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Auditing BITS 2.0 Settings

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SMSUtils has a great tool to audit and report on your BITS 2.0 settings for your SMS 2003 Advanced Clients.  You can download the tool from here: https://www.smsutils.com/CommunityDownloads/tabid/58/Default.aspx

Here is some background information that I wrote up about the tool a few months ago:

BITS (binary intelligent transfer service) is the technology that SMS uses to determine if a client is connected via a slow link to the SMS server. If BITS is not configured then the client assumes that it can consume all available bandwidth when downloading software packages or running SMS inventory. There Active Directory Group Policy settings that can be set to configure BITS throttling. This scan tool will verify those settings.

In order to manage BITS throttling settings, BITS 2 must be installed. BITS 2 is included with Windows XP SP2. For Windows XP Sp1 systems, Microsoft patch KB842773 must be installed.

With BITS 2, it is possible to manage BITS through five registry entries. These entries are:

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\BITS]

"EnableBITSMaxBandwidth"

"MaxTransferRateOnSchedule”

"MaxBandwidthValidFrom"

"MaxBandwidthValidTo"

"MaxTransferRateOffSchedule"

 

Here is a breakdown of these registry entries:

  • EnableBITSMaxBandwidth – Values 0 or 1. Turns on BITS throttling
  • MaxTransferRateOnSchedule – Configures the Maximum amount of bandwidth that BITS can use during working hours. This is configured in Kb/s
  • MaxBandwidthValidFrom – The time when you want the maximum amount of BITS throttling to start. The time should be entered in 24 hour format
  • MaxBandwidthValidTo – The time when you want the maximum amount of BITS throttling to end. The time should be entered in 24 hour format
  • MaxTransferRateOffSchedule – The maximum amount of bandwidth that BITS should use during non working hours. This is configured in Kb/s

 

These registry settings can also be managed through Group Policy. In order to manage BITS through Group Policy, the Windows XP SP2 group policy templates need to be installed.

 

The Group Policy settings for BITS are located at: Computer Configuration, Administrative Templates, Network, Background Intelligent Transfer Service.

 

There are two settings that can be applied:

  • Maximum network bandwidth that BITS uses
  • Timeout (days) for inactive jobs

The BITS audit tool checks for several settings. It will check the Service Pack Level of your Windows XP Systems. If the system is running Windows XP SP1, it will check to see if KB842773 is installed. The BITS audit tool will also gather all of the information inside of the BITS registry keys.

 

There are three reports available to you:

  1. BITS Settings by Collection - Click on the Values button and choose the Collection that contains your remote site. Click on Display to displey the report
  2. Computers that do not have BITS throttling enabled - This is a report showing all machines within your Collection that do not have BITS throttling turned on, that is they are using all available bandwidth. Please note that only remote sites currently have BITS throttling enabled.
  3. Computers that do not have the BITS patch Installed - This report shows machines with Service Pack 1 that do not have the BITS patch installed.

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  • Anonymous
    January 01, 2003
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