You can specify additional settings for viewing performance information within the properties of Performance Monitor. You can access these options by clicking the Properties button in the Taskbar or by right- clicking the Performance Monitor display and selecting Properties. You can change these additional settings by using the following tabs:
General Tab On the General tab (shown in Figure 16.5), you can specify several options that relate to Performance Monitor views:
FIGURE 16.5 General tab of the Performance Monitor Properties dialog box
■ You can enable or disable legends (which display information about the various counters), the value bar, and the toolbar.
■ For the Report and Histogram views, you can choose which type of information is displayed. The options are Default, Current, Minimum, Maximum, and Average. What you see with each of these options depends on the type of data being collected. These options are not available for the Graph view because the Graph view displays an average value over a period of time (the sample interval).
■ You can also choose the graph elements. By default, the display will be set to update every second. If you want to update less often, you should increase the number of seconds between updates.
Source Tab On the Source tab (shown in Figure 16.6), you can specify the source for the performance information you want to view. Options include current activity (the default setting) or data from a log file. If you choose to analyze information from a log file, you can also specify the time range for which you want to view statistics. We’ll cover these selections in the next section.
FIGURE 16.6 Source tab of the Performance Monitor Properties dialog box
Data Tab The Data tab (shown in Figure 16.7) lists the counters that have been added to the Performance Monitor display. These counters apply to the Chart, Histogram, and Report views. Using this interface, you can also add or remove any of the counters and change the properties, such as the width, style, and color of the line and the scale used for display.
FIGURE 16.7 The Data tab of the Performance Monitor Properties dialog box
Graph Tab On the Graph tab (shown in Figure 16.8), you can specify certain options that will allow you to customize the display of Performance Monitor views. First you can specify what type of view you want to see (Line, Histogram, or Report). Then you can add a title for the graph, specify a label for the vertical axis, choose to display grids, and specify the vertical scale range.
FIGURE 16.8 The Graph tab of the Performance Monitor Properties dialog box
Appearance Tab Using the Appearance tab (see Figure 16.9), you can specify the colors for the areas of the display, such as the background and foreground. You can also specify the fonts that are used to display counter values in Performance Monitor views. You can change settings to find a suitable balance between readability and the amount of information shown on one screen. Finally, you can set up the properties for a border.
FIGURE 16.9 The Appearance tab of the Performance Monitor Properties dialog box
Now that you have an idea of the types of information Performance Monitor tracks and how this data is displayed, let’s take a look at another feature— saving and analyzing performance data.