Why Is This Website So Slow?

StrategyCat · Post by **StrategyCat** » Tue Aug 26, 2003 6:52 am

Why is this website so slow to load? I've been coming here now for the past several days and the loading times have not improved.

Is there some kind of graphics or sound gimmickry I need to turn off?

Although I only have a modem connection, I don't have this problem with other websites that seem to use the same type of software.

Any suggestions?

Belisarius · Post by **Belisarius** » Tue Aug 26, 2003 10:12 am

I have no idea. It loads as fast as ever for me, both at work (ehe) and at home w/ DSL connection.

Maybe it's something with the new stylesheets that loads slowly for you? Are you using Internet Explorer? ('cause I'm not, from home)

U2 · Post by U2 » Tue Aug 26, 2003 10:54 am

Belisarius wrote:I have no idea. It loads as fast as ever for me, both at work (ehe) and at home w/ DSL connection.

Maybe it's something with the new stylesheets that loads slowly for you? Are you using Internet Explorer? ('cause I'm not, from home)

It's kind of slow for me too

Fred98 · Post by **Fred98** » Tue Aug 26, 2003 11:10 am

Yep, very slow for me too.

It has to be the new sticky header. Lets get rid of it

Resisti · Post by **Resisti** » Tue Aug 26, 2003 11:22 am

U2 wrote:It's kind of slow for me too

Ditto.
Even with a 640KB DSL connection..

Les_the_Sarge_9_1 · Post by **Les_the_Sarge_9_1** » Tue Aug 26, 2003 4:23 pm

It does seem sluggish on my end. The thread seems to pause in a clunky fashion when scrolling.

I have also noticed text that I type in is clunky and not instantaneous.

But I seem to have noticed this elsewhere as well.

I am not yet convinced this is a Matrix Games issue. It might be a reflection of current internet conditions (all the virus garbage we have been dealing with lately).

Jim1954 · Post by **Jim1954** » Tue Aug 26, 2003 4:33 pm

I'm slower, even with a T-1.

wodin · Post by **wodin** » Tue Aug 26, 2003 5:48 pm

I was using Internet Explorer 6 and it was very very slow after the site was updated.

I have know change to Mozilla Firebird which you can download.The internet as a whole is know far quicker. This site know loads very fast. So go download Mozilla Firebird (dont get the other Mozilla products go for Firebird) it keeps all your Bookmarks automatically.

Wodin

Paul Vebber · Post by **Paul Vebber** » Tue Aug 26, 2003 6:01 pm

I just loaded 10 random forum pages and it seems the number of users on the particular forum is what is slowing it slightly. Forums that nobody was on loaded in just under 3 secs (2.73) while those with 5 or more people on then were somewhat slower (nearly 4 secs 3.91). The shortest load time was 2.2 and the longest 4.1

That is using the latest version of IE on a notoriously slow network.

The header graphic is generally cached so once it is downloaded, it should not be much of a load.

Loading our much more graphically intensive home page takes less than 2 sec.

LarkinVB · Post by **LarkinVB** » Tue Aug 26, 2003 6:15 pm

Paul Vebber wrote: Loading our much more graphically intensive home page takes less than 2 sec.

That's a hint that the forum->php->mysql performance is slow.

Paul Vebber · Post by **Paul Vebber** » Tue Aug 26, 2003 6:24 pm

Could be with nearly half a million posts in teh system. But I think its more to do with how its handling users - forums with no users load quickly, those with more users seem to load more slowly.

Paul Vebber · Post by **Paul Vebber** » Tue Aug 26, 2003 6:26 pm

I updated some of the user stats and it seems to run faster for me now AOW loads in under 2 secs just like one with no users.

StrategyCat · Post by **StrategyCat** » Tue Aug 26, 2003 7:34 pm

I just clicked on my bookmark for the front page of this site and it took no less than 1 minute to load.
Getting from the front page to this thread takes a similar amount of time.
But the worst is when I post a message. Yesterday, after posting the original message to this topic, I ended up closing IE because I thought it had frozen.
Let's see how long it takes to load this message, I'll time it...
(remember, I have a 56K modem connection)

StrategyCat · Post by **StrategyCat** » Tue Aug 26, 2003 7:40 pm

StrategyCat wrote:Let's see how long it takes to load this message, I'll time it...

26 seconds from the instant I hit 'Submit Reply' until it was posted and I was back reading the topic. Not too bad, it seems, but yesterday it was much worse - maybe because I had started a new topic?

Well, in any case, these slow loading times are what has been keeping me from visiting this website too much, for the past 2-3 years. I rarely used to go past the front page. But now I have to, because I bought KP and need to keep up on it.

LarkinVB · Post by **LarkinVB** » Tue Aug 26, 2003 8:21 pm

Posting sometimes is a real pain. When I press the submit button it takes forever. The IE flag is waving but nothing else happens. After 1-2 minutes I just hit the back button and try submit again and often it will work much faster. Seems that the server is too busy to handle my request.

Is it possible that the hardware running the web server and/or SQL server is a bit underpowered ? It seems you are running it on Windoze, perhaps Linux/Apache on a multi processor server would be the better choice. I'm running a webserver here at our university (4 processor, 1GB RAM, fast SCSI disks) with a good performance. Of course our database isn't nearly as big as Matrixgames.

Belisarius · Post by **Belisarius** » Tue Aug 26, 2003 8:46 pm

Alright, now I too had a 2:03 delay between hitting the "post reply" button and the forum timing out on me.

First time today, tho, so I guess it's the WWW who's at fault, not the forum itself?

Paul Vebber · Post by **Paul Vebber** » Tue Aug 26, 2003 8:48 pm

You would think that if it were the server that it would happen uniformly to everyone. I have occasional hangs where posts "get stuck" but that has happened since Day 1.

I have not had a "hung post" at all with the new version. If we were processing thousands of users on line at a time then moving to an Apache server might be in order, but considering uor max users has been under 150 and is generally under 100, I really don't think its a server speed issue. We just aren't stressing the server with that many users.

We have found running asp pages on an MS platform more stable and secure than php.

LarkinVB · Post by **LarkinVB** » Tue Aug 26, 2003 8:58 pm

Paul Vebber wrote:You would think that if it were the server that it would happen uniformly to everyone. I have occasional hangs where posts "get stuck" but that has happened since Day 1.

I have not had a "hung post" at all with the new version. If we were processing thousands of users on line at a time then moving to an Apache server might be in order, but considering uor max users has been under 150 and is generally under 100, I really don't think its a server speed issue. We just aren't stressing the server with that many users.

We have found running asp pages on an MS platform more stable and secure than php.

Isn't "www.matrixgames.com/forums/forumdisplay.php" obviously PHP ?

I'm not competent on evaluating the security of PHP but AFAIK Linux/Apache is more secure than the Windows webserver. I guess this is one of the reasons why the majority of websites are Unix based. But thats not the topic. What is fact is that response time of your setup sometimes is very sluggish. Since number of users is small my guess is that your SQL server is not up to its task. Only trying to help with some knowledge on system administration.

wodin · Post by **wodin** » Tue Aug 26, 2003 9:01 pm

Anyone using IE should ditch it even on a 512k adsl connection it took a while for things to load.

I know I mentioned this before but honestly Mozilla Firebird gets me aroung in seconds here.

Wodin

Paul Vebber · Post by **Paul Vebber** » Tue Aug 26, 2003 9:21 pm

The forum is a php app, but you'll notice all our other pages are asp.

Linux Apache may be more secure running php, but due to other software we run we have to run on a windows server. We don't have the resources to pay 10's of thousands $$ for high end SQL liscences, or e-commerce software for Linnux/Apache so we muddle along with what we have. When we tried to run php on the windows server he had LOTs of problems that going back to asp solved.

Talking about the site in general, not the forum software...

If its a server issue than I should be waiting minutes too, but am not. Guess I'm just lucky enough to post during a lull? Yes, the current SQL server may be part of the problem, but its not ALL of the problem.

Note this post took 11 secs to post