During the next two days, Wednesday and Thursday I'll be moving TheBeachcats.com to a much more powerful server to handle the continued traffic increase.
Please use the contact form to report any problems you notice. If the site is down for you please use the webmaster@ email to report the problem. Thank you and keep your fingers crossed.
For the geeks here are the basic specs of the new Dell server.
Intell Xeon Quad Core w/6mb cache
4GB RAM @ 1333MHz
2 x 250 high speed Hard drives
Centos 5.5 64bit OS
Hopefully that will keep the site going for the next couple of years, please report any problems you notice. The move includes a change of IP address for the site, so the plan is to copy the site to the new server while leaving the old one in place, then switch the domain IP address.
Any time a database based site is moved it is possible for some content to get lost in the shuffle, this can happen if you post content to the old server just after the final copy is done to the new one but before the IP change propagates. If you post on the forums, classifieds, or photo albums and later your content vanishes you'll know you got caught in the crossfire and will need to repost.
Damon: I know you weren't looking for advice, much less mine, but....
Are you sure you want to go with the Intell Xeon Quad Core w/6mb cache? That thing wears out muffler bearings like nobodys business.....they are a bear to replace and require a special pipe stretcher. Also, you will find that the Centos 5.5 64bit OS is made of unobtanium...it will cost you a damn fortune if you ever have to upgrade!
Always glad to hear advice from our most tech-savy members, unfortunately Jerome ain't one of them. Awesome sailor but can't operate a digital watch, much less a web server.
Do you literally have the server or is it Hosted by VPN/VPS?
One of the virtual worlds i helped create,(yes, i know..i'm a bit young for that.. )is running on a Windows 2003 and has no slow database problems..(1TB HD For the win?!?!)
But then again, We Defrag the Server & Stuff weekly...just to keep it at it's fastest!
Real dedicated Dell server, located in a very fast/connected data center. It's currently on a high-end VPS, before last October it was on a low-end dedicated server, I've found that the VPS just can't handle the peaks and this is before the heavy use months get here.
Put it on the public Internet and invite a couple hundred of your closest friends to pound it at the same time, let me know how that goes.
"There's no kill like overkill"
Obviously the site could get by on less, but moving it is a b--i--t--c--h and I want SPEED this summer and no hassles.