Web Hosting Talk : Web Hosting Main Forums : Web Hosting : Out of Memory error

[IvanM]

I have been hosting a site with a large hosting company for several years. It's on an old server with an old package plan that is way outdated. It gets a good deal of traffic. I am continually seeing "Out of Memory!" errors in our error logs in regard to cgi scripts.

These scripts are the same that have been running when the site was developed 2-3 years ago. Our site has grown and it gets a fair amount of traffic per day, but nothing like we are hoping to expect by this time next year.

The hosting company told us about six months ago that we were on a server with another site that also got a lot of traffic and used scripting. And they were suppose to have fixed the problem when we began paying for extra bandwidth.

The memory errors stopped for several months and now they are back again. Each time we report it they tell us they have increased the memory. The last time the sys admin (not tech support) told us this "canned" response, the error logs reported out of memory errors only three hours later.

What is the problem? What could be causing this? We are not backend techies so we are clueless as to whether they are BS'ing us and laughing all the way to the bank with our money. I should also add that we are paying 2x-3x a month for disk space and bandwidth that most hosting services are charging these days.

The most logical answer would be to move the site, BUT it is a huge site with many commercial scripts that would have to be reconfigured only after the DNS propogated. Downtime would be extensive and lost sales could kill us. Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks.

[rghf]

It could be that the CGI-scripts are trying to grab a chunk of memory then failing when they run out. Would it be possible for the hosting company to move you onto a bigger server but keep the same IP address?

Also (assuming this a Linux server) what the output of "free" is

Rgds

Rus Foster

[Website Rob]

I would suggest you grab and install this PHP script: http://phpsysinfo.sourceforge.net/ -- safe_mode must be off in order for it to work.

This will answer any questions as to how much memory the Server has and few others as well.

And they were suppose to have fixed the problem when we began paying for extra bandwidth.

This problem is related to Server resources and has nothing to do with Data Transfer.

What is the problem? What could be causing this?

Lots of reasons actually; little memory, too many scripts (as a whole) running on the Server, the scripts being used (even by yourself) may be outdated and using more memory than upgraded coding (if a home spun script) or a newer version would. What version of Perl is being used and are your scripts coded to take advantage of that version?

Downtime would be extensive and lost sales could kill us.

Why would there be any downtime? Whilst propagation is going on you have access to your new Hosting account and can transfer/setup everything before hand. Surely the scripts can be adjusted to use an IP address along with a Domain name -- giving you time to troubleshoot any bugs on the new Server.