Rate the Speed of the Site

**BitBender** · 03-05-2002, 10:23 PM

Post your comments below.

I've just upgraded the PHP level to 4.1.1, and installed the sapi version over the CGI version. Net Result? We should see a performance improvement. I won't tell you the number that the website gave, as they also have the disclaimer that "Your Mileage may Vary".

So, I'll ask the best source of information on that point, the membership !!

Be fair, check at different times, network lag exists beyond my routers sometimes, and BBF can't do anything about that!!

**AmStoned** · 03-05-2002, 10:33 PM

Sorry Bits, but on a scale of 1 to 10, I'll have to give the new board a -2 for speed. ouch.... wait, you just upgraded again? give me a sec, I'll be right back...

**BitBender** · 03-05-2002, 10:44 PM

Well, it's running faster here at the house than it ever did before, so we'll see once it's under decent load. Should make a hell of a difference, because the old version used a CGI executable, and now we are using the sapi modules, which are supposed to be a substaintial difference.

**TheHeretic** · 03-05-2002, 10:47 PM

still slow to me. but I have beenhaving problems with my ISP but this site is still the slowest of all the tech sites I visit. keep up the good work though. sooner or later you shall have this thing running at OC-48 speeds or faster.

TheHeretic

**Rando** · 03-05-2002, 10:51 PM

Hammer down for me using dial-up. You got Karma CTO!

**AmStoned** · 03-05-2002, 10:51 PM

Hmmm... I wonder if switching over to pure FSB OC will raise my modem's speed... you know with the PCI bus going 40MHz and all... But yeah, it's a bit faster than yesterday. Still, the original site seem faster.

**Alakazam** · 03-05-2002, 10:52 PM

Right now it seems slower for me & I'm on dial-up. Oppps, I'm down in Florida right now so it will have to wait until I'm back up north to make an honest comparison, 2 more weeks.

**ImaginAsian** · 03-05-2002, 10:52 PM

Definately notice the difference Meagi. Its getting better that's for sure!

CGI are notorious for being slow and u did the right thing moving to SAPI

**Darksword** · 03-05-2002, 11:04 PM

Grr, it's still slow as molasses for me on my T1 line. Actually, the forums are slower now than before.

**Montana** · 03-06-2002, 05:28 AM

Pretty confidant there aren't you. Where's the poll selection for worse than ever before?

I have cable modem but my page time load varies widely from day to day just as before. Sorry no help.

**Lonnie** · 03-06-2002, 05:37 AM

I have cable modem also...sheesh! When I first joined BBF it was very slow to load, and it seems that it is still slow...and I have visited here at various times with same results. It is 6:37AM here, and loading was still bad...

**Montana** · 03-06-2002, 05:50 AM

G' morning Lonnie. Since this is a graphic heavey site it would be difficult to avoid slow web page loads. We'll just have to avoid the graphic intensive threads like the Babes and Hunks threads! NOT!

Chris · 03-06-2002, 05:54 AM

I have a cable modem aswell and well for me, one minute the speed is fast and the next minute it is slow.
And right now it is slow.

But it is alot faster than yesturday.

Chris.

**BitBender** · 03-06-2002, 06:38 AM

Originally posted by BitBender

Be fair, check at different times, network lag exists beyond my routers sometimes, and BBF can't do anything about that!!

One other point of note...I just upgraded the PHP component Tuesday Night, 3/5/2002. This is a request from this time forward....

Please keep in mind that cable modems, and college university circuts are usually 'sharing' the bandwidth with other traffic, and that may be some of the latency.

**Lonnie** · 03-06-2002, 08:15 AM

That's what is so weird...the pix load real fast, but the startpage with the graphics, and even the loading up of the reply section are dragging ass! True the cable traffic for my ISP fluctuates, but there are no problems w/ISP at all - for my area at least. I don't have the highest processor,RAM,etc (633MHz/128RAM), but I can go pour a cup of coffee, add sugar,etc...and back to computer and I finally get startpage loaded

This is the only site I have this problem...oh well, I am here, that's all that matters

**floppybootstomp** · 03-06-2002, 09:00 AM

As far as the new board is concerned, it's improved a lot since it started. For me, 56K dial-up, UK, it's now about the same speed as the previous board version.

**Darcy** · 03-06-2002, 09:19 AM

I can "ditto" Lonnie in Part:

*snip*, but the startpage with the graphics, and even the loading up of the reply section are dragging ass!

at work now (which is slower than from home) so can't give defintive answer yet. But yes! improved.

**KaraK** · 03-06-2002, 10:40 AM

post upgrade I found the board to be very sluggish but today (post-php upgrade) it seems to be back up to speed

**BitBender** · 03-06-2002, 10:48 AM

I'm seeing pretty speedy load times from downtown dallas, Texas, about 25 miles from the server...

But durn...that front page with the pictures DOES load slow !!

We are going to need to rethink the packaging of those ... There is an attachment viewer add-on that we can use to provide a link for the pix, instead of displaying them. If the viewer wants to see the photo, they can select the link which pop's open a different window with the pix.

I'll shut up now, and just continue observation mode...

Party on !!

**ImaginAsian** · 03-06-2002, 11:15 AM

Hmmm...if we only use the IMG tags in our news posts, the pics are being hosted by the article's website and not our own right?

**Darcy** · 03-06-2002, 11:30 AM

All the pix i post using IMG load quick as a wink, while the ones that are "attached" take quite a while to load.

**martzweb** · 03-06-2002, 12:06 PM

speeds seem to have improved somewhat over here.... i would say around 8-10 seconds on isdn, which isn't too bad. It seems for some reason that cablemodem users are the worst hit.

**Techvillage** · 03-06-2002, 12:56 PM

It's damn quick at the moment

- will try again when I get home, but I suspect it it will be just as speedy there, providing my darn ISP has got it's routing problems from last night sorted out.

**BitBender** · 03-06-2002, 01:22 PM

Originally posted by ImaginAsian
Hmmm...if we only use the IMG tags in our news posts, the pics are being hosted by the article's website and not our own right?

Ahh Daniel-san Correct is his study, but then we are talking about the lag introduced by that website, if it's under a load at the moement...one can see this too...by just watching the lower left of the browser window..You will see which graphic is slow to load....

For me, it seems that ICQ Icons are always the last to arrive.

Something to keep in mind when using [ IMG ] Tags ..

Also, as Darc has pointed out, it's a lot better to have the pix hosted, rather than be stored as an attachement in the database.

I do offer space for this on the BBF server, in the FTP folder. I'll be getting details out on how guest access will work there using FTP, but for now, you can Email me the pix, I'll compress them, and then store them in the FTP folder. You can browse this folder from your browser, and as you will see, images from there load faster than attachements.

www.bitbenderforums.com/ftp is the directory

We have a number of new functions in this board that introduce more server overhead, to be sure, but not so much that it's hitting us here. CPU busy percentages rarely go above 60%, with the highest observed at 79%, and available memory is at 453M PM free on average. I have seen that drift quite a bit as more and more users are on the board, but at 25 users, we still had over 200M free. And I was using that box at the time, so even thse numbers are a bit high. When it's uninterrupted, it barely climbs above 40%.

**Cool Canuck** · 03-06-2002, 01:25 PM

I got DSL here Bits and there is a definite improvement. But befores ya starts to

there is still lots of room for improvement. Going in the right direction.

**muckshifter** · 03-06-2002, 02:10 PM

All is ok here ... for now ... but boy was MY ISP driving me nuts.

**Lonnie** · 03-06-2002, 02:20 PM

sheesh...1 full minute to load from your reply to get to this screen to do my reply...grrrr

anyway, Mucks...did you forget to feed the gerbils? maybe that's why your ISP was 'mucked' up?

**muckshifter** · 03-06-2002, 02:32 PM

Now that's fast Lonnie ... at the workshop on dial-up this afternoon it took 4min 38sec to load the front page.

I gave up and did some "work"

**James** · 03-07-2002, 02:06 AM

I now most never click post reply,CABLE,slower than i can deal with 95% of the time.there must be a BUG hiding in there someplace,maybe the smilies

**Mad dog** · 03-07-2002, 05:06 AM

There should have been and option in the poll for slower. It wasn't really a fair poll. Shame on you bits

**BitBender** · 03-07-2002, 06:47 AM

Originally posted by James
I now most never click post reply,CABLE,slower than i can deal with 95% of the time.there must be a BUG hiding in there someplace,maybe the smilies

Funny that you should mention that.

Vbulletin sent me a mailer just yesterday telling me that a bug fix release(2.2.3) is out that fixes a performance issue in the forum display function.

Guess what that means. It means I get to start over with the upgrade. They dont just fix what is wrong, it's a full release, and it's up to ME to redo everything.

Since I have to start over, I am going to STRIP most of the new features OUT of the patch version. Sounds like most of you are more concerned with speed than functionality, so be it. Not only that, but it's plain stupid to expect people to come to a bulletin board, and not POST anything.

Fancy ass logo's/Features/stats/front page pictures/news - all mean MORE database activity, and larger page sizes, which, in case you don't equate that, longer load times. The first time BBF guest has a page that's over 250K to load. Gee...wonder why it's slow.

Be watching. There will not be the fanfare of before. Just a change in the board one day. It will simply go back to being the vanilla thing that it was before.

It's a busy week for me at my paying job. I don't nor will I have the 30 or so hours it takes to redo everything, so it will be awhile.
Bitbendette will not allow me to conduct yet another marathon, I'm too tired already.

But by the same token, I'm on a quest now.

Thank you and the membership for your patience on this matter.

Good Day.

**Zemuss** · 03-07-2002, 07:28 AM

What happen to the speed? It's taking longer for the pages to come up.
I am behind a T1 it shouldn't be like this..
I try to post this message and waited like 20 seconds. Before it was like 5 seconds.

I know there must be some tweaking that needs to be done.

****************************************************
Bits, I think i speak for everyone here. Good Job with the upgrade man. Like I said there are things that might need tweaking to make this board run as it did before.

If you need any help (Not that I will be much help) I can try.
I don't know how this board works but would like to know. Maybe splitting the Data and the pages off into two seperate boxes will make it perform a tad better? I don't know just thinking out loud.

I mean I shouldn't say anything really, No complaints... etc..
I am not the one that spent the money to build this thing. That was you! And we all thankyou for this place we call home.

One more idea, If its the front page that is causing some of the sluggish speeds. Then why not create the Front page on One box and the Forum on another?

"Z"