We are getting very significant response problems with Outlook 2003 and ACT 2009. We have cleaned up the file, reduced the size of the Outlook OST file and followed all of Microsoft suggestions and fixes. We are running hosted Exchange. This problem seems to have gotten worse when we upgraded to ACT 2009 where the emails are being attached automatically to ACT.

Messages take several seconds to open, when clicking reply it will take 3-10 seconds to open the reply window. When replying to a message it takes several seconds to open and it takes up to ten seconds for the cursor to appear. While typing a response the program stalls (cursor disappears) and takes up to 10 seconds to reappear.

Task manager shows Outlook taking from 40 to 60 percent of the CPU and SQL server taking 30-40 percent of the CPU. Cursor disappears until usage drops.

Any suggestions?

Well, we're definitely not ACT experts here at OutlookPower, but we can probably get you started on some good, general, problem solving techniques.

It seems you have a number of variables here: Outlook, ACT, Exchange, CPU utilization, and an SQL server. You also haven't said whether you're experiencing this problem on one machine or on all machines connected to the Exchange server. You did say your Exchange server was hosted, so that probably means you're accessing it over the Internet.

I would recommend you start by disconnecting Outlook from ACT (either by uninstalling ACT or disabling the ACT add-ins to Outlook) and see if the Outlook/Exchange performance improves. If you're using a clean Outlook client with your hosted Exchange and you have good performance, you'll know your problem isn't the Outlook/Exchange relationship.

On the other hand, if your performance still is bad, you've got more work to do. If you're still having problems, I'd then recommend doing a fresh installation of Outlook on a completely fresh machine, and see if you're still having Exchange problems. If so, your problem's not in ACT. But I'm guessing that's not going to be the case.

You could also go through your machine, shut down all unnecessary services and applications, and see if any of that increases your performance.

Next, go to the ACT site, visit their knowledgebase, and look at their various articles for tuning SQL performance. Specifically, I recommend their How to Troubleshoot the Installation of the Microsoft SQL Server for ACT! by Sage article.

In the category of wild guess, you might also want to make sure your Windows firewall is giving ACT all the pass it needs. Read their How to Add ACT! to the Exception List for Windows XP Internet Connection Firewall article.