What’s New in Database Health Monitor: Smarter TempDB Tracking, Scheduled Reports, and Real-Time Index Insights
In the latest Stedman SQL Podcast, Mitchell Glasscock and George Stedman took a deep dive into the newest features in Database Health Monitor—many inspired directly by user feedback and real-world SQL Server challenges.
As our clients know, Database Health Monitor isn’t just a monitoring tool—it’s a practical companion for DBAs, helping detect performance issues before they become outages. This release builds on that vision with smarter TempDB monitoring, better automation, and deeper index insight.
Let’s explore the highlights.
1. Catch TempDB Bloat Before It Takes Down Your Server
One of the biggest new features is Quick Scan Check #245, which warns you when the version store is taking up more than 80% of TempDB.
Why does this matter? With Read Committed Snapshot Isolation (RCSI) becoming more common, SQL Server stores snapshot versions of rows in TempDB during reads and updates. Open transactions can leave these snapshots hanging around longer than expected, causing TempDB to balloon until your entire system slows—or even locks up.
Now, Database Health Monitor detects this early and alerts you before it becomes a problem.
Pair that with the new Open Transactions Report, and you can instantly see which sessions are holding things open and where they originated.
This combination gives DBAs a complete early warning system for TempDB issues.
2. Run Health Reports Automatically (Command-Line Mode)
One of the most requested features from our clients—especially during audit season—was the ability to run health reports automatically, without manually opening the GUI.
The new command-line parameters make it easy to schedule Database Health Monitor reports as part of your daily or weekly routine.
You can now:
- Run silent health reports on a schedule
- Generate multi-instance reports
- Save output to custom file paths
- Automatically name and organize reports by date
This turns Database Health Monitor into a hands-free reporting system—perfect for DBAs who want morning health checks waiting in their inbox at 7am.
3. Historic vs. Real-Time Index Usage
Another powerful update addresses index tracking. Previously, index usage stats were reset with every SQL Server restart, making it hard to see long-term patterns.
With this release, Database Health Monitor now retains historic index usage across restarts—so you can spot trends over months or even years.
And with the new historic vs. real-time view toggle, you can easily compare:
- Historic usage: How often an index has been used over its lifetime.
- Real-time usage: How indexes perform since the last reboot.
This change helps DBAs avoid accidentally dropping indexes that are critical for monthly or quarterly workloads. It’s a subtle enhancement—but one that can save hours of performance troubleshooting.
4. Enhanced Drill-Downs and Smarter Visuals
We’ve expanded the drill-down functionality across several reports—like blocking, CPU by database, and query-level CPU usage.
For example:
- Click on a database in the CPU by Database report to instantly see which queries are consuming the most resources.
- The blocking by hour report now links directly to historic blocking details, helping you see not just when blocking occurred, but exactly which query caused it.
We’ve also refreshed the heat map color scheme, making it more intuitive:
- Green = Healthy
- Orange = Watch this
- Red = Action needed
These visual tweaks make it easier to spot trends—and potential trouble—at a glance.
5. Backup Chain Clarity
Ever get confused by copy-only backups in your VM snapshots?
Now, you can hide copy-only backups in the Backup Status Report, making it easy to see your true SQL Server backup chain.
This update prevents VM-level copy backups from hiding gaps in your real backup sequence—critical for accurate recovery planning.
6. Coming Soon: TempDB Allocation Chart
Rounding out the episode, George and Mitch previewed an upcoming feature: the TempDB Allocation Chart.
This chart visualizes how TempDB space is being used—by version store, user objects, and internal objects—so you can monitor growth patterns over time. It’s another step toward giving DBAs a complete view of TempDB health.
Why This Matters
Every one of these enhancements came from real-world client experience.
At Stedman Solutions, we use Database Health Monitor daily to manage and monitor client environments, so the features we build solve problems we’ve actually seen—like TempDB bloats, backup confusion, or missing audit reports.
If you’re managing SQL Servers and want to proactively catch issues before users notice, you can download the latest version of Database Health Monitor at DatabaseHealth.com.
Need More Help?
If you’re looking for a dedicated team to monitor, tune, and manage your SQL Servers 24/7, that’s exactly what our SQL Server Managed Services are built for.
We combine Database Health Monitor with over three decades of SQL Server expertise to deliver:
- Continuous monitoring and alerting
- Immediate remediation when problems arise
- Unlimited business-hours support
- Regular maintenance, upgrades, and mentoring
You can learn more or contact us at StedmanSolutions.com/contact-us.
Want to be a guest on the Podcast, see how at https://stedmansolutions.com/sql-server-podcast-guest/
Check out Season 3 episodes: https://stedmansolutions.com/home/sql-server-podcast/season-3/
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