[Gllug] Underpowered box & apache 2

[Steve Nelson]

On 5/20/05, Adrian McMenamin <adrian at mcmen.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> I am (re)building a server to run an apache/perl/mysql/sendmail combo -
> previously this was all based on a 1.x version of apache and although
> the box was underpowered - just 64MB ram though a Pentium II processor -
> it performed fine under the very light loads generated.
> 
> Now everything is very slow if it involves perl and ludicrously slow if
> it involves sendmail - users hit a button and wait 40 seconds for the
> next page to appear.
> 
> The maillog indicates big delays (30 seconds) in processing each message
> - xdelay of 20 seconds plus.
> 
> Is this unavoidable or is there something else I can adjust - basically
> the server was upgraded from Red Hat 7.3 to Fedora Core 3

I am sure there are things you can remove and tweak.  I'm not very
familiar with FC3, but I wouldn't be surprised to learn that accretion
has occured, meaning that over the releases more and more stuff has
crept into the distribution, much of which uses up resources, and
might not be noticible on faster equipment.  I'd look at it in terms
of what an 'average' machine's spec was when RH 7.3 was released,
compared to when FC3 was released.  Quite different.  I'd expect the
demands of a base system to similarly grow.

If you wanted to use something a little closer to RH 7.3, I'd point
you in the direction of centos (already plugged once today).  You
could, of course, run a simple Debian system, which is always a good
bet for a light-powered system, but my personal preference for such
machines is freebsd, which seems to fly on comparatively under-powered
kit.

Have fun.

> Adrian McMenamin <adrian at mcmen.demon.co.uk>

Steve
-- 
Gllug mailing list  -  Gllug at gllug.org.uk
http://lists.gllug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/gllug