SSRS 2012 Stops Rendering Images in a report after random amount of time

Question

Hi All,

I have read one other forum post on this issue but was not able to make a determination for a solution. I have a report that contains a dataset with UNC paths to images. The images are all loaded from the same file server and render fine in the SSRS Web Portal. After X amount of time, the images will stop rendering in the reports until a restart of the SSRS Service is performed.

I have read that this could be related to a memory issue but, was not able to determine how to fully resolve this problem. Prior to going live with the report, the images were previously pulled from a VarBinary column from a database table however, we had to stop using that method due to the growth of the database. We now store the images on a separate file server and where both a full res and thumbnail version of the image is saved. When we load the report, we only load the thumbnail file to keep the report size as small as possible.

Can anyone offer any advice of the specific settings I should be looking at to resolve the issue. This just seems like an SSRS bug to me.

Thanks

Answer 1

Just some supplamental information.

When the image stops rendering, I do not see an error in the report or the Red X that has been reported by some users, I just see a blank picture box with the border showing but no image. I have tried closing and re-opening the browser with no difference. I also tried in Edge and Chrome and both display the same issue at the same time and both start working again after the SSRS Service restart.

I have checked the SSRS Log file and no errors are reported, just INFO messages.

The server is quite busy during business hours however, images stopped working several times throughout the working day, therefore, it is unlikely the server is releasing the SSRS site from memory due to lack of activity.

Currently the memory usage is sitting at approx 5GB with the images working in the SSRS report however, just an FYI, this is NOT the SQL serve that hosts any databases. It is only used currently for it's SSRS capabilities. The actual databases are hosted on a separate SQL 2005 Server. With that said, there doesn't appear to be any problems retrieving the database records because data relating to the records are shown, it's just the image that doesn't render.

I am happy to post the log file if it will help. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Answer 2

Hi @Phill ,
Assuming that your report server database is called ReportServer, use the following T-SQL statement to view ExecutionLog3, and use the report execution log to find out the report request frequency, the most commonly used output format, and the processing time (milliseconds) used in each processing stage.

Use ReportServer  
select * from ExecutionLog3 order by TimeStart DESC  

Execution log records contain information about report execution statistics, auditing, performance diagnosis, and optimization.

I think it is a series of problems caused by insufficient memory. If this is the case, I suggest you add additional memory to the SSRS server, and then update the SSRS server to the latest version.
Best Regards,
Joy

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Answer 3

I Looked at the memory usage on the Server and it is using 38GB out of 48GB of memory. The server also works as an RDP Server too with 100+ users on it.

SQL was using approx 5.5GB of memory however, SQL Server was configured with no memory limit. I added a 4GB max memory and restarted the SQL Server. Upon restart, it was using 230MB. I checked the report after 2-3 hours and images were still working but SQL had increased to 550MB

Then after about 1-2 additional hours, I noticed the images had stopped working and SQL was using 770MB of memory. At the time the images stopped working, the server was still sitting at around 38GB out of 48GB memory usage.

It would be difficult to justify adding more memory to the server given it's current allocation. On average, the image seems to work for 4-5 hours and then stop working.

I want the SELECT statement but, I am unsure how I would use the information to make any determination for optimization. It's a busy server and is almost constantly being used to generate reports from our ERP system.

Answer 4

I think we have been able to eliminate the memory theory. At around 7PM local time, we upped the memory allocated to the VM from 48GB to 64GB and rebooted the server. 2 hours later the images had already stopped working and when checking the execution log, only 2 SSRS reports were run and neither of those reports had any associated images.

I then altered the max SQL memory to 16GB and rebooted the server again. Images worked again after the reboot but, I'm starting to wonder if a specific issue/event in the system is causing SSRS to stop loading images rather than a memory limit issue. The behavior in this problem is very bizarre for sure.