Skip to content

How to troubleshoot my VPS?

edited March 2013 in Need Help
What specs and/or stats can I look at to determine if my VPS is not working properly?
I've never used a VPS before so sorry for the noob question.

Comments

  • AlexRAlexR Cape Town
    Think of it like a computer. What do you look for to check your computer is not working? 
  • ronron SERLists.com
    Focus on: CPU, RAM and Internet Speed.
  • I've run speed tests and they've all tested good. My CPU is below 2% most of the time. Occasionally the CPU usage will spike - but only for a few seconds or a few minutes.
  • ronron SERLists.com
    edited March 2013

    CPU can take a pounding, but if you see it at 100% for a stretch, it's just a matter of time before there's a freeze. The scheduler can usually overcome this easily. I like running 20 projects at 15 minutes as that really hits all the projects every two hours with a steady stream of links. A lot of people do 10 projects every 30 minutes. Everyone has a different recipe.

    Another of my favorite tricks (because I don't like the way scheduler handles paused projects) is to run the critical project(s) without scheduler when I go to bed and leave the others inactive. Then when I wake up I turn on the less important projects. So a scheduler-less day.

    Always have the task manager on so you can easily spot how things are going with RAM and CPU. Make sure you *backup every day*. Usually I do a mid-day backup, and then before midnight I rewrite that file with a more current backup. Just keep 2-3 days of backup because those files can get big, and you only have so much disk space.

    Usually with a good VPS internet speed is not an issue, but you have to keep those guys honest. Always remember that your speed is affected by where your vps is hosted, and where your proxies are located. So don't do a speed test on a vps in Germany using Munich as the test site when your proxies are U.S. based - that's apples and oranges. Make a fair comparison based on the location of your vps and proxies.

  • AlexRAlexR Cape Town
    @theorbital - how is your program coming along that restarts SER if it freezes? This is a must have for all SER users...I don't have crashes but sometimes found a freeze here and there. 
  • Ron

    "Another of my favorite tricks (because I don't like the way scheduler
    handles paused projects) is to run the critical project(s) without
    scheduler when I go to bed and leave the others inactive. Then when I
    wake up I turn on the less important projects. So a scheduler-less day."

    When you wake up,
    1. do you change the status of less important projects to from inactive to active?
    2. do you change the status of your critical projects to inactive or just leave them as active (p)?
    3. what happen if you accidentally hit the Stop button? Will that mess up the projects eg lose all the previous submissions?
  • @Ron - Thanks for the time you put into that response, it helps a lot.

    Part of my problem is that I live in a 3rd world country with a fairly unreliable internet connection. That, combined with this being my first time using a VPS has made it a little tricky for me to figure out if in fact its my VPS thats slowing me down.

    So... rather then spending another week trying to tweak my settings I went ahead and bought another VPS from a different provider. In fact, I'm installing it now and restoring my back-up file into the new installation.

    Hopefully I'll see some improvement once I fire things up with this new server.

    Thanks,
    George
  • ronron SERLists.com

    @zurlanger

    1. No I leave them as active. The T1's and other contextual tiers (T2,T3) are usually on Pause anyway. And the junk tiers will get more links even though they probably don't need it. But all projects get plenty of links.

    2. Usually I change the Active(P) to inactive. When I do that, my thinking is that I will eliminate unnecessary verification routines, so I end up getting more submissions that way.

    3. Nothing is lost. Just hit Start again, and you pick up where you left off. Sometimes I just hit stop because I want to run something else, and just want to give SER a break. For the most part, my PC has been running without being turned off for about 5 months now.

  • Hi Ron

    Thanks for your reply. I will try your non-schedule method since I have more control over critical projects.
  • AlexRAlexR Cape Town
    @zuluranger - you from Natal??
  • AlexRAlexR Cape Town
    @zuluranger - where you're from?:-)
  • Hi Alex

    Asia.
Sign In or Register to comment.