vBulletin too Resource Intensive? Lunarpages says it is

[swansong]

I'm currently running a vBulletin board on Lunarpages and have been told that they are disallowing the use of vBulletin on Lunarpages immediatly. They want their users to run either phpBB or Invision Power Board. I was under the impression that vBulletin was a resource friendly script. Can anyone point me in the direction of somekind of test data that I could take a look at to see if vBulletin is the pig they claim it to be.

I have been running the board for over a year now and have never had any complaints from them about load, my board is fairly small. This situation smokes me since I just paid for a new year of hosting. Up to this point I have been very happy with Lunarpages, but if they make me convert to phpBB or IPB, I'm done with them.

http://www.lunarforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=13186

[Zachery]

vBulletin is not really a reasource hog, but at the same time it can be.

vBulletin 3 is very optimized to be less server intensive than vB2 but it does consume abit more ram but its only to keep the server load lower.

If your host is unwilling to support vBulletin it might be time to change, i might understand the request if it was for any CGI based forums.

[RichM]

So basically they are implying that they don't have very good servers. Either that or they are jealous or anti vbulletin.

I think you should make it their loss and not yours, i.e find a better host and issue a charge back with your credit card company.

[HiveHost]

Even though LunarPages is a competitor they use very good equipment. I think that they are looking at the picture as a whole and seeing that the few customers that are running large vBulletin installations on shared hosting is impacting their other customers. I think that they would rather see a few customers leave because of not being able to host a vBulletin bulletin board rather than a majority of their customers because of resource issues. HiveMail has this same issue with quite a few hosts unfortunately because their script was (and still is) resource intensive if you don't know how to manage it and use it.

[walter]

A strange move...

My last server hosts more than 100 sites, 6 of them vBulletin sites and even some other boards (phpBB). CPU load is usually at 0.20.

Of course the vBulletin sites are no really big ones (the biggest with 20-50 users online), but the server really flies...

[walter]

I think that they are looking at the picture as a whole and seeing that the few customers that are running large vBulletin installations on shared hosting is impacting their other customers. I think that they would rather see a few customers leave because of not being able to host a vBulletin bulletin board rather than a majority of their customers because of resource issues.

That is what all hosts have to do - look at all the customers at the server and not allowing a site to use all CPU and I/O cycles. But I can't see a reason to disallow small vBulletin forums on a server...

[HiveHost]

It's one of those things where the people abusing it because they don't want to spend the money ruins it for those that are running small installs. You can't take it away from the people that are running large installs without taking it away from everyone...it's along the lines of "If can't be used correctly then nobody will use it on our servers".

[swansong]

My site has 82 registered users, max ever on line was 21, normally 4-5 online. My biggest complaint is that there are some large phpBB sites hosted there and I can't believe my site is pulling more resources than they are.

[Zachery]

There is a good chance that they are using more than you, but its a hosts company.

[HiveHost]

Another thing to keep in mind is that until they officially update their TOS/AUP they really can't tell you that you cannot run the forum legally, since they don't have a written policy regarding it. This might not keep them from turning your site off eventually, but it may buy you some time.

[Joshs]

How many active users do you usually have on your forums?

[walter]

It's one of those things where the people abusing it because they don't want to spend the money ruins it for those that are running small installs. You can't take it away from the people that are running large installs without taking it away from everyone...

I don't think that's true.

Every host has in his terms of service that sites will be shut down if they are not apropriate for a shared server because they use too many resources.

And every technician should be able to find out which sites are hogging a server and which not. Really.

[Shining Arcanine]

My host says that vBulletin is a resource hog and lets me run it anyway...

[HiveHost]

We allow our users to run vBulletin installs because we don't oversell our equipment and because that is one of the areas that we specialize in. Lunarpages and alot of other hosts don't so they freak out when they see just how resource intensive the program can be. And yes, the techs can shut down a vBulletin install that is hogging resources but then you have a major custoemr that's crying foul because there's tons of similarsites running with vBulletin because they are smaller....need to think from the business and server admin side of things instead of a consumer on this one.

[walter]

We allow our users to run vBulletin installs because we don't oversell our equipment and because that is one of the areas that we specialize in. Lunarpages and alot of other hosts don't so they freak out when they see just how resource intensive the program can be.

That's a good point about overselling and part of the reason, why overselling/cheap hosts act as they do.

And yes, the techs can shut down a vBulletin install that is hogging resources but then you have a major custoemr that's crying foul because there's tons of similarsites running with vBulletin because they are smaller....need to think from the business and server admin side of things instead of a consumer on this one.

Thanks, but I run a hosting business myself, and if someone can't treat a customer right, specially in critical situations "crying foul", maybe he shouldn't have to handle customers
(Don't get me wrong, this is no attack at you).

If servers are monitored constantly, in most cases a host will know in advance when a site becomes to popular for a shared account. The host then has plenty of time to talk to the customer...
Proactive is the keyword, not reactive