Server suggestions..

I have read all the pages..

http://www.boonex.com/trac/dolphin/wiki/HostingServerSetupRecommendations

http://www.boonex.com/trac/dolphin/wiki/DolTech

and have setup up my own servers from scratch...

I have been proposed a question about how "big" a ded box should be for a site.

"How big should my server be? I'm going to have 5k members and about 200 online at any given time, what do you suggest?"

I have read post in the past about just 80 members taking down the biggest boxes.

Who can give me some rock solid suggestion for such an active site?

Without drama and sarcastic remarks please.. thanks. 

well my own server is:-

Processor: AMD Opteron™ 4274

Speed: 8 Cores x 2.5 GHz  (3.5 Turbo Core)

RAM: 16 GB DDR3 ECC

Hard-disk space: 1,500 GB (2 x 1,500 SATA)

This server handles 2x dolphin sites (one which gets 20,000+ uniques per week) including 12 other non PHP sites ....

Server runs smooth and super quick now I learned to optimize it right and CPU usage is very low!

edit:  the server easily handles 3 different dolphin sites and 12 non PHP sites :)

Is that all? No one else can suggest?

I have yet to build up the membership usage on my site; I am seeing perhaps 25 on at a time.  However, I got what I could afford at the time:

Four Core Xeon (not sure of the speed 2 something)

16 gigs of ram

2-1TB drives in RAID 1 (get the RAID)

1.6 Gb/s connection (standard was 100 meg)

20TB of total (in and out) bandwidth

I ditched Apache and installed the latest stable version of Nginx.  PHP is PHP-FPM (FastCGI).  I am very happy with my setup.  As for how the site runs, I need to wait until more are using it at one time before I can really tell.  At the moment the site is very responsive.

I will add that I would avoid any non-server CPU configurations.  Server CPUs are designed for server operations.

Thanks for response.

25 users is good, are they chatting? Are you allowing video uploads?

I have done some larger setups, for testing the load, creating fake users, www.blitz.io to test the site and load it down.

GG can you do a blitz on that beast and see if what your timings and server load goes up to.

On my VPS, my box craps out at about 250 users with a server load average up to 50!

If someone else could "blitz" there large server to see how it handles hundreds of users..

For a member base that size I would suggest at least:

- Quad-Core processor

- 16GB of RAM

- 1.5 TB HDD

Of course there are some other things to consider such as network speeds and location of the server itself. If you get cPanel with your dedicated server, there are several other 'tweaks' that you can do as well.

Rule of thumb: If you can afford it, it's always best to overbuy then underbuy.

When do you recommend a dedicated MYSQL server?

And then a dedicated RMS server?

Need it for my business proposal for costs of up scaling when the time comes.

 that was my last suggestion, three boxes..

Zarcon, customer wants to go with you guys but cannot manage a ded.. so I'm trying to help them understand this,

there really is no way to be sure on what to start out with..

Ditch such things as cPanel, Plesk, and go with something very light.  The only things I am using to help manage the box is webmin, FTP client, phpMyAdmin and of course shelling into the server.  I actually have two Dolphin sites on the server; however, one is just a test set up where I had members helping to test things before moving to the production site so no one is ever logged onto it.  As I said, I am using Nginx which is configured differently than Apache.

Talk to the people that you are thinking of leasing from; if you are thinking of leasing.  One thing I asked about was upgrading the server and if I need a completely new server instead of just increasing the ram; they will help with setting it up and migrating the site side by side so I don't have any long downtimes.  And that RAID is worth the extra fee, if your drive crashes, you will never know, push in a new drive and it mirrors automatically.

Not sure about trying to blitz the box; my members are still on edge from the VPS catastrophe caused by Boonex lying about hosting; that still has a bitter taste in my mouth.

Here is something I learned the other day.  I did a back-up and it dumped the temp file into the same temp directory used by MySQL causing the directory to reach its limit which then triggered a lot of database errors and had me jumping.  Put the temp for MySQL in its own private directory.

Having a separate box for the mySQL server is not as important as it may seem; unless you are really big in size.  Having a separate box is going to up the cost.  You may be better off just increasing the resources on the box; getting as large a box as possible since the costs will be lower than have a dedicated box for the sql server; such as going with a dual or quad processor box, two - four core cpus instead of two boxes each with a quad core processor.

 do at night when site is not active..

https://www.blitz.io/report/f3bef567df128352ad511b919f4e13eb

Its true that there is no way to 'predict' exactly what you will need. There are so many factors that play in when choosing a server setup. For example, will your members be mainly posting text, just photos, all 200 online members using video chat at the same time, etc.

We know not everyone knows how to manage a server so we often receive questions on 'How do I....' that we are happy to answer. In this case, if he needed someone to manage the server for them, they could always just ask you :)

@Steve - I personally do not recommend using multiple servers unless it is DEFINITELY needed. The reason is mostly due to latency between the response times of each server (and cost). So it's possible that a website will be slower in response than a site that has 1 server with Site/RMS/MySQL installed on it.

 that is exactly what is going on. I agreed to do it. Just trying to decide on what to go with.

They are telling me they expect 80-100 users chatting, uploading videos. In reality I don't think this will happen, chatting yes but not constant video uploads..

 Not saying it's 'not' possible, but it more likely not to be the case. I think I may know who you are talking about. I have some PMs between a member asking about this same stuff with that member count. I explained all of this already.

 lol, ok.. your most likely right.

[edit] so a 32 core server is a bit overkill?

 Well, if your interested I believe NASA has a supercomputer for sale. It Might.... Just Might.. be able to handle Dolphin :)

 OK, well going with you guys would be the best option, keeping it in the circle and being that your conversing with them now..

No joking on the server, this is an upgrade to that package, its crazy..

AMD Quad x 16 CORES 2.1Ghz Opteron 6272 - Total of 64 CORES! [add $300/month]  134 GIGAHERTZ of processing power

So it is safe to say a four core system, your suggestion, is what to go with. The RAM is the important factor here right?

For a member base that size I would suggest at least:

- Quad-Core processor

- 16GB of RAM

- 1.5 TB HDD

Zarcon, could you PM or post the link for the suggested package?

 Yeah I will hit you up via PM

 Thanks, that price cannot be beat!

After coming back and reading the rest of the replies, I feel a bit violated :lol:

 Why?

I may need your help setting up nginx.. lol

Newton27   I don't know what you think about 1and1 hosting but they are currently giving 3 months free hosting on powerful dedicated servers with discounted price after ...

I know some people don't like 1and1's support service BUT I have used them since their very beginning and if you know what your doing there is no need for their support ...

I admin all my own servers from 1and1 without issue so I personally recommend their servers!

After the treatment I got from 1&1 I would not lease a server from them.  Which was a good thing because after they jerked me around for a week, I got a better deal elsewhere.  Take the bandwidth thing; I was on the phone with a sales rep and I asked about the bandwidth, which was 2TB per month.  I was told that if I went over that they would throttle the site and I would have to call them and get the throttle removed.  So I asked about just buying more bandwidth.  The sales rep just kept repeating that they would throttle the account; why would I want to have the site crawl to a stop and have to call them after getting member complaints about the site?  At the time I looked, to get any deal you had to go under a year's contract, meaning if you did not like what you were getting, you were stuck with it or you had to pay even if you went elsewhere.

I have been with 1and1 for some ten years now on shared hosting and they treated me like crap when I tried to least a dedicated server from them; and I have some fourteen domains with them; which I will be slowly moving to a different registrar; they keep going up on the domain fees anyway.

So, my advice as a user is to run away from 1and1

hummm yeah well I know different people have mixed feelings about them!    I have not had issues with them ever and I rarely need them for any support whatsoever  ... On my package I have Bandwidth100 Mbit and 'real' unlimited traffic allowance. At different times my network receives a lot of activity and last year we had over 50K visitors over 3 days due to a topic and event we covered and the server did not struggle one bit!

I guess it's really a case of 'each to their own' ... I  have seen hosting recommended at Boonex that I have also tried and very much regretted ...

I would appreciate a little feedback from those in the know.

I just upgraded to cloud-hosting at hostforweb with storage : 55gb RAM 2048 MB CPU 1.8 GHz Bandwidth 3000 GB

I am getting 2-5 new members/day.

I allow photos/sounds upload while videos are youtube only. no chatting.

What do you think? Do I have enough?

currently YES .... there is no point upgrading to large powerful servers at the beginning stages which will drain your finances ....

as your site grows you can upgrade but what you have currently is more than enough!

I appreciate all the feedback I got here, Thanks..

Ended up with this..

Harddisk     2x 2000 GB SATA 3,5" 7.200 rpm

CPU              AMD Opteron 3280 Octacore (8 cores)

Barebone     Fujitsu PRIMERGY MX130 S2

RAM     32x Gigabyte RAM

nice ... good set up there man ;)

I find 16GB RAM good at moment but will also be making this 32GB

 Hey Detective.

That's what i thought, but something seems to be eating up all my RAM and the hosts are now insisting I upgrade.  I have no idea what's taking up my ram.  I have 300 members, 2000+ visitors/day, 2-5 new members per day. And the only extensions I use are the AQB Points System + FB apps.

Also, in HOST TOOLS I am wondering if the host should be doing a better hosting job for me. Or is it something I should be dealing with?

Site optimization

• PHP:
  • php accelerator = NO - WARNING (Dolphin can be much faster if you install some php accelator))
  • php setup = cgi-fcgi - WARNING (your PHP setup maybe very inefficient, please check it for sure and try to switch to mod_php, apache dso module or FastCGI)
• MySQL:
  • key_buffer_size = 67108864 - OK
  • query_cache_limit = 2097152 - OK
  • query_cache_size = 67108864 - OK
  • query_cache_type = ON - OK
  • max_heap_table_size = 16777216 - OK
  • tmp_table_size = 134217728 - OK
  • thread_cache_size = 256 - OK
• Web-server:
  • User-side caching for static conten = click here to check it in Google Page Speed 
    If it is not enabled then please consider implement this optimization, since it improve perceived site speed and save the bandwidth, refer to this tutorial on how to do this. 
    To apply this optimization you need to have expires_module Apache module - OK
  • Server-side content compression = can be checked manually or in "Page Speed" tool build-in into browser. 
    If it is not enabled then please consider implement this optimization, since it improve perceived site speed and save the bandwidth, refer to this tutorial on how to do this. 
    To apply this optimization you need to have deflate_module Apache module - FAIL (You will need to install deflate_module for Apache)
• Dolphin:
  • DB cache = On (File based cache engine) - WARNING (installing php accelerator will speed-up file cache)
  • Page blocks cache = On (File based cache engine) - WARNING (installing php accelerator will speed-up file cache)
  • Member menu cache = On (File based cache engine) - WARNING (installing php accelerator will speed-up file cache)
  • Templates Cache = On (FileHtml based cache engine) - OK
  • CSS files cache = On - OK
  • JS files cache = On - OK
  • Compression for CSS/JS cache = On - OK

Any ideas?

 This was for my newest growing site..

it may be some overkill but I will need it soon if things still keep going the direction they are.

 And just where did you get this mister??? :)

 i want it too!!!

 Well by cracky, shoot me a PM or visit my site and you can have one too.. haha