title: What to monitor on SQL Server
body: <p>I have been asked to monitor SQL Server (2005 &amp; 2008) and am wondering what are good metrics to look at? I can access WMI counters but am slightly lost as to how much depth is going to be useful. </p>
  
  <p>Currently I have on my list:</p>
  
  <ul>
  <li>user connections</li>
  <li>logins per second</li>
  <li>latch waits per second</li>
  <li>total latch wait time</li>
  <li>dead locks per second</li>
  <li>errors per second</li>
  <li>Log and data file sizes</li>
  </ul>
  
  <p>I am looking to be able to monitor values that will indicate a degradation of performance on the machine or a potential serious issue. To this end I am also wondering at what values some of these things would be considered normal vs problematic?</p>
  
  <p>As I reckon it would probably be a really good question to have answered for the general community I thought I'd court some of you DBA experts out there (I am certainly not one of them!)</p>
  
  <p>Apologies if a rather open ended question.
  Ry</p>