Sever size
 

I notice that even though there are a bazillion people on line at this site, it flat screams as far as speed.

Can someone tell me what type of server this site uses?
Ram, CPU, etc...

My site is bogging with only 100 online users. I am using a clean vb 3.87, with no mods.

Are you on a dedicated, VPS, or shared server?

Started with shared at A2Hosting and blew by that within a few minutes. Upgraded to their VPS+.

They tell me that my mem usage is peaking at 3 gig and according to them, that's the max. I'm thinking 3 gig? I have 5 year old laptops with more memory. They are suggesting a dedicated server but are telling me that it's only 4 gig, and it cost $200 per month (an extra $120 over the VPS rate) . (ouch)

Even if I was to try and swallow that $200/mth charge, if I am peaking at 3 gig, I doubt one more gig will help.

Maybe it's time I went back to using my own server co-lo'ed somewhere... it has 64gig ram.

Are the 100 users all members, or are alot of them bots?

Please provide site URL?

There is other hosting out there with better servers i would think about moving if the one u are on cant handle what u have now

All members... I do have guests but they are limited to one small category/forum (of 175 different sections)

xRunner bots are non-existant, I turned off new registrations.

No, by bots I mean search bots.

http://ktmtalk.com

fyi: Up until a week ago, I had a very old highly customized version of Invision but it started showing signs of age (over 10 years old) so I converted to vBulletin - I am running v 3.81. I bought and could upgrade but I like the look and feel of 3.x so I stuck with it and did not convert to 4+

122,000 members, 2 million posts (2 more million waiting to be uploaded from old system)

With the old Invision software, it had a few issues (terrible search, lack of mobile skins, etc) but it was very fast... at least until it started mySql issues a week or so ago - thats when I converted to vb and, thats where I am today... a slow server on a completley clean no modded VB. (ok, not completely no-mods - I did add some adverstising on the side and top but those are not the issues slowing down the site).

--------------- Added [DATE]1387499536[/DATE] at [TIME]1387499536[/TIME] ---------------

dunno... I need to monitor those and disable them as muich as I can (I assume via robots.txt?)

First byte time from your host is terrible.

http://www.webpagetest.org/result/13...11D/1/details/

You can repeat this test and also run it from different locations, different connection types and browsers, and so on.

You have one 404 error in your waterfall, apparently a missing image.

As you can see by the waterfall chart, once the "handshake" between the server and the browser is finished, your vBulletin then loads in less than one second with only 584kb of data loaded and only 47 requests.

The issue the host is reporting has nothing to do with your vBulletin installation, it has to do with them overselling this machine it is on.

Get a responsible host.

Holy moley... thats a pretty slick tool. I fixed the missing image - it was an upper case/lower case issue.

--------------- Added [DATE]1387501257[/DATE] at [TIME]1387501257[/TIME] ---------------

Speaking of search engine bots... I thought for sure that I had something that constantly showed my the names of the search engine bots that were hitting my site - If I remember correctly, it was real-time.

Was I dreaming??

Any good recommendations for a new host (like one as fast as vBulletin.org)?

Where is this server located, it takes forever to load the site, overseas or USA?

You need a decent host for that thriving board. The host you have is probably also hosting the Obamacare website on same machine.

Oh wait. That wouldn't cause any heavy server load since nobody's using that site. Carry on.

But really, seriously - you need a decent host.

Yeah I would suggest looking here, if you are USA based.

I use them and I have to say they are the best host I have had.

They told me that it was in Michigan... lemme do an ip check and see what it shows:

http://en.utrace.de/?query=ktmtalk.com
http://en.utrace.de/?query=162.212.131.214

Shows Kansas or somewhere close

We've been online for 14 years and up until about 4 months ago, I had my own honker of a 1u server sitting on a 20mb line right into my garage but I lost the line and had to scramble to get a host - A2hosting seemed to have the best reviews (as far as support) but I doubt any of those reviewers had big-time usage.

Now I'm on the search again... I cannot tell you guys how much I appreciate your input and help.

hivelocity.net - I'll look in to them.
Any more recommendations for hosts?

That it suddenly got better, as this test I just did shows:

http://www.webpagetest.org/result/131220_77_1FV/

Means the host dealt with the real problem site that was slowing down the server. It's not you.

These dishonest companies over sell their shared hosting on purpose, then give you the upsell schtick when you have trouble. This is why i am saying get a responsible host not a upseller ripoff specialist.

IIRC Kansas is not off the main hub, so if they have a hop issue from point to point, that will slow down the site for some users but not others.

That page has a LOT of options... ranging in price from $99 per month all the way up to $1400 per month... fumnny, all more than the 4gig that A2Hosting is suggesting).

So which one (which option) do I need?

Just a guess, but I would start off with something like this one:
Then as you need to you can always add new hardware to it.

It does that all day long.... fast, slow, fast, slow... they blame it on me (my vBulletin).

It goes from really really fast, to ok, to it's coming, and finally to OMG, WTF,... go get another cup of coffee :) I can go thru all of these cycles in one hour.

It ain't vBulletin causing the problems, especially with one not modded, like yours.

You can see from the tests you don't have a massive amount of calls, and you don't have a massive amount of server or processor load. You don't even have many third party elements that could slow you down.

Your host is just using the default "you need to upgrade" nonsense. Because that's the script they have been given. Most of them aren't qualified to work at McDonald's much less as "tech support" for a hosting company.

Where did that LIKE icon come from? A plugin?
Same for that flashing envelope when I have a new PM... is that a plugin too?

Kinda neat to see new features and not have to code them myself like I have had to do for 14 years :)

Yes they can both be achieved with mods, that can be found on here. There is a whole bunch of them that handle things differently. Best bet is to search for them, and try them out.