JeevesBond — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 05:38:14 +0000

NiteWatcher wrote: Do you want me to make a video to show how slow this site actually is?

That won't be necessary. Am not saying I disbelieve you, just that you're the only one seeing the problem, which is weird. Well, you're the only one who's posted about it anyway. Since we have several mods from the US they should have told us... Oi! Mods! Is the site loading slowly for you?

NiteWatcher wrote: Two that do post from the US are claiming the site is loading slow.

Who's the other one? Anyway, I've created a support ticket with our hosts, we'll soon know if they've got any connectivity issues. Thanks for going to the trouble of reporting the problem by the way. It's really annoying when people don't give feedback and you're left wondering why something isn't successful!

NiteWatcher — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 04:18:38 +0000

Most visitors do not post, JB. If you get more than 1 in 10 posting, you're doing very well.

Two that do post from the US are claiming the site is loading slow. I backed up my statement with a tracert, even. So the issue is replicated by 2 from different parts of the US (so it's not our computers/networks).

Do you want me to make a video to show how slow this site actually is?

If those with broadband with high up/dl speeds can't load a page within 1 second, despite your server load, there's a disconnect between the visitor's computers and the site itself. 160ms pings indicates there's a delay at the EU side of the equation.

I'm picky, but the web designer in me understands what kills sites quick (and looking around, yep, it's affecting membership participation -- and by the looks of it -- even EU participants!).

JeevesBond — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 03:43:51 +0000

NiteWatcher wrote: 85.233.164.139 also points to a Plesk page. And if this is on a VPS

It's on an--almost--dedicated server (we run a couple of other low volume sites on the same machine). Currently top looks like:

 04:12:19  up 37 days, 13:03,  3 users,  load average: 0.25, 0.72, 0.59
114 processes: 113 sleeping, 1 running, 0 zombie, 0 stopped
CPU states:  cpu    user    nice  system    irq  softirq  iowait    idle
           total    0.0%    0.0%    4.0%   0.0%     0.0%    0.0%   96.0%
           cpu00    0.0%    0.0%    7.6%   0.0%     0.0%    0.0%   92.3%
           cpu01    0.0%    0.0%    0.0%   0.0%     0.0%    0.0%  100.0%
Mem:   501188k av,  484860k used,   16328k free,       0k shrd,   69308k buff
                    276484k actv,   52136k in_d,    6520k in_c
Swap:  987956k av,  286780k used,  701176k free                   72936k cached

'
So it's definitely not the server itself. I'm in Canada, pr0gr4mm3r is in the US and we have several mods from the US who aren't seeing this problem (or at least they're not saying anything about it). I wasn't aware that ISPs had started charging websites for service yet? :eek:

Am not refuting that you're having troubles, and possibly a lot of others are too, but most of the visitors to the site aren't seeing it. I'll try raising a support ticket with the hosts to see if there are any connection issues we're not aware of. It's a weird problem, would be funny if we solved this and the floodgates opened to thousands of new users (doubtful though).

From here am getting a ping of ~95ms, not great but not bad for a Web site either. Have to take into consideration that up here in Canada all network packets have to be delivered by carrier-moose, that increases latency.

pr0gr4mm3r — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 03:23:17 +0000

JeevesBond;225655 wrote: Very true, so the animation in the ads has been removed and the advertisers notified. Howzat?

Wow, better and faster than I could have ever hoped or expected. Usually forum and site owners ignore those kind of requests. You certainly stand above them.

Regarding the slow page loads, the home page completely loads in ~1.2 seconds for me, and the threads load in under 3 seconds. The ping here is a little slow (140 ms), but the page loads are what matters. I'm in NW Indiana, US by the way.

JeevesBond — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 03:08:23 +0000

programmer wrote: In other words, advertising if fine, but it's really hard to read posts and write responses while there's a strobe party going on in the sidebar.

Very true, so the animation in the ads has been removed and the advertisers notified. Howzat?

NiteWatcher — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 03:00:01 +0000

JeevesBond;225627 wrote: Hmmm, no it's in London.

Yep, and explains the 160ms pings!

Here's the site performance at 10pm EST...

6    12 ms    12 ms    10 ms  tbr2.attga.ip.att.net [12.122.84.178]
7    11 ms    10 ms     9 ms  ggr2.attga.ip.att.net [12.123.20.205]
8    59 ms    60 ms    59 ms  192.205.33.42
9    78 ms    71 ms    73 ms  ash-bb1-link.telia.net [213.248.80.141]
0    77 ms   154 ms   153 ms  prs-bb1-link.telia.net [80.91.251.99]
1   157 ms   164 ms   152 ms  prs-bb2-link.telia.net [80.91.251.101]
2   159 ms   162 ms     *     ldn-b1-pos5-0.telia.net [213.248.74.14]
3   162 ms   163 ms   160 ms  ldn-b1-pos3-0.telia.net [213.248.74.6]
4   112 ms   241 ms   298 ms  80.239.193.142
5   158 ms   163 ms   162 ms  thn1-gi0-2.namesco.net [212.159.2.10]
6   163 ms   160 ms   172 ms  thn1-gi0-2.namesco.net [212.159.2.10]
7   164 ms   160 ms   162 ms  thm1-gi0-1.namesco.net [195.7.224.245]
8   160 ms   159 ms   161 ms  thm2-gi0-2.namesco.net [195.7.224.237]
<strong>9   161 ms   161 ms   160 ms</strong>  server1.intermedia-online.com [85.233.164.139]

85.233.164.139 also points to a Plesk page. And if this is on a VPS, would explain the s-l-o-w page loads. Usual ping to UK from my locale is around 78ms (at least on game servers).

JeevesBond;225627 wrote: Not for me. It's lightning quick, although I have been doing a lot of processor intensive work recently. Has anyone else noticed a slow-down? You might have just been surfing at a bad time, although I should really stop stealing all the servers processor cycles.

Hate to say this: this is the slowest site I've ever been on. Really need to get the pings down if you wish to have anyone from the US to park themselves here for long. As last night the pages simply would not load (had to retrieve cache pages instead).

pr0gr4mm3r — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 14:18:20 +0000

Just also thought I should put it out there that if I was a new user coming to a site with advertisements as flashy as a specific one that talks about making some large sum of money in the $200k area by virtually doing nothing, it makes me either leave or enable AdBlock for that site. The ads on a site can really influence how long its visitors stick around.

In other words, advertising if fine, but it's really hard to read posts and write responses while there's a strobe party going on in the sidebar.

pr0gr4mm3r — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 14:05:13 +0000

Quote: Not for me. It's lightning quick, although I have been doing a lot of processor intensive work recently. Has anyone else noticed a slow-down? You might have just been surfing at a bad time, although I should really stop stealing all the servers processor cycles.

Nope. Roughly 1-3 seconds load time per page.

JeevesBond — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 11:29:44 +0000

Nitewatcher wrote: the server points to Amsterdam

Hmmm, no it's in London.

Nitewatcher wrote: It's like 56k modem speed to go from page-to-page

Not for me. It's lightning quick, although I have been doing a lot of processor intensive work recently. Has anyone else noticed a slow-down? You might have just been surfing at a bad time, although I should really stop stealing all the servers processor cycles.

NiteWatcher — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 08:29:13 +0000

greg;224959 wrote: I was just wondering if there was a battle plan in discussion or in place to try to get more members?
Or if it's something TWF wants.

I feel the site is lacking in liveliness. A couple of new posts are made each day and a couple of threads are replied to but that's about it.

What's hurting is page loads. 128ms pings as well, as the server points to Amsterdam. :/

It's like 56k modem speed to go from page-to-page (despite very fast broadband)...

And page loads truly affects how folks will stay to seed a forum.