I'm a novice, so please be patient with me :)

I have a dual xeon dedicated server with Redhat Enterprise 3, CPanel, and WHM running some vbulletin forums.

98% of the time it runs great with a server load of around .30-.50. However, every now and then it spikes to 2.00 - 4.00. There isn't a substantial change in users on the forums or anything, just a spike out of nowhere.

What is the best way for me to find exactly what is using all of the CPU power?

Thank you kindly for any help.

DO you experience a large iowait in top when this occurs? If so i suggest a 2.6 kernel.

Originally posted by thelinuxguy
DO you experience a large iowait in top when this occurs? If so i suggest a 2.6 kernel.

I just sent you a PM. But here is the current readings from TOP. Does it tell you anything?


18:20:43 up 7 days, 16:08, 1 user, load average: 4.83, 4.33, 3.72
219 processes: 217 sleeping, 1 running, 1 zombie, 0 stopped
CPU states: cpu user nice system irq softirq iowait idle
total 5.6% 0.0% 1.5% 0.0% 0.4% 4.7% 87.5%
cpu00 2.5% 0.0% 2.1% 0.1% 1.7% 4.3% 88.8%
cpu01 7.3% 0.0% 1.9% 0.0% 0.0% 4.7% 85.8%
cpu02 3.9% 0.0% 0.9% 0.0% 0.0% 4.5% 90.4%
cpu03 8.7% 0.0% 0.9% 0.0% 0.0% 5.3% 84.8%
Mem: 2061576k av, 2041524k used, 20052k free, 0k shrd, 59972k buff
1468040k actv, 180316k in_d, 33052k in_c
Swap: 2040212k av, 0k used, 2040212k free 1422388k cached


5916 S 0.5 0.4 0:01 2 httpd
7769 nobody 15 0 9068 9068 5620 S 0.5 0.4 0:00 1 httpd
7901 nobody 15 0 8380 8380 5036 S 0.5 0.4 0:00 2 httpd
7950 nobody 16 0 9600 9600 6120 S 0.5 0.4 0:00 2 httpd
7965 nobody 15 0 8528 8528 5168 S 0.5 0.4 0:00 1 httpd
7766 nobody 15 0 9588 9588 5868 S 0.4 0.4 0:00 0 httpd
7779 nobody 15 0 9596 9596 6216 S 0.4 0.4 0:01 1 httpd
2301 mailman 15 0 3212 3212 420 S 0.2 0.1 2:39 0 python2
7800 nobody 15 0 9500 9500 6336 S 0.2 0.4 0:00 2 httpd
8023 nobody 18 0 7376 7376 4620 S 0.2 0.3 0:00 2 httpd
9896 mysql 16 0 63304 61M 1308 S 0.1 3.0 3:36 1 mysqld
21051 mysql 16 0 63304 61M 1308 S 0.1 3.0 2:44 3 mysqld
21059 mysql 15 0 63304 61M 1308 S 0.1 3.0 2:44 1 mysqld
18370 mysql 15 0 63304 61M 1308 S 0.1 3.0 0:33 3 mysqld
7773 nobody 15 0 9304 9304 5960 S 0.1 0.4 0:01 3 httpd
7804 nobody 15 0 9200 9200 5704 S 0.1 0.4 0:00 3 httpd
7857 root 15 0 1292 1292 848 R 0.1 0.0 0:00 2 top
7896 nobody 15 0 8396 8396 5052 S 0.1 0.4 0:00 2 httpd
7957 nobody 15 0 8332 8332 5128 S 0.1 0.4 0:00 0 httpd
1 root 15 0 504 504 448 S 0.0 0.0 0:13 1 init
2 root RT 0 0 0 0 SW 0.0 0.0 0:00 0 migration/0
3 root RT 0 0 0 0 SW 0.0 0.0 0:00 1 migration/1
4 root RT 0 0 0 0 SW 0.0 0.0 0:00 2 migration/2
5 root RT 0 0 0 0 SW 0.0 0.0 0:00 3 migration/3
6 root 15 0 0 0 0 SW 0.0 0.0 0:00 0 keventd
7 root 34 19 0 0 0 SWN 0.0 0.0 0:00 0 ksoftirqd/0
8 root 34 19 0 0 0 SWN 0.0 0.0 0:00 1 ksoftirqd/1
9 root 34 19 0 0 0 SWN 0.0 0.0 0:00 2 ksoftirqd/2
10 root 34 19 0 0 0 SWN 0.0 0.0 0:00 3 ksoftirqd/3
13 root 15 0 0 0 0 SW 0.0 0.0 0:00 2 bdflush
11 root 15 0 0 0 0 SW 0.0 0.0 3:04 3 kswapd
12 root 15 0 0 0 0 SW 0.0 0.0 1:55 0 kscand
14 root 15 0 0 0 0 SW 0.0 0.0 0:33 2 kupdated
15 root 25 0 0 0 0 SW 0.0 0.0 0:00 2 mdrecoveryd
24 root 15 0 0 0 0 SW 0.0 0.0 0:40 1 kjournald
79 root 25 0 0 0 0 SW 0.0 0.0 0:00 1 khubd
154 root 15 0 0 0 0 SW 0.0 0.0 0:00 0 kjournald
155 root 15 0 0 0 0 SW 0.0 0.0 0:45 3 kjournald
156 root 15 0 0 0 0 SW 0.0 0.0 1:24 0 kjournald
157 root 15 0 0 0 0 SW 0.0 0.0 0:48 0 kjournald