Configuring Idle Time-out for Worker Processes

Applies To: Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2003 with SP1

To conserve system resources, configure the idle time-out interval of an application pool to shut down its worker process, or worker processes, after a specified period of idle time. This reduces memory consumption and CPU overhead. This also helps you manage the resources on a Web server when the processing load is heavy, when identified applications consistently fall into an idle state, or when new processing space is not available. To preserve performance, as the number of application pools that run simultaneously on a server increases, you should decrease the idle timeout setting.

By default, idle time-out is enabled, and the default time-out period is 20 minutes. To automatically shut down worker processes as they become idle, configure a scheduled shutdown of the idle worker process, or worker processes.

For information about how to configure idle time-out by using IIS Manager, see Configure Application Pool Performance. For information about how to configure idle time-out by using a command-line procedure or scripts, see the IdleTimeout Metabase Property.