eG Monitoring
 

Measures reported by AzrVmTest

This test auto-discovers the virtual machines used by the target Microsoft Azure subscription, and for each VM, it reveals in-depth metrics such as status, memory utilization, CPU utilization, disk I/O measures, etc. In the process, the test points administrators to resource-hungry VMs.

Outputs of the test : One set of results for each VM in every resource group of the target Azure subscription

The measures made by this test are as follows:

Measurement Description Measurement Unit Interpretation
Vm_status Indicates the current state of this virtual machine.   The values reported by this measure and its numeric equivalents are mentioned in the table below:

Measure Value Numeric Value
Provisioning succeeded 1
Running 2
Updating 3
Deallocating 4
Starting 5
Stopped 6
Deallocated 7


Note:

By default, this measure reports the Measure Values listed in the table above to indicate the current state of this virtual machine. In the graph of this measure however, the same is represented using the numeric equivalents only.

Use the detailed diagnosis of this measure to know the IP, location, type, OS, and size of the VM.
Prvsng_status Indicates provisioning status of this virtual machine. Number The values reported by this measure and its numeric equivalents are mentioned in the table below:

Measure Value Numeric Value
Succeeded 1
Updating 2


Note:

By default, this measure reports the Measure Values listed in the table above to indicate the current state of this virtual machine. In the graph of this measure however, the same is represented using the numeric equivalents only.
Cpu_cores Indicates the total number of cores in this virtual machine. Number  
Memory Indicates the amount of memory that is configured for this VM. GB  
Max_dsk_sz Indicates the maximum size of the disk allocated to this VM. GB  
Temp_dsk_sz Indicates the size of the ‘temporary disk’ allocated to this VM. GB  
Max_data_dsk Indicates the maximum number of the ‘Data disks’ attached to this VM. Number  
Max_iops Indicates the maximum number of I/O operations that are allowed for this VM. Number  
Cpu_prcntg Indicates the percentage of CPU utilized by this VM. Percent A value close to 100% is a cause for concern, as it implies a severe contention for CPU resources on the VM. You may want to look deeper into the VM to figure out if any application is hogging its CPU resources.
Ntwrk_in Indicates the amount of data received by this VM through all network interfaces. MB In the event that there is a network congestion, compare the values of these measures across VMs to know which VM is probably causing it.
Ntwrk_out Indicates the amount of data sent out through all the network interfaces by this VM. MB
Dsk_rd_byts Indicates the amount of data read from the disk of this VM during the last measurement period. MB  
Dsk_wrt_byts Indicates the amount of data written to the disk of this VM during the last measurement period. MB  
Dsk_rd_opr Indicates the rate at which data was read from the disk of this VM during the last measurement period. Operations/second  
Dsk_wrt_opr Indicates the rate at which data was written from the disk of this VM during the last measurement period. Operations/second  
Total_iops Indicates the total number of I/O Operations per second on this VM. Number  
Prcr_intrpt_tym Indicates the percentage of time that the processor of this VM spent receiving and servicing hardware interrupts during the last measurement period. Percent The value of this measure is an indirect indicator of the activity of devices that generate interrupts, such as the system clock, the mouse, disk drivers, data communication lines, network interface cards, and other peripheral devices. These devices normally interrupt the processor when they have completed a task or require attention. Normal thread execution is suspended during interrupts. Most system clocks interrupt the processor every 10 milliseconds, creating a background of interrupt activity.
Prcr_prcsr_tym Indicates the percentage of time that the processor of this VM is executing application or operating system processes other than Idle threads. Percent The value of this measure is a primary indicator of processor activity. It is calculated by measuring the time that the processor spends executing the thread of the Idle process in each sample interval, and subtracting that value from 100%. Each processor has an Idle thread which consumes cycles when no other threads are ready to run.

This measure will be reported only if the following conditions are fulfilled:

  1. Install the Azure Diagnostics Agent on each VM you want monitored. To achieve this, Click here

  2. Set the DIAGNOSTIC MEASURES flag of this test to On.
Prcr_usr_tym Indicates the percentage of non-idle processor time that is spent in user mode by the processor of this VM. Percent User mode is a restricted processing mode designed for applications, environment subsystems, and integral subsystems. The alternative, privileged mode, is designed for operating system components and allows direct access to hardware and all memory. The operating system switches application threads to privileged mode to obtain operating system services.

This measure will be reported only if the following conditions are fulfilled:

  1. Install the Azure Diagnostics Agent on each VM you want monitored. To achieve this, Click here

  2. Set the DIAGNOSTIC MEASURES flag of this test to On.
Prcr_prvlgd_tym Indicates the percentage of non-idle processor time spent in privileged mode by the processor of this VM. Percent Privileged mode is a processing mode designed for operating system components and hardwaremanipulating drivers. It allows direct access to hardware and all memory. The alternative, user mode, is a restricted processing mode designed for applications, environment subsystems, and integral subsystems. The operating system switches application threads to privileged mode to obtain operating system services. % Privileged Time includes time spent servicing interrupts and DPCs. A high rate of privileged time might be attributable to a large number of interrupts generated by a failing device.
Prcrinfo_prcsr_frqncy Indicates the frequency at which the processor of this VM operates. Number This measure will be reported only if the following conditions are fulfilled:

  1. Install the Azure Diagnostics Agent on each VM you want monitored. To achieve this, Click here

  2. Set the DIAGNOSTIC MEASURES flag of this test to On.
Prcrinfo_prkng_status Indicates the number of CPU cores that were parked for the processor of this VM. Number  
Prcs_pg_flts Indicates the rate at which page faults by the threads executing in this process of this VM are occurring. Faults/second A page fault occurs when a thread refers to a virtual memory page that is not in its working set in main memory. This does not cause the page to be fetched from disk if it is on the standby list and hence already in main memory, or if it is in use by another process with whom the page is shared.
Prcs_hndl_cnt Indicates the number of handles that are currently utilized by the processes on this VM. Number A high value of this measure could indicate a memory leak on the VM.

This measure will be reported only if the following conditions are fulfilled:

  1. Install the Azure Diagnostics Agent on each VM you want monitored. To achieve this, Click here

  2. Set the DIAGNOSTIC MEASURES flag of this test to On.
Prcs_pvt_byts Indicates the amount of data bytes that the processes of the processor associated with this VM has allocated that cannot be shared with other processes. MB  
Prcs_wrkngst Indicates the current number of bytes in the working set of the processes of the processor of this VM. Number The working set is the set of memory pages touched recently by the threads in the process. If free memory in the VM is above a certain threshold, pages are left in the working set of a process even if they are not in use. When free memory falls below a certain threshold, pages are trimmed from working sets. If they are needed, they are then softfaulted back into the working set before they leave main memory.

This measure will be reported only if the following conditions are fulfilled:

  1. Install the Azure Diagnostics Agent on each VM you want monitored. To achieve this, Click here

  2. Set the DIAGNOSTIC MEASURES flag of this test to On.
Prcs_wrkngst_pvt Indicates the number of bytes in the working set that are not shared and cannot be shared by other processes of the processor of this VM. Number This measure will be reported only if the following conditions are fulfilled:

  1. Install the Azure Diagnostics Agent on each VM you want monitored. To achieve this, Click here

  2. Set the DIAGNOSTIC MEASURES flag of this test to On.
Sys_prcsr Indicates the number of system processes in this VM at the time of data collection. Number This measure will be reported only if the following conditions are fulfilled:

  1. Install the Azure Diagnostics Agent on each VM you want monitored. To achieve this, Click here

  2. Set the DIAGNOSTIC MEASURES flag of this test to On.
Sys_thrd Indicates the number of system threads in this VM at the time of data collection. Number  
Thrd_cntxt_swtch Indicates the rate at which context switches occurred on this VM. Switches/second A context switch occurs when the kernel switches the processor from one thread to another. A context switch might also occur when a thread with a higher priority than the running thread becomes ready or when a running thread must wait for some reason (such as an I/O operation). The Thread\Context Switches/sec counter value increases when the thread gets or loses the time of the processor.

This measure will be reported only if the following conditions are fulfilled:

  1. Install the Azure Diagnostics Agent on each VM you want monitored. To achieve this, Click here

  2. Set the DIAGNOSTIC MEASURES flag of this test to On.
Mem_avlbl_byts Indicates the amount of physical memory, in bytes, that is immediately available for allocation to a process or for use by this VM. MB A low value for this measure implies excessive memory usage by a VM.

This measure will be reported only if the following conditions are fulfilled:

  1. Install the Azure Diagnostics Agent on each VM you want monitored. To achieve this, Click here

  2. Set the DIAGNOSTIC MEASURES flag of this test to On.
Mem_cmtd_byts_in_use Indicates the amount of physical memory that is in use for which space has been reserved in the paging file so that it can be written to disk allocated to this VM. MB This measure will be reported only if the following conditions are fulfilled:

  1. Install the Azure Diagnostics Agent on each VM you want monitored. To achieve this, Click here

  2. Set the DIAGNOSTIC MEASURES flag of this test to On.
Mem_cache_flts Indicates the rate at which faults occur when a page sought in the file system cache is not found and must be retrieved from elsewhere in memory (a soft fault) or from disk (a hard fault) of this VM. Faults/second Ideally, the value of this measure should be 0 or very low.
Mem_pg_rd Indicates the rate at which the disk of this VM was read to resolve hard page faults. Pages/second Hard page faults occur when a process references a page in virtual memory that is not in its working set or elsewhere in physical memory, and must be retrieved from disk. This measure is a primary indicator of the kinds of faults that cause systemwide delays. It includes read operations to satisfy faults in the file system cache (usually requested by applications) and in noncached mapped memory files. Compare the value of Page Reads/sec to the value of Pages Input/sec to find an average of how many pages were read during each read operation.
Mem_pgs Indicates the rate at which pages are read from or written to disk of this VM to resolve hard page faults. Pages/second This measure will be reported only if the following conditions are fulfilled:

  1. Install the Azure Diagnostics Agent on each VM you want monitored. To achieve this, Click here

  2. Set the DIAGNOSTIC MEASURES flag of this test to On.
Mem_pl_pgd_byts Indicates the size of the paged pool which is an area of system memory (physical memory) for objects that can be written to disk of this VM when they are not being used. MB This measure will be reported only if the following conditions are fulfilled:

  1. Install the Azure Diagnostics Agent on each VM you want monitored. To achieve this, Click here

  2. Set the DIAGNOSTIC MEASURES flag of this test to On.
Mem_pl_non_pgd_byts Indicates the size of the nonpaged pool which is an area of system memory (physical memory) for objects that cannot be written to disk of this VM, but must remain in physical memory as long as they are allocated. MB This measure will be reported only if the following conditions are fulfilled:

  1. Install the Azure Diagnostics Agent on each VM you want monitored. To achieve this, Click here

  2. Set the DIAGNOSTIC MEASURES flag of this test to On.
Mem_cmtd_byts Indicates the amount of committed virtual memory allocated to this VM. MB This measure will be reported only if the following conditions are fulfilled:

  1. Install the Azure Diagnostics Agent on each VM you want monitored. To achieve this, Click here

  2. Set the DIAGNOSTIC MEASURES flag of this test to On.
Mem_pg_flts Indicates the average number of pages faulted per second. Faults/second This measure will be reported only if the following conditions are fulfilled:

  1. Install the Azure Diagnostics Agent on each VM you want monitored. To achieve this, Click here

  2. Set the DIAGNOSTIC MEASURES flag of this test to On.
Mem_trnstn_flts Indicates the rate at which page faults are resolved by recovering pages that were being used by another process sharing the page, or were on the modified page list or the standby list, or were being written to disk of this VM at the time of the page fault. Faults/second  
Phy_dsk_rd_byts Indicates the amount of data read from the disk of this VM. MB This measure will be reported only if the following conditions are fulfilled:

  1. Install the Azure Diagnostics Agent on each VM you want monitored. To achieve this, Click here

  2. Set the DIAGNOSTIC MEASURES flag of this test to On.
Phy_dsk_wrt_byts Indicates the amount of data written to the disk of this VM. MB
Tcpv4_con_filr Indicates the number of times the TCP connection to this VM failed. Number This measure is calculated based on the number of times TCP connections have made a direct transition to the CLOSED state from the SYN-SENT state or the SYNRCVD state along with the number of times TCP connections have made a direct transition to the LISTEN state from the SYN-RCVD state.
Tcpv4_sgmnt_snt Indicates the rate at which TCP Segments were sent from this VM. Segments/second The value of this measure includes those segemtns sent from current connections, but excludes those containing only retransmitted bytes.
Tcpv4_sgmnt_retrnx Indicates the rate at which segments containing one or more previously transmitted bytes were retransmitted by this VM. Segments/second  
Tcpv4_con_rst Indicates the number of times that TCP connections from this VM have made a direct transition to the CLOSED state from either the ESTABLISHED or CLOSE-WAIT state. Number  
Tcpv4_seg_rcvd Indicates the rate at which segments were received by this VM, including those received in error. Segments/second The value of this measure includes segments received on currently established connections.
Tcpv4_con_est Indicates the number of TCP connections established on this VM. Number  
Prcr_idle_time Indicates the percentage of time for which the CPU of this VM has been idle. Percent If the CPU utilization measure of a VM reports a value close to 100%, then you may want to compare the value of the Interrupt time, Processor time, User time, and these two measures to understand where CPU was spent - in servicing interrupts? in executing application/OS processes? in user mode? idle? or waiting for input?
Prcr_wait_time Indicates the percentage of time the processor of this VM was waiting for I/O. Percent
Mem_pg_writes Indicates the rate at which this VM writes pages to disk. Pages/Second  
Packt_sent_error Indicates the number of error packets sent by this VM. Number Ideally, the value of these measures should be 0.
Packt_rcvd_error Indicates the number of error packets received by this VM. Number
Cpu_credits_consum Indicates the number of CPU credits consumed by this VM. Number Some VMs may not need to the full performance of the CPU continuously, like web servers, proof of concepts, small databases and development build environments. These workloads typically have burstable performance requirements. To support such requirements, Azure provides you with the ability to purchase a VM size with baseline performance that can build up credits when it is using less than its baseline. Every time a VM uses up a portion of the accumulated CPU credits, it means that that VM is using CPU above its baseline. Ideally therefore, the value of the CPU credits consumed measure should be low, and the CPU credits remaining measure should be high.
Cpu_credits_remain Indicates the number of CPU credits still unused by this VM. Number
Bandwidth_cached Indicates the percentage calculated by the total disk throughput completed over the max cached throughput of this VM. Percent Virtual machines that are enabled for both premium storage and premium storage caching have two different storage bandwidth limits.

  • The max uncached disk throughput is the default storage maximum limit that the virtual machine can handle.

  • The max cached storage throughput limit is a separate limit when you enable host caching. Host caching works by bringing storage closer to the VM that can be written or read to quickly.



If the value of the VM uncached bandwidth consumed is at 100%, it means that the VM has fully utilized its default storage limit. No data can be stored in the VM's disk from this point forward. This can cause the VM to suffer serious and prolonged performance degradations.

If the value of the VM cached bandwidth consumed is at 100%, it means that the VM has fully utilized the storage set aside for host caching. You may want to consider allocating more space for caching to improve throughput.
Bandwidth_uncached Indicates the percentage calculated by the total disk throughput completed over the max uncached throughput of this VM. Percent
Iops_cached Indicates the percentage calculated by the total IOPS completed over the max cached IOPS limit of this VM. Percent Azure virtual machines have input/output operations per second (IOPS) and throughput performance limits based on the virtual machine type and size.

If the value of the VM uncached IOPS consumed measure is 100%, it means the VM performance has been capped. This can happen when the VM is requesting for more IOPS or throughput than what is allotted for the virtual machines or attached disks. When capped, the VM experiences suboptimal performance. This can lead to negative consequences like increased latency. To avoid this, you may want to increase the IOPS limit of the VM.

Reads served by the cache are not included in the disk IOPS and Throughput, hence not subject to disk limits. Cache has its separate IOPS and Throughput limit per VM.

If the VM cached IOPS consumed measure reports the value 100% for a VM, then it means that the VM has exhausted the IOPS limit configured for the cache. This can adversely impact throughput and I/O processing by the VM's cache. To avoid this, you may want to increase the IOPS limit of the cache.
Iops_uncached Indicates the percentage calculated by the total IOPS completed over the max uncached IOPS limit of this VM. Percent
System_uptime Indicates the uptime of this VM. Second  
Used_memory Indicates the amount of memory used by this VM. MB  
Memory_utiliz Indicates the percentage of memory used by this VM. Percent A value close to 100% indicates excessive memory usage by the VM. A consistent rise in this value could hint at a potential memory shortage on the VM. You may want to allocate more memory to VM to avoid this.