Clearing IP addresses from the database

[Jayphen]

Is there a way to quickly and safely delete all stored IP addresses from the database? Whenever I query to find out what users are registered with identical IP addresses, my entire forum freezes up for around 10 minutes due to the server load. I want to clear the IP address field from the db to quicken this search up in the future.

[Marco van Herwaarden]

Try setting IP's not to resolve to names in your vB Options and see if that helps.

[Jayphen]

Hmm it's already turned off.

I'd prefer to just clean out the database. The forum has been up for around 4 years, with at least 10000 members coming and going over that period of time, so it's grown pretty large.

[Marco van Herwaarden]

How exactly are you searching?

PS Maybe adding an extra index could also solve your problem.

[Paul M]

This has been mentioned before - add an index on the ip address, it works wonders. I had to do this a while ago. :)

[Reeve of shinra]

We really need a consolidated place for these kinds of tips.

[Jayphen]

I'm going to User Options on the user, which takes me to admincp.. I choose View IP Adresses, and it gives me a list of IP addresses they have posted with in the past.. I then click 'Find More Users with this IP Address', and this is when the server freezes for 10 minutes or so.

What do you mean by add an extra index to the IP address?