SQL I/O Error Message and its resolution

Starting with Microsoft SQL Server 2000 Service Pack 4 (SP4), SQL Server helps detect stalled and stuck conditions for database I/O reads and writes.

When an I/O operation has been pending for 15 seconds or longer, SQL Server logs the following message in the SQL errorlogs:

SQL Server has encountered %d occurrence(s) of I/O requests taking longer than %d seconds to complete on file [%ls] in database [%ls] (%d). The OS file handle is 0x%p. The offset of the latest long I/O is: %#016I64x.

The important thing to understand over here is that this message is reported by SQL Server but is not necessarily an issue with SQL Server.

This is also applicable to SQL 2005.

Identifying the Cause

This problem can be caused system performance issues, hardware errors, firmware errors, device driver problems, or filter driver intervention in the IO process.

More information on this error message is documented at the Events and Error Messages Center.

Resolution

Refer to KB 897284 for more details on this error message and possible suggestions for resolution.

POSTED BY : Sanchan Saxena