I used to host my site on Windows servers for two years. After they closed my account due to high bandwith I moved to Unix ( Linux) server and I lost about 30% of my traffic right away. Then I moved to another Unix server hoping to improve my traffic, but it appeared I lost an additional 20% of traffic.

Can anyone advice me why I lost traffic on Unix?
Is unique IP address for website important for site stability? May be there is something else I'm missing and what I should look for when looking for a host?

So windows is better or it just depends on a service provider's server ability.
Thanks

If anything, Unix is a more stable platform than Windows.

Maybe you lost some traffic because your site was down in between the moves, or some other factors?

Why don't you post a link to your site? Then we can really tell you why.

Thank you.
However, I doubt that I could lose too much as downtime was 1-2 days only. But the level of traffic never recovered to the level it was before for two years.
What factors could be in effect for such a massive loss?

Thanks.

Hi all,
Thanks for the replies.
my site is http://bestcupid.com

However, probably it will not work correctly now because I messed up a bit with server names yesturday ( I transeferred server names back to to the host where I initially lost only 30%, but they never responded, so I'm returning back to the service where I lost another 20%) and now my domain in the process of moving. Could you check my site tomorrow ( I hope the transfer will complete by that time).
Thanks in advance. All help is appreciated very much.

Sounds more like you lost search engine ranks - Unix vs Windows would really make no difference in the serving of your site to your visitors.

Nope, unless there were some settings on your original server that were simply never ported over (such as custom error pages), the OS of the server is invisible to your users.

BTW, you're probably screwing yourself even more by moving it back and forth. SE's may try to check it while it's down and drop you. Not to mention lost visitors who will go elsewhere.

Thank you all guys.
I agree that it is not good to move back and forthe, but when your traffic is going down right in in front of your eyes you would panic too ( because of of uncertanty why it goes this way). I lost google listing probably during my first move, but I never counted on SE because it was very small percentage of my total traffic. The majority of my traffic was coming from reciprcal links ( due to nature of my site content) and this did not change too much so there should be something else.

I would kindly ask to check my site tomorrow when the domain transfer should be completed. May be my site is not loaded every time or may be there are some errors which I can not see from my PC.
http://bestcupid.com

thanks you all.

However, I doubt that I could lose too much as downtime was 1-2 days only

LOL, 1-2 days downtime is a lot, and certain to cause traffic loss. Maybe if the downtime was >1 hour you'd be ok, but 2 days?

By the way, platforms don't generate (or lose) traffic. :rolleyes:

Well, your site is down from here.

Tracert gets "unresolved host".

It's because Windows is a much better and faster operating system than *nix.









Ok, not really but I had to say it to all the people who constantly say Windows is horrible. :)

What type of network did you move from/to? That could be a big factor. A faster/better networks could cause this.

his provider uses cogent. lol

so it looks like it's just his server isn't responding / isp issue?!

I do not see why switching hosts would make you lose visitors? How would your visitors know if you were on Windows or UNIX? The only factor that I would consider is that your site was down for 2 days, during the move(s), and your visitors lost interest.

Guys,
I do really appreciate the talk. However, my concern is:
I've been on windows for more than two years. And the traffic was stable at all times!!!! Even for these two years I had even bigger downtime ( 3-4 days due server problems) I never lost my level of traffic. When I moved to another server ( I expalined why above) I lost traffic ( and never recovered it) from the first day I appeard on my new host. Below are the numbers of my traffic. In April I was on my old windows host ( and those numbers are almost the same for previous months- a bit up abit down, but never down like it is now). Since May 2 I'm on new Unix host. Since July 2 I'm on another Unix host ( but has not transferred te domain yet completely).

Sorry for asking stupid questions, but really want to know why is it happening.

Once again the site is not functional now ( because of my panic stupidity). Will be hopfully up tomorrow.

Thanks again

PS. The forum did not let me to put long message so I'll post my stat in the next message.

Maybe, your Windows Host, was faster? Maybe you had some valuable ASP scripts in use, that you cannot use on your UNIX server? There is no way that your visitors stopped visiting your site, because of the OS you are on.

June 20,
2879
June 19,
3011
June 18,
2928
June 17,
3104
June 16,
2950
June 15,
2721
June 14,
3065
June 13,
2848
June 12,
3006
June 11,
3268
June 10,
3384
June 09,
3147
June 08,
2720
June 07,
2950
June 06,
2877
June 05,
2982
June 04,
3189
June 03,
3224
June 02,
2858
June 01,
2792
May 31,
3319
May 30,
3208
May 29,
3255
May 28,
3330
May 27,
3230
May 26,
2858
May 25,
3106
May 24
3721
May 23
3124
May 22
3560
May 21
3474
May 20
3424
May 19
3133
May 18
3319
May 17
3364
May 16
3153
May 15
3153
May 14
3429
May 13
3682
May 12
3260
May 11
3391
May 10
3519
May 09
2765
May 08
3289
May 07
3438
May 06
3281
May 05
2351
May 04
1813
May 03
17
May 02
27
May 01
41
April 30
2969
April 29
4193
April 28
3796
April 27
4265
April 26
4405
April 25
5065
April 24
5023
April 23
4421
April 22
6658
April 21
5205
April 20
5497
April 19
5740
April 18
5042
April 17
5209
April 16
5348
April 15
3430
April 14
4969
April 13
5147
April 12
5775
April 11
6450
April 10
7215
April 09
7117
April 08
4717
April 07
3946
April 06
4508
April 05
4310
April 04
4192
April 03
3916
April 02
4444
April 01
4314

That's traffic degeneration. Sounds like you aren't getting enough new signups or dedicated members to keep you going.

How can you blame it on the OS of your server?

if the speed of your site went down, it could have lost popularity. also, hosts could have IP blocks banned for some reason, and if a certain IP block was banned, then that would certainly explain some of it.

Must be Cogent.

(kidding)

Or it could be that people are tired of seeing the default page show up... (kidding again)

bestcupid.com now resolves to 217.204.37.220


This is the Server Administrator™ default page.
If you see this page it means:

1) hosting for this domain is not configured
or
2) there's no such domain registered in Plesk.


Seriously, maybe what you offer to browsers is not as interesting or relevant as it once was. Assuming that regardless of which host you were on that your site was available, loaded reasonably fast -- Look at your content, not at the technology driving your site, first.

It could be your host, but I doubt it's the OS.
For example I had a host once that blocked off all of France from viewing my website.

Really my site is the way it was six month ago. It may not look too attractive but it worked very well the way it is, so why change? So it could not lose the content or something else. Plus I do not beleive that yesterday ( lets say) it was OK and generated lots of traffic, but today on new host suddenly half of people refuse to come. Hard to beleive.
It seems that domain is transferred OK At least I could access my site with no problem. If someone can check my site http://bestcupid.com and tell me if there are any errors, slowing down, not loading or anything else I would greatly appreciate it.
Thank you all participating on this matter.

http://www.bestcupid.com works just fine but http://bestcupid.com doesn't... "the page cannon be displayed" messege

Originally posted by AdamW
http://www.bestcupid.com works just fine but http://bestcupid.com doesn't... "the page cannon be displayed" messege

And that, qwqw, is your problem.

What type of network did you move from/to? That could be a big factor. A faster/better networks could cause this

Originally posted by mwatkins
Must be Cogent.

(kidding)

Yeah, they got routed to another country. :D

Thank you guys.
Just one question for those who got " Can not display the page" when used URL http://bestcupid.com ( without www. in front).

What browser do you have? I have IE 5.5 and Netscape 4.7 when I type in the location " bestcupid.com" it opens www.bestcupid.com ( basicaly if I understand correctly the server or browser redirects bestcupid.com to www.bestcupid.com) but some browsers may not support such redirection ( I guess). But all links on my site and to my site from other sites are set up as http://bestcupid.com ( without www.) My old host ( run Windows)supported this feature, so I did not have any problem. But when I moved on Unix it seems this feature is not supported and some people can not open my site when use http://bestcupid.com URL ( without www.) May this be a reason for losing traffic because some people just can not open the site due to this factor?

Can someone check my site using http://bestcupid.com ( without www. ) Please let me know if you got any error message ( page can not be displayed or something similar)

Thanks a lot.

It's how they setup the zone file for your DNS.

It appears without the WWW. is just a Alias Record (CNAME), instead of a A Record. A record points it to the server ip.