Home Forums Discussions Problems Beta versio slow

There are just times that I sit and stare at the screen.

Every time it happens it wastes time and that adds up during the day.

We are increasing the ram on the server this weekend, changing to and N+ router and a new card for my lap top.

Hopefully that will help.

Is it the software or the hardware??

Anybody else slowed down?

Hasn't been an issue (v5.0.24, all hard wired) but..

Which version are you using?
What's your current ram? are you peer or domain?
Is internet also slow suggesting more of a hardware problem?
Is it on all computers or just 1, do wired computers move quicker?

5.0.26
2 megs on Server ( will upgrade to 4 megs Saturday (Xp2003)
The internet is not slow (Comcast 8 meg)

I use a wireless Dell Latitude to move from room to room.

Your approach to the problems is valid, memory and N seem like valid updates.

Let us know how this goes.

After updating to beta V5.0.24, I too noted slow (30 sec) screen changes, usually in the afternoon - which would resolve by rebooting AC. I am planning to get a faster computer also.

Dr.Lindsay,

by rebooting, do you mean starting AC or rebooting the computer?

Thanks

By the Jack Cassel, MD was on Fox News this morning. He is a local doctor.He put the sign up about Obamacare.

Any thoughts from the general AC crowd?

He got somebody's attention. That's more than I can say for the rest of us.

We have been looking into the sporadic reports of slow down in V5. This clearly impacts some folks significantly, while most practices are not affected. We believe that this issue may be directly related to the number of messages in Amazing Charts. For example, some of the worst affected practices have literally thousands of messages in their Amazing Charts message inbox.

Amazing Charts was not designed for this, and with the new Order messages in V5, the program regularly checks messages. If each message takes some fraction of a second to be read into memory, reading in thousands of messages more frequently may explain the delay. In addition, this might also help explain the SQL Server detaching issue some folks have reported, as we believe that the long delay to read the messages into memory may cause a time-out in SQL Server.

We are currently working to add a filter to the message mailbox so that a user who choses to have thousands of messages (not recommended) can pull just those from the last day/week/month/quarter/year, etc.

In our testing, this seems to dramatically help speed up the time from startup to login and screen refreshes. We hope to have a beta version with this new feature within a week, if not sooner.

In the meantime, ensuring you delete messages that are not needed is highly recommended, as is saving messages to the patient's chart if they are patient-related. Saving a message to a patient chart (1) makes it part of their medical record (fyi - the message is not part of a patients medical record if it hasn't been saved to their chart), and (2) removes the message from the message inbox and will thus no longer add to the delay in reading the messages.

Jon

I just log out of AC, and back in. This usually helps for a few hours. I don't have more than 20 messages (see Jon's post below)

I have too seen significant slowdowns in version 5.026 compared to Version 4. It seems to get worse as the day goes on and gets better if I reboot the main computer.

I am using a Windows XP peer to peer network, all hard wired ethernet 100MB/s.

Of note the internet / internet explorer does not slow down so it appears it is something related to the new program.

My hardware is admittedly old, but it ran version 4 just fine and I have been waiting to upgrade
1) in case the stimulus package required actual receipts on hardware purchases within a certain timeframe (now we know it doesn't matter how you spend the $, just than you have an acceptable EMR with meaningful use).
and
2) Until Windows 7 was available and stable (I skipped Vista)

I have tested the time to connect to databases from main computer (1-2 seconds) and from other computers on the network and it is 1-2 seconds too.

My main computer is a Pentium 2Ghz single core, 1 GB RAM, Windows XP professional Service pack 3. I plan on moving the database to a Dual Core 1.8 GHZ 3 GB RAM machine this weekend and see if that helps, however I wonder whether there is some bug in Version 5 as like I said it starts out fast and then is slow after a few hours.


Oh, and I only have about 30 messages in my inbox.

I finally found out why one of my exam room computers was so slow with Amazing Charts. I was using it as one of the locations for the Amazing Charts backup with Amazing Automator and it was very low on hard disk space since old versions of the backup are not automatically deleted. I know this issue has been brought up in another post as a potential problem.

Ken - as a tangential follow-up, that machine that ran low on disk space probably needs to de-fragmented. That will help performance on that machine, especially if it uses the virtual memory (as a replacement for physical memory).

Thanks Indy,
Great idea. I also deleted the Amazing Charts Version 1.2.6 installation file from 2003. I didn't know I was such a packrat!
...Ken

Ken,

This is why I highly recommend putting any and all backups on external drives. First, you can get a 1TB drive for the cost of a Dunkin' Donuts coffee and donut. OK, a little more.

Second, worse case scenario, you get an error message telling you there are two many backups. If you were only backing up the Nameofpractice.enc file (AARRGGHH!!), this would take about Just under 11 years, given your backup file were 250Mbs. All bets are off if you are backing up imported items. But, even if you weren't, they would have to go there.

I never think it is a good idea to store any patient data, whether live accessible data or backups on peer client computers. If possible, you want all your data (AC databases) and backups in locations you can monitor and have permissions on. Even an employee that can barely play Solitaire on the PC (check that, that seems to be a requirement), can copy and paste a .enc file to one of their thumb drives in case you one day terminate them.

I have one of these around someplace, but I am sure Indy can write you a batch file that will tell AC Backup to only allow five backups and delete the oldest one. This should be programmed into the program itself.

Short of that, make a 2GB partition on your drive that is specifically for these backups. Then, when it fills up, you won't lose speed on that computer. Now, I have to admit, I have not practiced what would happen if you backup to a full drive. Would you receive an error message or not. I do know that the message you receive in your inbox is a fairly thorough message. I can't see its telling you it was a good backup when it never happened.

HTH

Bert,
Thanks for the advice. There were really old backups that did not completely fill the drive, but routine use of the computer over the last 6 months did. I know you are wondering how backups could fill a hard disk, but this computer only has a 20 GB hard drive! The computer's only purpose in life is to run amazing charts in an exam room and it has done really well. I shouldn't have chosen it to receive backups. Note, this is not the only computer receivng backups. I do offsite backups on USB drives, plus encrypted over the internet backups (was using Mozy, now using Jungle Disk).

About that nameofpractice.enc file; I thought it was encrypted? Is it encrypted or just password protected? If encrypted how would a rogue terminated employee access the data?
...Ken

Anyone with sufficient computer smarts and familiarity with AC could download the installer from the AC website onto another computer. Then they could setup a dummy practice, and use the Restore program with the ".enc" backup file to reconstruct your entire practice on that computer, including eRx, assuming that person had a login and password.

Oh, I assumed, perhaps incorrectly, that one would have to have an admin login and password in order to restore from backup. Will any Amazing Charts low level login work? I haven't tried this.
...Ken

You need an Admin password to use Backup Restore. However, if the evil-doer sets up a dummy practice, they can enter the dummy practice's Admin code to overwrite the dummy database with your .enc file. Then they can sign in with their own password. If they are provider level or know the Admin password of your practice, they have full access.

That's why Bert recommends password protecting the main computer or server, and not saving backups on a client computer.

John is completely right. This is where client/server is an advantage over peer-to-peer. While you could sort of set things up similarly on a "main pc" as far as permissions, it brings up issues you would have with server/client.

When you think of a folder and how you share it, think of this way. The first thing you do is to set up shares. What clients and users have access to the folder over the NETWORK. Then with the advent of NTFS, security made a huge leap. Think of NTFS permssions as those that control the folder as if you were on that computer. In order to properly secure resources, you need to have at least a minimal understanding of shares and permissions. They are not the same.

EVERYTIME you set up data on your server whether it is the Amazing Charts folder or your Billing software or even your pictures from the beach. Once you set up the data, sit down and say who do you want to access this and how much do you want them to access. Do they get read only, read/write, editing, deletion. The ultimate test for you, the admin, is to make sure you can go to any client and browse to the folder, create a text file, write on the text file, save the text file, then delete the text file. But, you don't want users to be able to do that.

So, say you make a folder on the server that contains the AC backups, forgetting the auto backups (which makes my head spin), you must make sure that the program can access it and you must make sure you can access it. Your staff should never be able to access it either from their computer or from the server computer as they should never be able to get on the server.

This is what makes YOU the SYSTEM ADMINISTRATOR. And, you are, you just don't know it. You just want to become a better systems admin.

Another nice thing about a server/client setup is you know WHO logged into that server exactly when. I am anal about passwords for clients. They know to log off and let another person log in even if they are going to the bathroom. They only access Medware, FAP or AC from their account. And, their passwords are made by me, because I can't accept a password created from their dog and their birthday. Letting someone use their password is not punishable by termination (too harsh) or a slap on the wrist (too easy), but by losing their Internet access over lunch. Facebook has become the number one form of discipline for employees. But, all they have to do is walk over and use Employee B's facebook. And, now they have lost facebook for three lunches AND, the person's computer they used has lost it for three.

Whether they are on the Internet or not is a different discussion. I used to allow it all day, but I think lunch hour is a decent compromise. And, they can get their banking done, etc. Because God knows I pay them so much!

In 1997, I bought a Dell with 2GBs. I sold it on eBay. Ken, did you buy it?

Nope I bought an old Radio Shack TRS-80. I use it to store yourpracticename.enc backup files, however the cassette tape storage is a little slow :-)

Thanks for the advice.
I will put it to good use.

...Ken

It must have been late when I posted that. I never knew I was so witty.