display, Memory, Printer, Drive, Input,Multimedia, and Network. Clicking any of the tabs provides you withcomprehensive information about hardware and, in some cases, software. You canfile the reports for future reference, or mail them to tech-support personnelwho need detailed configuration information.

UnBelievable UnErase
How often do users call you asking for help with accidentally deleted files?Restoring files is time consuming, not to mention problematic. Users often wantto retrieve files with recent changes. Norton Utilities' deleted file protectionfeature helps with this frustrating issue.

Norton's file protection replaces the NT 4.0 Recycle Bin. The feature alsoaugments Windows' usual file protection by monitoring all disk activity andtaking proactive steps to prevent data loss. For instance, the Windows RecycleBin does not protect against overwritten files, nor does it protect files youdelete in DOS. Norton Utilities provides protection in both cases.

When you install the software, Norton replaces the Recycle Bin program withits UnErase wizard. To recover a deleted or overwritten file, click the RecycleBin. The UnErase wizard prompts you for information (i.e., a filename, which caninclude wildcards), processes your information, and displays a restorable fileslist. You merely select the files you want to restore, and click Restore.

A drawback of Norton Utilities NT is that it excludes undelete capabilitiesfor client systems that share files. You cannot let users undelete if youinstall Norton Utilities on an NT server, nor if users store files in their homedirectory on the server. System administrators must perform the undelete. Itwould be nice if Norton provided a client program to interact with theappropriate Norton directories and undelete files.

Using the Unerase wizard takes fine-tuning to get it working properly. Ifyou simply set up Norton Utilities with its default settings on a typicalBackOffice server and tell the software to monitor all your drives, you collecthundreds of unwanted deleted files.

These files include temporary files created by BackOffice components suchas Exchange Server, work files created by Systems Management Server (SMS), anduser files created when you establish user profiles. In other words, if youdon't properly configure the Unprotect feature, the software protects a lot ofuseless temporary files.

To configure the software, click the Recycle Bin and then click Properties.A dialog box appears, showing the disk drives on which you enabled NortonProtection. Tabs designate the number of drives. On a drive-by-drive basis, youcan control the deleted files' retention period. If you have a system drive anda user drive, for example, you can set the system drive's retention to two days,but set the user drive's to five days.

Also on a drive-by-drive basis, you can tell the software the maximumamount of disk space to allocate toward recovering deleted files. On a busy fileserver, you might allocate 10 percent to 20 percent of the disk to thisfunction. However, if you're short on space, you might allocate only 5 percentand reduce the deleted file retention period to two days.

When you make changes to Norton Protection, do not panic when you see themessage "Initializing drive X:". The first time I saw this message, myheart almost stopped. Even though I knew (or hoped I knew) that Norton wouldn'tbe performing a format on the drive, I couldn't understand why Symantec pickedthat particular phrase. Perhaps the phrase "Initializing Protection onDrive X:" is more appropriate?

Interactive Updates
Live Update is new technology that lets you automatically update Symantec'sproducts. It tracks the software and warns you when certain components expire.For example, virus definition files expire every 35 days. When the componentsare about to expire, the software automatically connects to the Web, or to theLive Update servers, and installs the updates. (Although Norton Utilities isn'ta virus protection program, it includes a basic virus scan sensor.)

To use Live Update, you must have either a direct Internet connection or amodem and a phone line to directly contact the Symantec update site. When youuse the Internet, the software establishes a connection to a remote FTP site.When you use a phone line, the software automatically dials out on your modem toone of several centralized global update facilities.

Unfortunately, the technology that Live Update uses to make a connectionperforms erratically. While I was testing the feature, for example, my NT serverhad a modem available only for dial out. Luckily, I opted to preview the presettelephone number. It was a telephone number in the Netherlands, even though Ilive in the United States. At 2 p.m. on a weekday, the update's cost would haveexceeded the cost of the original software!

Inexpensive Protection
Symantec produces a winner with Norton Utilities for Windows NT 4.0. Thetime saved simply by using file protection quickly pays for the software. Foradditional information, and a free trial of the Speed Disk component of NortonUtilities, visit Symantec's Web site.