# somthing is slowing things down: 11:00 Seattle



## jester47

11:00 Seattle.

There is somthing slowing the boards down.  I am waiting about 8-12 seconds between page loads on average and up to 35 seconds in some cases.  This seems severe now that we have the new server.  If it were peak hours I would not be concerned, but it isn't.  There are 570 users on line.  

I hope this is not due to traffic on the reviews and downloads section.  

Aaron.


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## Michael Morris

I can check.  The downloads section is the most likely culprit - but I can reduce the number of simulataneous connections allowed to it if necessary.  Also check your own connection speed using an internet speed test like www.bandwidth.com


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## Hand of Evil

Noticing a slow down at least a refreah rate.


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## Allanon

I've been having speed issues for a good portion of the day. Sometimes the speed increases but most of the time even small topics take about 5 to 8 minutes to open. Large topics are even worse taking over 10 minutes to show. It's not my internet connection or a proxy server as other sites (wizards.com, tweakers.net, froogle.com, google.com, gmail.google.com, etc.) have not slowed down.

I'll see if there is any change if I try it at home later todat but for now enworld feels almost as sluggish as with the old server.

EDIT: to be more exact the problem seems to be in the thread showing. The main page and the general forum listings are speedy as ever (even after purging my cache) but as soon as I request a topic it takes ages to be shown on screen.
Browser used IE, version 6.0.2800.1106.xpsp2.030422-1633 (in case it matters )


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## Darkness

Site's very sluggish for me but other sites (e.g., rpg.net) work just fine.


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## jester47

Some clarifications:  It was 11:00 PM.

Bandwidth is fine, but I checked again this morning before the roommate started his World of Warcrafting...

Still slow. 

Because its my profession, I am inclined to be paranoid and say that we might want to consider the possibilty that the server is getting used in another aspect beyond running the site.  How much do our servers caretakers know about security auditing?

Aaron.


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## Piratecat

Interesting. I'm finding it blazingly fast.


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## Ankh-Morpork Guard

Its a bit slow for me, actually. Not unbearable, though.


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## IronWolf

It's a little sluggish through the lunch time rush here....  Not as bad as before the server upgrade, but not nearly as quick as just after the upgrade.


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## Cthulhu's Librarian

It's slow for me, not too much faster than before the surver upgrade. Not unbearable, but definitly slow.


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## Michael Morris

I'll investigate.  My first hunch is downloads - that's the newest addition and is therefore the most suspect.


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## Cthulhu's Librarian

And now 10 minutes later it's down to a crawl...


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## Michael Morris

No downloads are in progress or have been done in the last 20 minutes.  I've dialed down the maximum allowed connections to 50, but that's not it.

The next suspect is the reviews section.  From a database optimization standpoint that thing is horribly written (I'm not trying to be mean - there's just no other way to say it).  It wouldn't surprise me that having that database active again is causing the lag.

I can turn off some un-neccessary frills, like the redirects system, but I'd rather hold off and hold off until I get Thomas to take a look at the log.  A lot of things can cause lag, not just the server itself.  And my inclination is that it isn't the server, but something enroute, that's getting stained.


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## EricNoah

Slow for me here, too.

edit: I keep seeing it sort of "hang" on two or three specific files.  I can't see the whole string but I see

statistics_java...
phpads
images/anniversary ?

But then this could just be because it's slow in general and each bit of the site is taking longer to load up.


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## pdkoning

Here it also seems incredibly slow. (speed about 500 bytes/second) and long times before http requests get answered. The ping times although, are normal: arround 120-130 msec. Most servers in the USA have a ping time of arround 130 msec (I checked some). So the connection is not the point. It appears to be the server load.


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## Michael Morris

I just turned something off.  Does that help?


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## EricNoah

I'm not noticing a difference.  

Any thoughts about why my computer would be re-downloading images (the buttons, etc.) each time?  Is there a cache setting (on your end or maybe on my end) that would be forcing this to happen?


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## DMH

No. I have a cable connection and last night and today each page takes 1-3 minutes to load. Heck while I am typing this the smilies are slowly being added. Now they are there.


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## pdkoning

No, it is not anything faster now.
Like EricNoah said: it looks like things are not stored in the cache, the smilies indeed have to reload every time. This might be the case with other items that are usually retrieved from the local browser cache and are now retransmitted every time.


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## Michael Morris

EricNoah said:
			
		

> I'm not noticing a difference.
> 
> Any thoughts about why my computer would be re-downloading images (the buttons, etc.) each time?  Is there a cache setting (on your end or maybe on my end) that would be forcing this to happen?




Yes, It was turned on.  Turned that off.


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## Hand of Evil

Piratecat is eatting all the bandwidth!    

No improvement.


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## BSF

It's still looking pretty darned slow for me at this time.  We have an 8Mb connection to the internet and I am able to pull up multiple sites while waiting for a thread to appear on EN World.  

It is very odd since everything seemed fine yesterday.


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## Michael Morris

This is very depressing.  I've restarted apache.


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## Allanon

I'm at home now and the speed still is dreadfull. I timed opening this topic with a stopwatch and it took 7 minutes and 23 seconds. As others have stated everything seems to come directly from the server as virtually nothing seems to instantly appear from cache.

I'm on a 2048 down/1024 up ADSL connection at home with no proxy server or badly configured firewall in site. Other american sites have not problems loading whatsoever. 
I've tried both Firefox and IE from here an it makes no difference. I retract my former statement in that it seems localised to leading threads as the main forum pages are slow too.

Firefox shows a lot of 'Waiting for Enworld" messages so either the communication is interupted somewhere along the line or the server itself is slow, but seeing as no other sites are experiencing the same slowdown option number 2 seems more likely.

EDIT: mmm... suddenly Firefox seems a lot faster but that could be due to a better caching routine...


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## BSF

Michael,
I can see where you would be frustrated.  Do you have access to the server itself?  Maybe you can check the performance?  I'm not convinced this is an issue with the server though.  Especially since Piratecat indicated it was working great for him.  

I believe Cyberstreet uses multiple data paths don't they?  Is it possible that one of the lines is in a degraded state?  Perhaps some users are coming in on one data pathway and others are coming in on a different data pathway?  

I'm just tossing out ideas here.  Without knowing how the infrastructure is configured, it is hard to guess at.


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## Michael Morris

I have turned reviews off to see if it's the cause.


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## EricNoah

Let's see, is Mortality.net on Cyberstreet?  Maybe I'll give that a shot...

Edit: Mortality was blazin'.


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## Michael Morris

MySQL's memory use dropped significantly - so I'm starting to think it is reviews causing the trouble.  I need outside confirmation though - for the record my page loads have never dropped outside the 1 minute window.


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## EricNoah

Speed has picked up momentarily at least for me.

Edit: spoke too soon... still slow.


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## pdkoning

Now images are loaded from my local cache!  -> a real speed increase. I think it is a good idea to wait until everyone has visited enough pages on enworld to have everything important in their cache, and than see if everything returns to normal speed again.


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## reanjr

The site isn't exactly blazing, but neither is it slow.  5 second load times seem the norm.


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## BSF

Wow.  It just sped up dramatically for me.


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## Super Girl

4 minutes and 38 seconds when i forced this thread to refresh.  I'm on cable.


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## Michael Morris

Ok, I'm going to turn reviews back on now - see if was the caching, or if it was the reviews.


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## Michael Morris

Super Girl said:
			
		

> 4 minutes and 38 seconds when i forced this thread to refresh.  I'm on cable.




I don't understand how I can be loading at 30 seconds / page and, at the same time, your experiencing a 4 minute load. Check the quality of your connection and your own machine first please.

People, understand that there are things other than the server that can cause slowdowns.  That's why I tend to ignore one or two people complaining.  When several dozen start complaining though chances are good the problem is on this side.

EDIT: Calming down now - calming down.


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## pdkoning

To me it look's like it's the caching.
Now the reviews are turned on, smileys and other images still load from cache.


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## Ankh-Morpork Guard

Michael Morris said:
			
		

> There is no way in hell I can be loading at 30 seconds / page and, at the same time, your experiencing a 4 minute load. Check the quality of your connection and your own machine first please.
> 
> People, understand that there are things other than the server that can cause slowdowns.  That's why I tend to ignore one or two people complaining.  When several dozen start complaining though chances are good the problem is on this side.



 I'm getting those long load times, too. But they aren't consistent and only happen here and there. From what I can tell, the page just won't display. It tells me that its loaded completely but will only display the 3e logo background. I know my connection is fine, as I'm having no trouble with other sites.

EDIT: Though now its sped it considerably...


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## EricNoah

Still sluggish for me too, not really all that different from before.  I'm seeing fewer signs of images downloading, and the text of the site loads up reasonably fast somtimes, but it's like some of the advertising or counter/statistics related php stuff is taking longer to finish up.


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## Michael Morris

Yeah.  I'm starting to think so to.  I'm gonna turn stats back on too.  Turning caching off on a board this large is impossible without a dedicated image server.


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## Michael Morris

Eric, it can take a few hours for all the user's browsers to recache all the images - so we may not see a return to normal until then.  Let's wait until this time tomorrow and see if things improve.


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## Super Girl

> There is no way in hell I can be loading at 30 seconds / page and, at the same time, your experiencing a 4 minute load. Check the quality of your connection and your own machine first please.
> 
> People, understand that there are things other than the server that can cause slowdowns. That's why I tend to ignore one or two people complaining. When several dozen start complaining though chances are good the problem is on this side.




According to your bandwidth website: 2,959.1 kbps 
Computer Stats:
2.54 Gigahertz P4
512 MB RAM

I am not having issues with any other site, normally I don't have any issues with this site, just lately (last couple of days)


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## Darkness

Still sluggish. Loading this reply page took 43 seconds. (Previous one: 66 seconds.)


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## Michael Morris

Super Girl said:
			
		

> According to your bandwidth website: 2,959.1 kbps
> Computer Stats:
> 2.54 Gigahertz P4
> *512 MB RAM*
> 
> I am not having issues with any other site, normally I don't have any issues with this site, just lately (last couple of days)




Well, let's see if the cache reworks for you.  Meanwhile, that RAM count is pretty low for (I presume) an XP machine.  I recommend at least 1 gig for XP.


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## Henry

I'd better reply too, to give you more sample. I'm in the South Carolina Area, on a fairly slow connect (128K), but the page loads have slowed SPECIFICALLY today, after 12pm. From the new server's inception to now, I've been receiving nothing but 5 to 10 second downloads. SOMETHING has changed within the past 5 hours to dramatically reduce my page loads specifically from ENWOrld; WotC's site, hp's site, and numerous others have not changed in download speed.


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## pdkoning

The site runs at an acceptable speed again as far as I can see from Holland. But it still appears not as fast as it used to be recently


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## Henry

Michael Morris said:
			
		

> Well, let's see if the cache reworks for you.  Meanwhile, that RAM count is pretty low for (I presume) an XP machine.  I recommend at least 1 gig for XP.




I don't mean to doubt you, Michael, but even 256MB RAM is ample for XP, especially for something as light-duty as web browsing. While I don't recommend below 128, 512MB RAM is more than enough for most XP duties, with the exception of video editing or game play or similar tasks.


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## Jaws

*It's slow again.*

I want my money back.


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## Michael Morris

Jaws said:
			
		

> I want my money back.



 You're joking right?


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## Jaws

Michael Morris said:
			
		

> You're joking right?



Yes. I know you will work it out.


Peace and smiles 

j.


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## Super Girl

Henry said:
			
		

> I don't mean to doubt you, Michael, but even 256MB RAM is ample for XP, especially for something as light-duty as web browsing. While I don't recommend below 128, 512MB RAM is more than enough for most XP duties, with the exception of video editing or game play or similar tasks.




I don't video edit, but I do play video games, and I have never had any slow down, or gone over 50% useage, I was going to upgrade eventually, but have never run into a situation where I needed more then I had.


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## Cyberzombie

Slow most of the day, but not nearly as bad as the Bad Old Days (last month).  It was especially bad when I went to the reply page instead of my usual quick reply.


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## Turjan

Ah, good that this has been noticed. I had load times of several minutes per page today. RPG.net (with 570 users) loaded within 2 seconds at the same time, so it's not my machine. It's somewhat better now, but still slow.

Edit: Funny ! Just in this very moment, it got fast !


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## EricNoah

Things do seem faster now (5:30pm central).  I'm seeing less lag overall.


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## Hand of Evil

Screaming for me now (7:45 PM EST) and I am at home with a 56K modem and about a 1000 users online, see it was PirateCat eatting all the bandwidth.


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## jester47

It is moving faster for me now too...

Aaron.


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## Darkness

Faster but still sluggish for me.


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## Mark

Darkness said:
			
		

> Faster but still sluggish for me.




Me, too.  Late this morning the whole site slowed down to a crawl (several minutes to load a page).  As of early evening, it has increased in speed to about where it was prior to the server upgrade (30-45 seconds a page).  Since the upgrade and up until this morning, pages were loading in a matter of moments.


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## Michael Morris

Well, the downloads page has been installed in that timeframe, so that's the most likely culprit.  I've dialed down the allowed connections to see if that will help.


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## Allanon

I'm not experiencing any more slowdown at the moment. Site is loading smoothly all the way  Happy Happy Joy Joy


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## Hand of Evil

At work now 6:20 AM 526 users online T1 connection and I don't know.  It looks like it is faster but there is a slow down on displaying/refreshing the contents of the page. 

Getting better.


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## HellHound

Screamin'ly quick for me.


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## Adlon

Site is about as fast for me as the day it was launched, but I seem to have missed yesterday's visit here....

The server, and it's security, has been checked out: al is well.


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## Mark

20 - 25 seconds for page loads as of this posting


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## Ankh-Morpork Guard

Mine's slowing down again...its about the same time it did this yesterday.


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## IronWolf

Just throwing my me too into the ring.  Page loads are pretty slow again (15 seconds or so?).


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## Cthulhu's Librarian

I'm noticing a slowdown again this afternoon. Instead of the 2-3 second page loads I was getting, It's up around 20-30 seconds.


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## EricNoah

Yep, same here -- also seeing lots of images re-downloading.


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## jester47

Hrm, judgeing from the accounts the problem seems cyclical.  It has sped up more since my last post.  

A.


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## Turjan

An hour ago it was very slow (for comparison, rpg.net had the usual 2 second response), and now it's not fast but better (maximally half a minute per page, usually better).


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## Felonious Ntent

EricNoah said:
			
		

> Yep, same here -- also seeing lots of images re-downloading.




Same here.
Often text will beradable while images loading


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## Mark

10 - 15 second page loads, 20 - 25 second post/edit response times, as of this posting


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## Cyberzombie

Today I have been getting pretty standard dialup performance.  Nothing to write home about, but nothing unusual.  On some pages the banner ad never loads, but not all of them.


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## msd

Pretty slow...bizarre.


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## Michael Morris

Adlon's already confirmed what I suspected - that the problem, whatever it is, is in the route to the server; not the server itself.  So this should clear up in a few days on its own.  In the meanwhile, there's really nothing that can be done about from the server end.


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## Darkness

This reply page took 14 seconds to load. Getting better...


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## alsih2o

3 minute page loads here, and all my normal sites seem to be plenty fast- Fark, Damnation Army, PVP, Something Positive, LJ, ConceptArt..

 Good luck finding what it is.


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## BryonD

Off and On very quick and very slow for me.

Right now is very very slow


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## Michael Morris

Read the announcement in the navbar - I'm running a background process that will, by its nature, slow things down.  I could shut the boards down entirely if you prefer 

It's been running 6 hours - should be close to getting done now.


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## Ankh-Morpork Guard

Read the annoucement up at the top of the pages. Michael's set up a mirror to test some things and its going to keep things slow for a bit. 

Edit: Woah...EXACT same time as Michael's post.


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## Thomas Heretic

How is speed now?


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## Darkness

Now it's fine. Better than an hour ago, too.


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## IronWolf

Just fine here, no slowdowns for the time being....


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## Ankh-Morpork Guard

Yep, speed is great.


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## Mark

Back to the quickest I have seen yet.


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## Crothian

ya, things are flying.....


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## GentleGiant

I just experienced some serious delays and even time outs when trying to open threads.
Just now, so that's just after 8 p.m. EST.
Edit: But this went straight through, so maybe it was just a fluke...


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