I have a dedicated server that tends to get a bit bogged down this time of day, i am wondering if incresing the servers memory will reduce server load? Its a entry level server, p4 2ghz with 1gig of ram I can upgrade it for a one time free of $300 per gig of ram What do you think? Will this help much?
What is the O\S? Can you tell how much of the RAM is being used (i.e. is it swapping). If it is a Unix box the TOP command will tell you that. Depending on how many users you are serving though I would think 2 gigs of RAM would be a good option for you. RAM will help things. I had the same situation about 2 years ago and went to 2 gigs and it worked out well.
The only way to tell is if you log in via ssh during peak times and look at top or free -m .Those two commands will tell you how much memory is being used and how much is free. Top will also tell you how much cpu is being used. Then you will know whether its the lack of memory that is slowing down your server or the lack of CPU power. BTW $300 per GB of RAM is too expensive. Should be more like $30.
My web host charges the same thing $295. You are paying them to install the RAM as well. Since it is their server you don't have much of a choice.
If your site starts using swap, adding RAM will help a lot. However, if it's not, you will need to consider CPU or other things. Anyway, have you tried to optimize your system yet? He mentioned one time, not monthly charge. It will need to count shipping cost, installation service, guarantee too
As every body has suggested, you need to find out Your CPU usage Your Memory usage If it is the CPU, I will suspect it is bad database design. Memory will not help. If it is memory, you need to find out who is chewing up your memory. If you have millions of records in your database, it will consume a large amount of memory. If that is the case, you are laughing all the way to the bank )), just upgrade your memory to 2Gig.
The server is self managed, i have had it for 6-8 months and done nothing with it, in regards to updating any software, the server company is planning to upgrade it from php 4.x to php 5 but other than that nothing is new on there. currently this time of day 8:00am GMT the server runs quick, current usage is: Server Load 1.11 (1 cpu) Memory Used 45.1 % Swap Used 0.38 % I got this through the servers WHM, i dont know anything about SSH etc, Its a linux server, no idea on what OS is installed, there is probably about 30-40 small sites on the server, nothing that requires too much resources, but during peak time its definitely noticeable, i will check server status again tonight in about 10 hours when it seem to slow down so we can see the difference and hopefully work out if more RAM will help $300 is a lot of $$$ if its not going to help. Regards
server can be tweaked as well as initial load reducing. But it may be depending on your usage may I know what you use server for? static site? forum? dynamic site? proixes? etc..?
There is a few article directories, they all run of one central mysql database, then there are some ecommerce sites that use oscommerce and oscommerce max. Also there are a few turnkey sites, such as lyrics sites, Recipe sites etc and a SMF forum, the forum is not massively active and the most active site only gets around 3,000 UV a day. Im also now running an apache update, hopefuly that may help a little also.
So at off peak times cpu load is 1.11? 8am is off peak for you? Whats the load figure at peak times? If that is the off peak load figure I think you may need to upgrade your CPU.
Swap tells you whether you need RAM upgrade. For your case, the bottleneck is your CPU. Time to move on to a better CPU server. Adding more RAM won't help you to lower your CPU load I'm afraid. If you're not financially ready to upgrade the server, try to optimize your Apache & mySQL. Cheers.
May be it is time for you to move to a new server. Without knowing how much you are paying and assuming you are moentizing your 3,000 UV for a decent income, I would suggest moving to a better server by sacrificing a fraction of your profits. You need to keep your visitors before that start leaving your site because of slow speed. $200-$250 per month will give you a dual core server with 2 gig of memory
Cause you don't know any thing about ssh, I doubt your apache, php, mysql have been optimized yet Hire an experienced admin to do it for you. It's not very expensive for that task, and you can notice the difference. Remember, memory usage in Linux is different than in Windows. The OS takes memory to put it into cache, then control the memory usage of each application. If your application can be optimized, of course, the memory usage will be better
yes, i agree with this. high load means the CPU is maxed out. if you don't have enough memory, what you get is errors, rather than high load.
I wish i could afford $200+ a month, unfortunatley your way off with your estimates, if i were to pay that much i would be broke in no time. Im am going to have to stick with this server for the time being until my revenue is up enough to upgrade. thanks for all your replies
I bet a cheap dreamhost or servage account would hold your stuff just fine. Doesn't sound like you know enough to have a dedicated nor the sites that would even require you to have one. I have my own server and I also have a Dreamhost and 2 servage accounts. I actually have more on one Servage account than my server and the dreamhost account combined and it runs just peachy for $6 a month. The great thing about Servage is clustered hosting...this is extremely important as the load is truly spread out. They also have I think over 60 MYSQL servers. If I have a problem with one of my sites sql...I just create a new database on a different server and bingo...problems solved. Doesn't sound to me like you need this dedicated. It's very old and should be placed in the museum. Hosts are a LOT stronger now than what you are running.
Thanks for your input "RectangleMan" I think i will be just fine with the server for the time being, i will try and optimize it and get the best i can from it, so far even though the sever can get bogged down at peak time, i have never had any major problems or downtime with it, Ive had a horrible time with reseller account and VPS in the past so although it may slow down a little at times i will be sticking with the museum relic for a while yet.