What should I do?

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  • theprof
    Senior Member
    • May 2000
    • 189

    What should I do?

    Here's my situation. I run a large board at http://www.romanceforums.com and during peak periods, I can have up to 250 users simultaeneously.

    However, upgrading from 1.16 proved a disaster. Pages kept timing out, errors such as

    Database error in vBulletin: Link-ID == false, connect failed
    mysql error:
    mysql error number:
    Date: Tuesday 27th of March 2001 05:19:46 PM


    were frequent. So, I upgraded mysql to the latest version, thinking that my woes would be solved. Alas, the load averages, which under the previous 1.1x keep around 1, ballooned to 20. I quickly downgraded and used the old forums back again, running on a backed up database.

    After that, I doubled my ram to 512 MB, and upgraded. However, I could not run search, online users, dot folders and a host of other things.

    I'm seriously thinking of switching back to the old vbulletin, upgrading it via hacks, and keeping it at that.

    Hardware:

    Webhost: Rackspace
    Operating System : RedHat Linux 6.2
    Processor : 650 Mhz
    Memory : 256MB RAM
    Hard Drive 1 : 20GB EIDE
    IP Address(es) : 1 IP
    Bandwidth : 75GB/Month

    Here is my extended status file: http://www.adolescentadulthood.com/status.php

    Here are my recent stats


    Here's my my.cnf file

    set-variable = max_connections=150
    set-variable = join_buffer=3M
    set-variable = key_buffer=16M
    set-variable = record_buffer=4M
    set-variable = sort_buffer=5M
    set-variable = table_cache=256

    Bottomline: I think in my situation, it would be better to remain with the old vbulletin, add the pm hack and poll hack, and leave it at that. A forum without search is useless, so is a forum which generates too many errors due to server overload

    I dont want to downgrade, but I see no way out......

    Suggestions anyone?
    Last edited by theprof; Wed 28 Mar '01, 6:38am.
  • theprof
    Senior Member
    • May 2000
    • 189

    #2

    Comment

    • jojo85
      Senior Member
      • Jan 2001
      • 915

      #3
      Originally posted by theprof
      What is this??It's the post per day or the thread or the users??

      Comment

      • Wayne Luke
        vBulletin Technical Support Lead
        • Aug 2000
        • 73979

        #4
        Chances are you are getting the same number of Connection errors under 1.1.X as well, however since the technical email address was in the database, it couldn't be retrieved when this happened.

        Here are some tips to get the database working better and improve performance.

        1. Go into the MySQL forum and read up on Optimizations. Especially on your buffers and table cache. You are reaching the maximum allowed on your caches and connections.
        2. Convert your 3.23.XX database tables to the MyISAM format as these improve performance and reliability.
        3. Increase your MAX_Connections to 300.
        4. Install Kier's Avatar hack which will remove avatars from the Database and place them in the file system.
        5. Increase your memory. With that many concurrent connections you should have 768 or 1 gig of memory.

        Database servers are resource hogs. You have to give them a lot of room to breathe and grow or they will choke your system. MySQL is no exception to this.

        For the search to work, you will have to reindex it. Do this in sections starting from your highest threadid and working down as you go. I would suggest doing these in 2000 thread blocks. During the Reindexing process your server will spike but it should be able to handle it. I run vBulletin 2 Beta 3 on a similar server at SitePointForums.com and while we don't get as many concurrent connections, the system is running stable.
        Translations provided by Google.

        Wayne Luke
        The Rabid Badger - a vBulletin Cloud demonstration site.
        vBulletin 5 API

        Comment

        • George L
          Former vBulletin Support
          • May 2000
          • 32996
          • 3.8.x

          #5
          theprof

          seems you my.cnf settings need updating again

          change max_connections to 300 as wayne suggested and up your table_cache from 256 to 800

          your extended-status output shows that both your max connections and table_cache reached the my.cnf limit you set - as you forum grows these settings will need retuning...

          then restart mysql again and monitor your stats for the next 2 days and see
          :: Always Back Up Forum Database + Attachments BEFORE upgrading !
          :: Nginx SPDY SSL - World Flags Demo [video results]
          :: vBulletin hacked forums: Clean Up Guide for VPS/Dedicated hosting users [ vbulletin.com blog summary ]

          Comment

          • Steve Machol
            Former Customer Support Manager
            • Jul 2000
            • 154488

            #6
            I don't know if this is applicable or not since I'm on a shared server, but I'm getting the same mySQL errors as you. And these keep happening even though I'm only running a test forum with only 1-2 people online at any given time.

            Here's the link to my problem:

            Steve Machol, former vBulletin Customer Support Manager (and NOT retired!)
            Change CKEditor Colors to Match Style (for 4.1.4 and above)

            Steve Machol Photography


            Mankind is the only creature smart enough to know its own history, and dumb enough to ignore it.


            Comment

            • BilldaCat
              New Member
              • Dec 2000
              • 26

              #7
              Hmm.. I'm on a shared server as well, and just got the first of these errors, after about 2 hours of running..

              Comment

              • RobAC
                Senior Member
                • Jan 2001
                • 1414
                • 3.8.x

                #8
                I've been experiencing the same problems ever since I enabled the Avatars option on my Forums. I have been running the beta 3 version ever since it was released and I started getting the same errors 2-3 weeks after it was already installed....as soon as I turned on the Avatar option. At first I got bombarded with error messages and then it gradually fell off to about 3-5 error messages per day. Here is a link to a thread I started here about this same issue:



                I've spoken with my hosting provider, and they can not find anything wrong. It sounds to me like this could be more of a widespread problem that goes beyond MySQL settings on a server and worthy of further investigation. I didn't have this problem with 1.1.6.

                Now that I think of it, I'm going to turn off the Avatars and see what happens over the next 24 hours.
                Rob

                Comment

                • BilldaCat
                  New Member
                  • Dec 2000
                  • 26

                  #9
                  Mine both happened on the main page, where I include the # of people logged into the forums, etc.. this may be causing too many queries, etc.. as my site does get hit pretty heavily at times (140k page views a day).. maybe I'll have to remove that, which sucks as it drives a lot of people to my forums.

                  Comment

                  • RobAC
                    Senior Member
                    • Jan 2001
                    • 1414
                    • 3.8.x

                    #10
                    Well as one member here already posted above, he's been getting the same errors on a test forum with only 1-2 members online at any given time. I've seen the same problem. I can have anywhere from 1-25 users on at once and I still receive the errors regardless of how many are on at the same time.

                    According to my hosting provider, they temporarily shutdown the MySQL database every hour on the hour to kill any unclosed connections caused by bad coding. This is when the error message seems to occur; when someone does something to make a call to the database and the database is in that 1-2 minute reboot phase at the top of the hour.

                    Again, I wasn't having this problem the first few weeks that beta 3 was running and other than turning the Avatar option on, I don't see what else could have possibly changed to initiate this kind of problem. Assuming that this is a normal practice for my hosting provider, I would have received these warning messages as soon as I installed vBulletin on my server.
                    Last edited by RobAC; Wed 28 Mar '01, 10:30am.
                    Rob

                    Comment

                    • theprof
                      Senior Member
                      • May 2000
                      • 189

                      #11
                      I think I will downgrade:

                      An email

                      Its improved, i can now get past the first page. But i notice that after a page
                      comes up IE is still i waiting for the odd picture to come up which never
                      arrives even after 3 minutes or so but at least the text is there.

                      The pages don't seem to always come up immediately sometimes its immediate or i
                      might wait 15 or so seconds and then when the text and a few pictures comes up
                      i'm still waiting for the rest of the picture icons which never seem to arrive.

                      I notice though that after clicking a couple of links that i cannot go beyond
                      that.

                      But i found a trick to get round it. I have to copy the link to the clipboard
                      and close all of IE (I can't leave any IE windows open). Then i load up IE again
                      and paste into the address bar then the page will come up. But this only seems
                      to work for the first or so links then i have to close IE again and start over
                      pasting in a new link into the address bar.

                      I did try the above trick just after i sent the last message, but what you must
                      have done has improved it since before i could only browse one page and then i'd
                      have to close IE now i can at least click on a link to get the next page, but
                      unfortunately not much further.

                      Comment

                      • theprof
                        Senior Member
                        • May 2000
                        • 189

                        #12
                        UPDATE: I have made changes to the my.cnf as sugegsted by eva2000, and for the moment, the forum is holding steady. However, I am forced to disable key functions such as search, user online and dot folders.

                        Comment

                        • George L
                          Former vBulletin Support
                          • May 2000
                          • 32996
                          • 3.8.x

                          #13
                          Originally posted by theprof
                          UPDATE: I have made changes to the my.cnf as sugegsted by eva2000, and for the moment, the forum is holding steady. However, I am forced to disable key functions such as search, user online and dot folders.
                          how's it holding up now ?

                          i see you load is between 0.80 - 2 right now
                          :: Always Back Up Forum Database + Attachments BEFORE upgrading !
                          :: Nginx SPDY SSL - World Flags Demo [video results]
                          :: vBulletin hacked forums: Clean Up Guide for VPS/Dedicated hosting users [ vbulletin.com blog summary ]

                          Comment

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