Server CPU

Question

I was wondering if it was normal in a school environment with about 30 computers for a server's CPU to spike at 100% and stay there untill restarted at which point the memmory usage than goes to 98%
xserver   Mac OS X (10.4)  

Answer 1

Whoa Barryc2, there are about 40 minutes between your posts... give people a chance to read and respond. Another good practice is to give as much detail about your situation as you can and the steps you have taken so far so people don't waste time suggesting things you've already done.
Some details that are necessary to begin to answer your question:
1) What Xserve model are you running?
2) What version of the of the OS are you running?
3) What services are you offering?
If you're trying to do 30 network home folders under 10.3 on a single processor Xserve with 256MB then I would expect 100% load. If you're running AFP for 30 users on a dual processor Xserve with 4GB under 10.4.8 then even 50% processor load would be unexpected.
Any runaway process can cause 100% processor use. ARD processes will occasionally do this and they can simply be killed off and the load can return to normal. Have you opened Activity Monitor and gotten the name of the process that is taking all the time? This is step 1. If it is so locked up you can't get through the UI try top over SSH to get the same information.
Once you find out exactly what process is actually taking the time the process the you can start to debug the problem. Some processes can simply be killed off and the problem will fix itself but others are more complicated. Checking the logs right before the processor maxed out can also be helpful - but this is easier if the problem is narrowed down a single process or service.
Hope this helps,
=Tod
G5/2.0x2, Dual XServes x2, XRAID, beige G3 501Mhz