Load problem - Help with server / xenforo optimization

[Chris D]

That's the thing. A host should be willing enough to help you to prove it the other way around. And you're totally right. You cannot possibly prove to your host that there is a server problem because you haven't got the technical knowledge to do so. But they certainly have.

Any host worth their salt would spend no more than 30 minutes looking at your logs and configs before coming to some sort of conclusion as to the cause of the issues.

The only other suggestion I have now is:

a) A XenForo ticket via the Customer Area (but this seems to be server related so it's a bit beyond the remit)
b) A fellow forum member who would be kind enough to look at your server directly. Maybe someone will volunteer.

And I still cannot access specific threads, this one for example that I've posted before, it simply doesn't load, for some reason I can't understand:

http://www.travelstories.gr/community/threads/Ταϋλάνδη-σε-10-μέρες-Τρέχουμε-τώρα.27956/

Well, of course we don't know why some threads won't load. But generally speaking it seems to be some sort of MySQL error. When I was trying to get into one of your threads previously - even with all add-ons switched off - I would eventually get hit by a MySQL Server Has Gone Away error. From what I understand, this is generally a connection issue to MySQL. If the MySQL server isn't on the same server as your web server, for example, then it could indicate a network issue.

EDIT: Also I think it's fair to add that yesterday you said your MySQL log was empty. As far as I understand it, that should never be the case so I wonder if you were looking at the correct log?

 

[Dakis]

Thanks Chris, your spending time on this is appreciated, I'm trying to solve this any way I can.

What I will do is try to repair any db tables, as just specific threads not loading seems really data-specific. We've already tried it's not plugin-related so that's the next thing I'll try now, and see what happens.

 

[Dakis]

Hmmm for the mysql log file, I don't know wtf is going on, this is the log file I'm opening up, and it's still empty:

 

[Chris D]

Is there anything interesting in the modsec_audit log?

I literally do not have a clue about most of these server issues. Hopefully someone else will have some better advice.

 

[Dakis]

Nope, not much in there. But I just got an idea, as I recently jumped on this vps from a dedicated server, the modsecurity rules that were in place in the old server might not have converted in this one - that wouldn't explain why everything was working though so far, but it's a start, I'll investigate that now.

 

[Dakis]

Bummer. modescurity rules are in place, so that's not it either. I'm rebuilding my xf search index now, not sure what else to do. Host can't see anything in the logfiles, I don't see anything in the website (in fact I've got it closed down for at least half an hour now), so I'm back to square one.

At least we've identified that the load is caused by that website, and not by another one of my sites (i've got like 10 in that vps, but all the rest are very very small)

 

[Dakis]

The host came back and said the problem comes from the /index.php file, which is the wordpress part of my site, not the /community part which is xenforo.

I will try to optimize wordpress and see what happens.

 

[Mike Edge]

As you know @Dakis we have discussed many things over the last few months via PC.. Feel free to PC me again if you'd like me to take a look.

 

[DRE]

That, to me, sounds like an excuse.

The online stats we have at ValveTime.net (http://www.valvetime.net/) are never much less than yours. And I notice your most online users ever is about 500. Ours is 2,500. When that happened (very recently), our VPS didn't buckle once.

Yet, it only has 3GB of RAM. Not sure about processor cores but I don't think it's as many as 8.

My point is, for your server to be that spec, and for him to be telling you that your server isn't good enough is frankly bull.

We use the Typhoon package at Nimbus Hosting (http://www.nimbushosting.co.uk/).

Oh. And our VPS hosts http://www.valvetime.net, http://xenmediagallery.com, http://combineoverwiki.com and in addition to all of that it also used to run http://8thos.com at the same time (we temporarily helped them out while they were between hosts).

I'm moving to Nimbus Hosting today and getting the Tornado package. Do you have a referral code or something?

 

[Chris D]

Don't think so.

You'll probably speak to Tim at some point.

Tell him I sent you

 

[DRE]

*scans their twitter for a promotional code*

 

[DRE]

Don't think so.

You'll probably speak to Tim at some point.

Tell him I sent you

http://youraccount.nimbushosting.co.uk/announcements.php

 

[Dakis]

The server's load is skyrocketing again, for no apparent reason. I'm trying to figure out if it's the forum or the wordpress that is responsible. I did install a caching plugin for wordpress, but doesn't look like it made any difference.

 

[Chris D]

Do you have any caching mechanism for XenForo?

APC and memcached should be useful.

 

[Dakis]

No. I'm starting to think that this is wordpress' fault and not xenforo's.

 

[MattW]

No. I'm starting to think that this is wordpress' fault and not xenforo's.

either way, having APC or Xcache will help reduce the load as it will pre-compile all the PHP pages.

 

[Dakis]

My host will recompile apache so it supports APC, let's see how it goes...

 

[Mike Edge]

My host will recompile apache so it supports APC, let's see how it goes...

I like Memcache better, but that's just me

 

[Dakis]

He told me xchache isn't supported by our setup.

 

[Mike Edge]

He told me xchache isn't supported by our setup.

Use Memcache