When your SQL Server is slow right now, you can run sp_BlitzFirst® to find out what’s going on. It checks for things like long-running queries, backups, blocking, files growing, and will tell you the top wait stats right now.
You can use the @Seconds parameter to control the sample length – by default, it samples for 5 seconds.
In the newest version, you can use @Seconds = 0 to skip the sampling altogether, and turn on @ExpertMode = 1 to see all the dirty details:
The top result set is about urgent warnings, and you can skip those if you’re doing over-time analysis. The wait stats and physical reads/writes are useful, though – these show you the top files by reads and writes for your instance.
Also in the news, when you fill out our EULA to download it (along with all of our goodies), there’s a checkbox to get alerted whenever we update our First Responder Kit. If you check that, we now send you a direct link to the zip file so you don’t have to hassle with the EULA again.
Enjoy, and hope this helps make your life easier.
7 Comments. Leave new
Thanks Brent
Although filling out a EULA isn’t a heavy price to pay for such great help, you’re making it even better.
I was just a bit confused because the name of the zip still contains the date of the previous release: …-20150427…
Thank you very much for all the work. I’m using your scripts regularly and I learn from it every time.
Thanks. I noticed the same thing about the date in the filename and was coming here to see if anyone had left comments already. Apparently I am not the only one. Is this a new version?
Yep! The file name is unrelated to the contents. Enjoy!
I just downloaded the First Responder Kit, and I am getting syntax errors when I try to create the stored procs on a sql 2005 server. I was just wondering if 2005 is no longer supported and this is expected, or if I should dig into the errors.
Patrick – you’ll need to read the documentation. Some of them aren’t supported on SQL 2005, and some of them don’t support databases in SQL 2000 compat mode.
Free tools, and faster response then with Microsoft, thanks a lot.
I was trying to install the sp_askbrent procedure, and CheckID 20 was causing the errors, so I commented that out, and it worked. I didn’t see anything in the documentation about it not working with 2005, so i thought I would pass it along.
I had already solved the problem on the server, but at least it is there for next time.
Thanks again.
Thank you for this. The information generated is great. Great work