Serious problems with midibox.org server

Miscellaneous
1

Hi,

maybe you’ve already noticed that some content of midibox.org is sometimes not accessible due to “capacitance problems”.

Today I got a message from my provider that these fails are caused by a disproportionate usage of midibox.org - in short: too many people are accessing the site at the same time. If I’m not able to lower the traffic in the next days, the account will be (temporary) closed to reduce the hit rate.

I must say that this doesn’t astonish me, since the price for this webpage is very low: 5 EUR per month for 500 MB and “unlimited” traffic. This cannot work over the long term.

So, I feel that it’s time to change the provider! In the meantime a lot of new offers should be available which guarantee a better server performance for affortable prices.

Therefore I’m asking for your suggestions - I don’t rely on offers from germany, especially since most accesses are from outside europe.

Constraints: at least 500 MB webspace, CGI/PHP/SQL, traffic/month > 20GB (!) (can be higher once the server runs faster)

Best Regards, Thorsten.

2

I dont’ know if it is the better way for you but i think if you build a your own server with a adsl connection (in italy a connection for unlimited time is 36€ a month) it will be more poweful in bandwidth and access time.

sorry for my bad english

Stefano

3

Hi Stefano,

36 EUR are far too much for the community (I don’t want to affort this), and ADSL is not practicable. I already own an ADSL “flatrate”, ok, I’ve 100 kb/s download rate, but only 16 kb/s upload rate. Now image that ca. 100 people or more around the world are accessing my PC at the same time… do you see the problem? :wink:

We need a professional solution…

Best Regards, Thorsten.

4

This is bad news - midibox.org is hosted by evanzo, right? And it’s about 95% forum, with just few downloads and the frontpage..

From my north european view - midibox.org has been pretty reliable.. some troubles here and there, but no real downtimes, that I had noticed, albeit being a bit slowish. (How does it feel there, over the pacific, guys?)

It’s pretty surprising to see MIDIbox Forum, while being active, not BUSY, to generate enough load(?) on server to cause troubles. I’m averaging around 20 users online on peak-hours.. But you can analyse logs, Thorsten ;D

So, I feel that it’s time to change the provider! In the meantime a lot of new offers should be available which guarantee a better server performance for affortable prices.

Yes, there are plenty of choices and the most companies are in the U.S.A. But then, most of those “really affordable” hosting companies seem to create mixed comments.. (“Not reliable”, “Website disappeared”, “Don’t give a BEEP after paying for a long hosting deal”, “Works great for me”)

Constraints: at least 500 MB webspace, CGI/PHP/SQL, traffic/month > 20GB (!) (can be higher once the server runs faster)

Just a couple of picks influenced mainly by http://news.netcraft.com - and that seem to fit:

http://www.1and1.com - 1&1 Business, 2Gig space, 50Gig transfer, MySQL, php ect. = $9,9/Mo.

http://www.godaddy.com - Hosting Economy Plan, 500Meg space, 25Gig transfer, MySQL, php = $3.95/mo.

(Deluxe Plan, 2Gig space, 100Gig transfer, 10 MySQL DBs,PHP + adding perl/CGI support = $9.95/Mo.)

Everyone - feel free to disagree!

Moebius

5

if it is the forum generating most traffic then i guess that everyone can help by keeping forum activity to the minimum over the next few days, maybe just visiting once a day or so to check messages

this is not a long term solution but might help keep the site up and running while a new home for it is being found

i remember reading on a hosts site that yabb and other forum software does work a server very very hard…

maybe someone here works for a big company or university that can host the forum on their servers :wink:

(any volunteers? anyone with a basement full of computers and a t1 line?)

i like the forum a lot so the alternatives are not very attractive to me (mailing lists, newsgroups etc.) though places like yahoo groups look quite good..

regarding web hosts, yes, some can be very unreliable, i think the main thing is to pay monthly if you can, or at least to avoid paying a lot up front (in case the company and the website disappears, which happens sometimes)

best wishes

adam

6

i do free lance web design here and there.  came across this once:

http://www.netfirms.com/web-hosting-advantage

didn’t end up using it in the end because it was a little more than i needed, but take a look and see what you think.  1gb space, 50gb transfer, and everything else you need, i think.  –$9.95/month

please take care of this soon because i don’t think i could survive a day without ucapps!!! :cry:

good luck!

7

it’s a money problem? good server are too expensive?

may be we can donate ?..

8

Hello Thorsten,

I rent webspace and i have a reseller account.

I can upgrade my account for more bandwidth if needed but for now i can host you for free and do some measurements about traffic.

I can give you 30GB traffic and 1 - 2 GB of webspace. If i increase my account for a few bucks more no problem.

Tell me and we will arrange the transfer of the site ASAP.

I am with this host now for a year and it has been down 3 times. (to me its acceptable for the amount of money i pay) It is located in the USA.

9

Nobody can tell me that Twin-X’s offer doesn’t sound attractive! :slight_smile:

I’m just starting to upload a test version of the forum to his server.

Once it is accessible for everybody, I will shutdown the current site and transfer everything to the new location, so that it is possible to test it for one week or so. If everything runs smooth, midibox.org will switch completely to Twin-X’s server

Best Regards, Thorsten.

10

NOO!

He haven’t told us, how long the down-times was, for HIS customers..

Bye, Moebius

11

NOO!

He haven’t told us, how long the down-times was, for HIS customers..

Bye, Moebius

Those 3 downtimes were a total of 40 minutes.

It was not for my customers (i dont have any) i am the customer :wink: so it was down for me.

12

Those 3 downtimes were a total of 40 minutes.

And that’s about as good as it gets, I suppose ;=)

Bye, Moebius