Web Hosting - Next Steps, Options & Recommendations
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What do the long term averages show for memory, cpu and IO per process including iowait? I'd guess that cpu usage is low or very low but either memory usage is high or IO is choking. Do you have RRDtool (or similar) setup for performance analysis/graphing, if you don't it will really help you understand where the system is struggling.
Are your sites DB backed? do you have one instance of MySQL (or similar) serving all sites or one instance per site? Do you thinly provision sites in apache as vhosts or does each get a virtualised centos instance.
My gut instinct is you've over specified the CPU, underspecified memory and IO performance so your server is spending most it is time waiting for in memory data to be paged to disk and/or read back from disk. I'd suspect 8GB of ram and 10k SAS disk and a slower CPU would generate a significant performance benefit.
Are your sites DB backed? do you have one instance of MySQL (or similar) serving all sites or one instance per site? Do you thinly provision sites in apache as vhosts or does each get a virtualised centos instance.
My gut instinct is you've over specified the CPU, underspecified memory and IO performance so your server is spending most it is time waiting for in memory data to be paged to disk and/or read back from disk. I'd suspect 8GB of ram and 10k SAS disk and a slower CPU would generate a significant performance benefit.
I think you've hit the nail on the head there. CPU usage is generally low, 10-20% even at peak times but memory usage is consistently around 3GB of the 4GB available.
I think we also have only one instance of MySQL serving all of the sites and we currently have 77 databases! Each site is setup as a vhost in Apache, so again, looks like we're stretching our resources too far.
Thanks for the advice, really helpful.
I think we also have only one instance of MySQL serving all of the sites and we currently have 77 databases! Each site is setup as a vhost in Apache, so again, looks like we're stretching our resources too far.
Thanks for the advice, really helpful.
You could just hive mysql off onto a dedicated server. You'll take a hit on latency by doing this but with effective query and page caching it shouldn't be noticeable to end users so long as both servers are interconnected through the same switch with decent local network port speed.
tvr_rich said:
I think you've hit the nail on the head there. CPU usage is generally low, 10-20% even at peak times but memory usage is consistently around 3GB of the 4GB available.
I think we also have only one instance of MySQL serving all of the sites and we currently have 77 databases! Each site is setup as a vhost in Apache, so again, looks like we're stretching our resources too far.
Thanks for the advice, really helpful.
What can happen with Apache is if a page is slow to render or process you can end up spawning hundreds of httpd processes to serve quite a modest load, and you can start to run out of memory or other resource and fall into a bit of a spiral that ends in something getting upset. Maybe I/O is slow, maybe the code is doing something weird. You could do with someone sysadminy going over it - or just throw an expensive server at it and hope.I think we also have only one instance of MySQL serving all of the sites and we currently have 77 databases! Each site is setup as a vhost in Apache, so again, looks like we're stretching our resources too far.
Thanks for the advice, really helpful.
Nginx isn't massively faster than apache it isn't going to make a site that takes 20s to load take <1s.
Rackspace seriously rock for support - don't know if even they'd get into performance issues in the code though. It's like selling you a car vs. teaching you to drive it. They will sell you the kitchen sink and the QE2 to put it in if you give them the chance. There is close to a 10x difference in price between managed ops where they might get involved and managed infrastructure which means is it switched on and plugged in.
I find plesk, cpanel et. al. to be amongst the biggest targets going for hack attempts. It's not that hard to do without them if you get a basic setup on and get yourself some vhost templates & procedures set up.
I help two small design agencies with sysadmin stuff but am obliterated with work at the moment (he says posting on ph
)Thanks for advice, all very helpful.
Webfusion are putting a proposal together now based on our new requirements and the points I've highlighted from this thread. They're getting their sysadmin people to have a look as well, as people have mentioned here, just throwing resources at this could be costly and unnecessary.
Webfusion are putting a proposal together now based on our new requirements and the points I've highlighted from this thread. They're getting their sysadmin people to have a look as well, as people have mentioned here, just throwing resources at this could be costly and unnecessary.
That's a good point, we initially went for a dedicated server, as we had plans to build 50-100 websites and required separate IP addresses for each one for SSL certificates. At the time, we found that with most VPS/basic hosting packages there were limits on the amount of websites we could host and restrictions which we couldn't work around.
We've now scaled back those plans and decided to focus on a smaller group of websites/projects, so maybe we should be looking at it from a different angle.
Looking at the standard web hosting and VPS packages from Heart Internet, Memset etc. looks like we might need to consider a simple solution.
We've now scaled back those plans and decided to focus on a smaller group of websites/projects, so maybe we should be looking at it from a different angle.
Looking at the standard web hosting and VPS packages from Heart Internet, Memset etc. looks like we might need to consider a simple solution.
I'll say one last time, find a Devops or sysadmin type company. If they provide hosting, great - if not stay where you are. The tin is generic, anyone can supply and host it, it's how to make the best of the hardware, the application and the LAMP stack underneath it that you need someone to sort out
Thanks for the advice Andy, all taken on board and very helpful.
Webfusion have come back with a proposal, massive overkill, almost x10 times our current costs! Not happy, as they said they would look at our sites and take into consideration our current usage levels. They also can't offer an enhanced support package and with our support tickets taking on average 24 hours to be responded to, think it's time to move!
Webfusion have come back with a proposal, massive overkill, almost x10 times our current costs! Not happy, as they said they would look at our sites and take into consideration our current usage levels. They also can't offer an enhanced support package and with our support tickets taking on average 24 hours to be responded to, think it's time to move!
Also, based on the comments about the speed of the site in my profile, we've spent some time tweaking the code and it's now running considerable quicker! Rolled out the same changes to our whole network of sites. Thanks to all for highlighting this and proves the point made by others that a higher spec server isn't going to solve all of our problems.
Just a quick update on this, after everyone's recommendations we transferred over our sites to TSOHOST.
I contacted x3 other hosting companies who offered comparable services but TSOHOST were the best fit. We needed a managed solution and after speaking to one of their directors, they suggested separate virtual servers for our main sites and cloud hosting for our smaller projects. The main difference was that they listened to our requirements and didn't push us down the route of expensive powerful dedicated servers, with more resources than we need.
So far the service has been fantastic and our websites are running very smoothly, would highly recommend them.
I contacted x3 other hosting companies who offered comparable services but TSOHOST were the best fit. We needed a managed solution and after speaking to one of their directors, they suggested separate virtual servers for our main sites and cloud hosting for our smaller projects. The main difference was that they listened to our requirements and didn't push us down the route of expensive powerful dedicated servers, with more resources than we need.
So far the service has been fantastic and our websites are running very smoothly, would highly recommend them.
tvr_rich said:
Just a quick update on this, after everyone's recommendations we transferred over our sites to TSOHOST.
I contacted x3 other hosting companies who offered comparable services but TSOHOST were the best fit. We needed a managed solution and after speaking to one of their directors, they suggested separate virtual servers for our main sites and cloud hosting for our smaller projects. The main difference was that they listened to our requirements and didn't push us down the route of expensive powerful dedicated servers, with more resources than we need.
So far the service has been fantastic and our websites are running very smoothly, would highly recommend them.
Told you, they are just brilliant.I contacted x3 other hosting companies who offered comparable services but TSOHOST were the best fit. We needed a managed solution and after speaking to one of their directors, they suggested separate virtual servers for our main sites and cloud hosting for our smaller projects. The main difference was that they listened to our requirements and didn't push us down the route of expensive powerful dedicated servers, with more resources than we need.
So far the service has been fantastic and our websites are running very smoothly, would highly recommend them.
budfox said:
tvr_rich said:
Just a quick update on this, after everyone's recommendations we transferred over our sites to TSOHOST.
I contacted x3 other hosting companies who offered comparable services but TSOHOST were the best fit. We needed a managed solution and after speaking to one of their directors, they suggested separate virtual servers for our main sites and cloud hosting for our smaller projects. The main difference was that they listened to our requirements and didn't push us down the route of expensive powerful dedicated servers, with more resources than we need.
So far the service has been fantastic and our websites are running very smoothly, would highly recommend them.
Told you, they are just brilliant.I contacted x3 other hosting companies who offered comparable services but TSOHOST were the best fit. We needed a managed solution and after speaking to one of their directors, they suggested separate virtual servers for our main sites and cloud hosting for our smaller projects. The main difference was that they listened to our requirements and didn't push us down the route of expensive powerful dedicated servers, with more resources than we need.
So far the service has been fantastic and our websites are running very smoothly, would highly recommend them.
6 weeks and they're still trying to migrate one of my sites....
jammy_basturd said:
When was the last contact you had with them regarding the transfer? Any reason they've given for the delay/time taken?
No reason given. They've told me it's all working a couple of times, i've replied with all the pages that aren't working, they've tried to fix them...Anyway, decided to transfer it myself now - i've got a couple of evenings free this week...
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