Hello, We have a task manager task that is set to start at 3:00 am. But for some reason ( and we've not touched the server since task job setup) the chron job in task manager will randomly start 20-25 mintues late! We can't see a pattern, it will just randomly start late a few times a week, then work as it should and then a few weeks later it starts late again. Why is this? This has never happened before to me in any NT system, is this a 2008 bug? As you can imagine this is wreaking havoc on that production server and causing client downtime and is completely unacceptable. Any ideas? (besides moving back to Linux ;) Thank you for your time, Donald

In the task's schedule, there's a checkbox for "Delay task for up to (random delay)" that could cause this behavior if checked. You'll also find an option for "Run task as soon as possible after a scheduled start is missed" in case you would prefer the task not be run if the schedule is missed for any reason (such as the previous instance still running, a reboot, etc).

Hi Andrew, Thank you for your reply. I'm looking in the tasks' properties window but cannot find "Delay task for up to...", which tab is this located? Thanks, dc