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  1. #1
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    Question Server Load - What is "Good", What is "Bad", and What is "UGLY"?

    Hello all!

    I've just had a vB site up for about 6 months now, so forgive me for being a newbie, but I must ask a newbie question:

    What should I expect for Server Load Averages on my forums?

    As I said, I have a brand new site, with next to NO traffic, and these are the Server Load Averages currently in my AdminCP:

    3.50, 5.75, 7.93

    Is that good or bad? What does it mean? How do I interpet these numbers? Are lower numbers better, or higher?

    I currently host with 1&1, but I will be switching within the week to HostGator, for larger capacity and hopefully faster speeds.

    What should I expect to see for my server load averages once I move to HostGator? That will still be a shared hosting plan, but they are supposed to be much quicker from everyone's posts.

    Any understanding you could help bring my way, would be appreciated!

    Thanks!
    Jeff
    Last edited by NashChristian; 02-21-2008 at 01:48 AM.

  2. #2
    Join Date
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    Under the sea
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    What kind of account do you have with them?

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Dec 2004
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    New York, NY
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    10,710
    How do you feel about the current performance of your site at 1and1?

  4. #4
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    Aug 2007
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    The way I look at it...

    if you have 1 cpu on the server, the load shouldn't be higher than 1. If you have 10 cpus on the server, the load shouldn't be greater than 10...

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Feb 2008
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    I have a shared hosting account with 1&1, their "HOME" account. I loved them for a long time, but they have been flaking out a little more the past couple of years.

    The big reason I'm moving, is because of the 100MB max MySQL, which is not sufficient to run Forum software.

    This past year, my sites have frequently seemed a lot slower through them.

    I'm going to purchase the "baby" shared hosting account at HostGator.

    Anybody know anything about Server Loads?

    Thanks!
    Jeff

  6. #6
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    Feb 2008
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    Quote Originally Posted by Soskel34 View Post
    The way I look at it...

    if you have 1 cpu on the server, the load shouldn't be higher than 1. If you have 10 cpus on the server, the load shouldn't be greater than 10...
    How do I know how many cpus they have on a shared hosting server?

    Thanks!
    Jeff

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Oct 2007
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    It should say it in your control panel. Overselling hosts will generally be slower and have higher cpu load. To give you an idea, right now our cpu load is 0.4 with 4 cores.
    eLief - Where your business matters.
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  8. #8
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    Quote Originally Posted by NashChristian View Post
    How do I know how many cpus they have on a shared hosting server?

    Thanks!
    Jeff


    try uploading phpsysinfo

    http://phpsysinfo.sourceforge.net/

    I know there is a ssh command, I forget it though :X
    Last edited by Soskel34; 02-21-2008 at 02:12 AM.

  9. #9
    Join Date
    Aug 2006
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    I don't think 1&1 provides SSH access, I could be wrong.

    but if you do, type this in:
    cat /proc/cpuinfo
    Otto Yiu
    Rsync Palace ● Providing offsite backups since 2007.
    Backomatic ● Hassle-free Automated cPanel/WHM, DirectAdmin, FTP, and MySQL backups.

  10. #10
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    Feb 2008
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    SSH is not provided with my plan. I believe it is with some of the higher plans though.

  11. #11
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    Quote Originally Posted by Handy Man View Post
    It should say it in your control panel. Overselling hosts will generally be slower and have higher cpu load. To give you an idea, right now our cpu load is 0.4 with 4 cores.
    So when I start using HostGator, who uses CPanel, it will tell me in my control panel what the load is, as well as the number of cores?

  12. #12
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    Feb 2008
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    So the higher the load, the slower the server will respond to requests. Is that correct?

    Thanks!
    Jeff

  13. #13
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    Quote Originally Posted by NashChristian View Post
    So when I start using HostGator, who uses CPanel, it will tell me in my control panel what the load is, as well as the number of cores?
    No..........

  14. #14
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    Quote Originally Posted by NashChristian View Post
    So the higher the load, the slower the server will respond to requests. Is that correct?

    Thanks!
    Jeff
    Not necessarily.

    A load of 0.1 isn't going to respond any faster than 0.2

  15. #15
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    It will tell you how many cores there are in the cPanel stats page.

    My server right now: Server Load 1.48 (4 cpus)
    Otto Yiu
    Rsync Palace ● Providing offsite backups since 2007.
    Backomatic ● Hassle-free Automated cPanel/WHM, DirectAdmin, FTP, and MySQL backups.

  16. #16
    Join Date
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    Austin, Texas
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    You can possibly write a php or cgi script that does something like:


    #!/usr/bin/perl

    print "Content-type: text/html\n\n";
    print "<pre>";
    system('cat /proc/cpuinfo');
    print "</pre>"
    ██ HermeTek Network Solutions
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    ██ BSD & Linux consulting, training, and hosting
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  17. #17
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    That might be a little bit "beyond" me.

    Thanks though!

    Jeff

  18. #18
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    Dublin, California
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    At what load should one be concerned? I always monitor my server load, but I have no clue what I am doing or looking for. I just try to make sure the server load is less than 1.00.

    If you have a vps or hybrid server is the server load the same for everyone, or does everyone have different server loads?

    What will be the result of having a high load? If you have a really high load, what should be done - upgrading a cpu, buying more ram?

  19. #19
    Join Date
    May 2005
    Location
    Chicago, IL USA
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    Hi Jeff,

    Welcome to WHT!

    Let me preface this by first stating that I am absolutely NOT bashing any company - including the one you are currently with. I am sure they are a good company. That said, the load averages you have quoted are not good at all. As stated by another poster, assuming you have one CPU server, you never want to see the load average above 1.00. You have noticed your site being slow to load, because the servers load average is so high.

    These high loads can be caused by many things on a shared server. Too many domains/accounts on the server, poor CGI coding, persistant database connections, DDOS attacks and so on.

    You might ask your current host to be moved to a different server. If you are otherwise happy with them, this would allow you to remain there.
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  20. #20
    Join Date
    Feb 2008
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    Lightbulb

    Quote Originally Posted by hermetek View Post
    You can possibly write a php or cgi script that does something like:


    #!/usr/bin/perl

    print "Content-type: text/html\n\n";
    print "<pre>";
    system('cat /proc/cpuinfo');
    print "</pre>"
    SO I would just upload that as a PHP file into my hosting package, then run it via my browser?

    Will that tell me the number of cores as well as the server load?

    Thanks!
    Jeff

  21. #21
    Join Date
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    Location
    Austin, Texas
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    At what load should one be concerned? I always monitor my server load, but I have no clue what I am doing or looking for. I just try to make sure the server load is less than 1.00.
    < 1.00 per CPU core, usually, although that is a rough measurement.

    If you have a vps or hybrid server is the server load the same for everyone, or does everyone have different server loads?
    On Xen at least, everyone has different server loads as they have different /proc filesystems..

    What will be the result of having a high load? If you have a really high load, what should be done - upgrading a cpu, buying more ram?
    With a higher load comes higher response times. It can be attributed to CPU usage, memory usage, or IO usage. You need to track down the cause of the load first before you can fix it.
    ██ HermeTek Network Solutions
    ██ Network design, security, and implementation
    ██ BSD & Linux consulting, training, and hosting
    ██ https://www.hermetek.com | 1.512.792.2525

  22. #22
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    SO I would just upload that as a PHP file into my hosting package, then run it via my browser?

    Will that tell me the number of cores as well as the server load?

    Thanks!
    Jeff
    I wrote that in perl to be put in your cgi-bin... But in PHP it would be very similar. I'm throwing something together right now for that and I'll paste it shortly. It would tell you what processors they are using and how many of them there are, as long as their system security permits.
    ██ HermeTek Network Solutions
    ██ Network design, security, and implementation
    ██ BSD & Linux consulting, training, and hosting
    ██ https://www.hermetek.com | 1.512.792.2525

  23. #23
    Join Date
    Feb 2008
    Location
    Austin, Texas
    Posts
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    Code:
    <?php
    
    echo "<pre>";
    system('cat /proc/cpuinfo');
    echo "</pre>";
    
    ?>
    ██ HermeTek Network Solutions
    ██ Network design, security, and implementation
    ██ BSD & Linux consulting, training, and hosting
    ██ https://www.hermetek.com | 1.512.792.2525

  24. #24
    Join Date
    Oct 2007
    Location
    United States
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    568
    Quote Originally Posted by NashChristian View Post
    So the higher the load, the slower the server will respond to requests. Is that correct?

    Thanks!
    Jeff
    In general, yes. A load of 0.4 compared to your load of 7.93, their will be performance differences.


    Quote Originally Posted by NashChristian View Post
    So when I start using HostGator, who uses CPanel, it will tell me in my control panel what the load is, as well as the number of cores?
    Yes, with cPanel it will tell you both how many cores the server your hosted on has as well as the server load.
    eLief - Where your business matters.
    cPanel Hosting - Reseller Hosting - VPS - Dedicated Servers - Magento Specialists
    Celebrating over 4 years of providing quality hosting.
    cPanel/WHM - LiteSpeed - CloudFlare - R1Soft Backups - 15k Cheetah's - 24x7 Support eLief.com

  25. #25
    Join Date
    Feb 2008
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    30
    Quote Originally Posted by hermetek View Post
    Code:
    <?php
    
    echo "<pre>";
    system('cat /proc/cpuinfo');
    echo "</pre>";
    
    ?>
    Thanks a lot Hermetek!

    I appreciate the help!
    Jeff

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