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  1. #1

    Yet another dedicated server nightmare

    I'm a newbie to dedicated hosting, admittedly. I bought a fairly high-traffic site, though, and realized this was the way to go.

    The site runs the UBBthreads forums (Infopop). Uses PhP/MySQL. 400-500 people on it at once...

    So I find a very cost-effective solution. Low CPU (900) and I add half GB of RAM. It comes with 100GB transfer. I figured (wrongly) that would be sufficient: but, a few hundred bucks setup and 100 a month.

    The site has run like a dog since day 1. The touted 24/7 support has never YET answered their phones: the server was down 8 HOURS one day... peak time, too. The dude tried to tell me I had a DOS... I had checked, and no, that wasn't so. He never did give an excuse for not being reachable via phone/email.

    The site is, meanwhile, taking more, and more, and more hits.

    Now I get an email from Server Dude that... I have leaped to 250 GB a month and he's going to charge me $700 a month! Erm, if it's 100 a month for 100GB, ...

    I'm aware I need a new server. Problem is, this site is red-hot NOW and will be for another month... I'd lose a ton of people if I have to futz around with a lengthy setup.

    I do require the 24/7 support, and I don't mind paying $200 a month... I've seen several services here which offer such. It needs to be Linux, and the folks have to be kind to server newbies (this guy wouldn't even help me set up a chron job

    Any ideas would be so very welcome.

  2. #2
    Get a cognet server from hostmania for arround $150.

    They will give you 900G cognet per month.

    Mac

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Jun 2000
    Location
    Washington, USA
    Posts
    5,990
    You're going to need some serious CPU to back that site...

    WHT runs on two seperate servers, and I believe those are Dual CPU.

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Apr 2002
    Posts
    48
    Hi NiL,

    I'm a Newer Newbie
    I dont even know whats a chron (ok, go ahead and laugh )

    Anyway I just got my first server for 3 days and I'm glad to always have someone on AIM.
    I'm sick of email support !

    If you would like some feedback, pm me.

    good luck.

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Jun 2001
    Posts
    597
    Im just wondering how does WHT load balance between two server?

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Jun 2000
    Location
    Washington, USA
    Posts
    5,990
    One server does MySQL, the other Apache.

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Jul 2002
    Location
    Vancouver, BC
    Posts
    1,028
    first thing that comes to mind is gettin' like two rackshack $99/month boxes to handle this load... for the forums... and tell that other host to shove it cuz it seems he's just tryin' 2 screw u 4 as much cash as he can...

    i wouldn't go with an all-cogent solution... rackshack is pretty good 'bout that... heck, i'll configure it 4 ya 4 free if u need help...

    best to go with like two of their $1 setup boxes n configure everythin' manually... cuz if its just one huge forum, wouldn't want the extra junk anyways... heh... i've got a couple forums being hosted off rackshack boxes... runs sweet... heh

  8. #8
    Join Date
    May 2001
    Location
    Islamabad, Pakistan
    Posts
    635
    try nocster.com, they also have a sprint line along with congent.. $1/gig if you purchase in bulk..
    Arsalan
    Nexus - http://nexus.pk/
    ** Smart Solutions for Smart People! **

  9. #9
    Join Date
    Dec 2001
    Location
    Darmstadt, Germany
    Posts
    1,096
    if you could tell us where you leased the server?!
    that would atleast prevent other ppl from going through the same problems.

    greets,
    In just two days, tomorrow will be yesterday.

  10. #10
    You probably should get something with more CPU power if you've got that much traffic, but its hard to tell based on the info you gave.

    I would definitely recommend switching to a new provider if they're acting the way you described. (who is it btw?)

    If you can't afford to switch right now, get an experienced linux admin (like myself, or someone else) who knows how to tweak a server. Some are willing to do it for much less than your standard setup fee at a datacenter. PHP's performance can be significantly improved pretty easily, especially if you're also using things like sessions, mysql, have large scripts with many includes, etc.

    If your server hasn't been tweaked at all, you can probably get twice the performance you're getting now. I do have slight suspicions that your CPU is insuficient, but as I said I'd need more info to know for sure.
    __________________
    SkiingYAC Custom Solutions http://www.skiingyac.com
    system administration, development, design, & hosting

  11. #11
    Also, if you are really interested in seeing this thing work well....and probably saving you some money in the long run with server costs, you might consider switching to vB as it should have lower resource requirements. Especially when paired with php_accelerator
    *AlphaOmegaHosting.Com* - Hosting since 1998
    Managed Dedicated Servers and VPS
    Hosted Exchange 2010 Email Service

  12. #12
    Thanks, all. I was beginning to wonder if I was, perhaps, in the wrong.

    Let me not yet divulge the name of the host: my site is extremely popular, and I have the distinct feeling that if Mr. Server finds this post here (and yes he could), he'd kill the site. Truly can't have that. Once I get the site safely elsewhere, I intend to blow that whistle... here and on UseNet. (I might be an old broad that doesn't know about servers... but I'm an ole geek broad all the same!)

    Y'all are probably correct in that it could benefit from 2 servers... but gawd, they'd be a fortune... perhaps I'm not doing the ad/banner thing right, but the site is far from self-supporting (though it's doing 250,000 page views/day and rising.)

    A Cognet server? Do they have OK support? I have forgotten all the UNIX I ever knew... forceably had to learn some lately, tho.

    CHRON jobs are jobs the server fires off at a specific time, for me fellow newbie.

    Looking for a new service, I reckon.

  13. #13
    Join Date
    Apr 2002
    Posts
    1,018
    WHT runs one server sql one server web, the sql server communicates with the web server over a private 100 mb network so no lag there, web server has php accelerator installed and httpd.conf optimized, load average is usually below .3 on both servers.

  14. #14
    Join Date
    Jul 2002
    Location
    Vancouver, BC
    Posts
    1,028
    one or two rackshack servers won't ding u more than $200/month... and the servers themselves are quite excellent for forums hosting... heh... if u get the ones with $1 setup, they have no panel/etc... so can totally strip the OS down n make it run all fast n efficient...

    seriously, say no to cogent... u want performance, don't u? lol... just stick with rackshack, nice multihoming...

  15. #15
    Update: having perused these forums like a madwoman (LOL), I narrowed it down to 5 choices. The one I am going with is edge-host. Unbeatable deal, nice folks, and highly responsive so far.

    I'll be there in a week or so. Thanks so much for all the help and offers. Amazing resource, this place is! How I WISH I'd found it earlier.

  16. #16
    Originally posted by BKM
    Hi NiL,

    I'm a Newer Newbie
    I dont even know whats a chron (ok, go ahead and laugh )
    good luck.
    Laugh? Not even!

    cron (short for chronometer) is a utility that runs scripts (et. al.) at certain times. It's roughly the same as Windows' scheduler and NT's AT program.

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