TS Server speed

[Julio Franco]

Last night my internet connection went kaputt and I had most pages loading extremely slow, for a little while I thought it was TechSpot server since I was trying to upload some stuff... a minute later I discovered it definitely had to be my connection, however this left me wondering.

While vB stats always show server load averages of less than 0.3%, I still wanted to ask you, our frequent visitors, how fast or slow do you think TechSpot server is compared to most other sites?

Thanks for your time.

 

[negroplasty]

Everything seems fine to me, but my opinion is irrelevant since I am on a 56K dial up. On a 56K you can't really compare, but I would say there isn't much difference between other sites, if any at all. So for us 56Kers everything is okay, as for those of you on faster connections such as DSL or ISDN, I'm sure it will be a different story .

 

[SNGX1275]

I've got 512 cable and TS appears most of the time to load up just as quick as the major sites (search engines, news sites). Occationally it takes a bit to start loading a page - like if I click go to first unread post (not from within the post itself), but it doesn't happen all the time, and some of it may be all the other stuff going on on my computer at the same time.

 

[olefarte]

I've got 512 DSL and TS is as fast or faster than other forums I frequent.

 

[Julio Franco]

Just like timmoore I'm on a slow connection so I needed to ask (I actually have cable but... 64kbps). Good to hear all those comments though.

 

[Rick]

I am on something faster than 1.4Mbps DSL.. Techspot always loads as fast as I click on the bookmark.

 

[LNCPapa]

I'm on 1.5 mbit cable - almost always loads very quickly, except when everyone else is also having probs or when I'm having probs with the ad banners.

LNCPapa

 

[poertner_1274]

I agree papa, the only thing that takes time to load is the ad banners. Right now the page has been loading for a minute thirty seconds, and it is still going trying to load form ads1.ad-flow.com.......although it might be because I am using opera and it blocks popups, but I'm not sure.

I used to have that problem with IE as well.

 

[Nodsu]

Yes, 512 DSL here and the only thing that's sometimes slow is the ad loading.

 

[Phantasm66]

I have 1mbps cable connection, and sometimes I think the site is VERY slow.

 

[MrGaribaldi]

I've got adsl 384 down, and it's quite fast...

But sometimes it'll just load the add and show it in the middle of the screen for some time before it finishes loading the rest of the thread...

 

[MrGaribaldi]

Strange...

Just after I posted the above message, techspot became quite slot... 30 sec+ to load a thread... But the forums themselves were fast...

 

[agissi]

take SNGX1275's post and ditto it under my name

 

[young&wild]

I've got 256 DSL....but still dunno why techspot when loadin' in any two of my pc seems to take some time...more than wat is used to take .

 

[Julio Franco]

Just wondering, have you noticed any speed changes in the forums or frontpage loading today? I've enabled two modules in order to speed up the server quite a bit plus save us some bandwidth.

The first is PHP Accelerator (www.phpaccelerator.co.uk) which should speed up all dynamic process in PHP, it's even used by Yahoo, so it's got to be good, I enabled this last night.

The second is GZip compression in vBulletin which should compress all vB pages on the fly with a low hit on load averages, I enabled this just a few minutes ago so you might want to give it a try for a longer time.

 

[Mictlantecuhtli]

The site loads up quickly here, probably because I'm using shared T-1 line, and I had dialup before, so I know the difference

 

[poertner_1274]

Actually Julio, I was thinking it was loading a little slower than I am used to. This is only in the forums though..... Also it doesn't happen all the time, just every once in a while. It is probably due to the ads once again, but just info for you.

 

[MrGaribaldi]

Well, it's been loading real fast for me yesterday night (around 22 GM), and today

 

[Phantasm66]

I've noticed a bit of a difference as well...

 

[Julio Franco]

Unfortunately I will have to agree, most ad servers slow things down, but we can't live without them.

 

[poertner_1274]

I know, just leaving a little feedback

 

[Per Hansson]

The AD's are always what slow down the site loading...

As has been said it can sometimes take several minutes for them to load...

I'm on a 30Mbps connection, and when comparing to some other forums www.sweclockers.com mainly (Swedish site) Techspot does feel a tad slow...

However they also have their forums on a separate dell server, which compared to the TS server is waaay faster...

Dell Poweredge 2600, Dual Xeon 2.4GHz, 2304MB DDR, 2x36GB 10KRPM SCSI. Weight: ~45KG.

Pics: 1 2 3

 

[LNCPapa]

HEY!!! I have one of those Per - really! Well, not mine really - but my group here at work. We use it to run stats on computer usage throughout the campus. Similar config except with 3 drives and another hot-swappable powersupply.

LNCPapa

 

[LNCPapa]

Well - I wanted to let you guys know (especially Julio) that I've been getting painfully slow response from Techspot pages lately - both website and forums. The forums are especially slow to load up the buttons across the top and the buttons next to each thread marking whether there is anything new or not. It's so slow these last couple of weeks that it's actually quicker for me to look at the date of last post and determine if I've been there since the newest update or not. Not sure if anyone else is having this prob - but I'm having it on multiple machines across two different connections (Cable - 1.5mbit/256kbit and a T3)

LNCPapa

 

[Julio Franco]

Last week TS was slashdotted so that probably slowed things down quite a bit, however the last few days things have got back to normal and server load is pretty average.

Anybody else experiencing slowdowns?