View Full Version : The Gameplay Forums
Hey guys, I don't mean to be rude but these boards are incredibly slow. Since getting broadband I've realised it isn't my connection as every other gaming board loads in seconds. Checking things here is a nightmare and posting a reply a real chore.
Any chance of an upgrade somewhere as it really looks like it's creaking at the edges.
Cheers...
yes, good point i dunno what is wrong with it but it can be anoying sometimes.
heh, if you knew what ran the forums then you'd probably take back your "upgrade" comment :)
Wireplay have mentioned in other posts that they are constantly working on these forums to make them better.
If you look at the ammount of posts/threads and users on the Wireplay forums then you may notice that any other "gaming" forums that you've been to can't really match the sheer ammount that Wireplay have, hence why you'll find your other gaming forums alot faster.
o rite :E i suppose they are actually getting better :)
correct me if i'm wrong, but I think WP have the largest community/members on their forums on the internet?
so no wonder it's slow
This is the largest forum of this type that I've ever seen, and we are aware of the problems that occur with its performance. We're currently waiting for vBulletin 2 to be released (due about a month ago), and once we have that we'll do our best to optimise it and then switch to it. There are a couple of other things that are being tried too (such as load balanced servers), but its largely software limitations than hardware problems which are causing the slow down.
Vbulletin 2.0 Beta is out now... get it :E
Hmmm, I see the reasons now. Ok, thanks. A few possibilities would certainly be load balancing (but as you say, the software needs to support this). But if that isn't possible soonish then another possibility would be to manaully load balance it by placing it across multiple severs and splitting it into several boards perhaps? Or is that already the case?
Another option - delete posts greater than x weeks old?
Originally posted by Hades
Hey guys, I don't mean to be rude but these boards are incredibly slow. Since getting broadband I've realised it isn't my connection as every other gaming board loads in seconds. Checking things here is a nightmare and posting a reply a real chore.
Any chance of an upgrade somewhere as it really looks like it's creaking at the edges.
Cheers...
if u think its slow through [/B] NORMAL [/B] internet then try it through [/B] WEBTV [/B] damn its slower than installing windows with a 2x cd drive!
The amount of posts doesn't affect the speed.
Just as well really with me around :E
Originally posted by { velvet }
This is the largest forum of this type that I've ever seen
proof size doesnt matter?:)
hey just a quicky , today i noticed that i couldnt really get on the forums at all they were sooo slow! i think you should remove some stuff of them that no1 uses.
Like what for instance?
All the usernames with 4ll th3s3 l33t n4m3s f0r 0n3?
:)
i think you should remove some stuff of them that no1 uses.
they tried, u just kept coming back:(
how about some smillies or sommat like - :amidala: , :cat: , :fett: i mean i have never seen n1 one use them. but the only smillie that you need is :monkee:!
wireplay have people paid to make the forums work better
u really think that if taking underused smilies out would speed em up a)they wouldnt ave done it, and b)they wouldnt ave known?
errrr...yes maybeh :cool:
/me runs to bed :bigcry: i have the damm flu
Goddamit, no sooner do I complain about speed than the boards get speeded up by at least 15 secs per msg :p
And I never have and never will be able to do smilies properly :) other than that one.
BodyWarmer
18-02-2001, 10:15
:imu: <-- owns.
They are only slow for me between 6pm and 8pm on weeknights, otherwise they are nice. :)
Board performance is pretty much fine most of the time. The problems come at 6pm when all the BT Internet 'free evenings' people simultaneously log on and have a serious attempt at melting our database server :{
I've been playing around with the beta of vBulletin 2.0 and the performance improvements in it look VERY promising - I'd be surprised if they didn't help our performance problem. No idea when the upgrade will be but we'll be sure to keep you guys informed.
One last thing - deleting old posts / users / smilies etc will have NOT effect on performance what so ever. The boards run off a mySQL relational database which doesn't care if there are 5 posts or 5 million :) All performance issues are purely down to the huge number of people accessing the forums at the same time.
Cheers,
Skunk
you'll have to start charging people to log onto the forums :E
5p everytime they log on :E
hry, you may of found a way to save Wireplay there! Forget the subs, you'll get all your money from Sar :D
The load balanced stuff is due pretty soon too. Will try and find out the exact date.
nah, d33, after the initial 5p from him, there wouldnt be another:)
Well sounds like things should be improved quite a bit soon which is good :)
But it is possible for the large number of posts to degrade performance. I don't use MYSQL but presumably the same principles apply to it as do to other relational databases. If there is a large increase in rows then it may be necessary to perform a re-org so the data is stored more efficiently.
It's also possible that the database engine is choosing a different access path and is no longer going down the most efficient route. I don't know what the equivalent MYSQL utility is, but 'runstats' (a DB2 term) occasionally need to be run on databases which have large volume changes in them. This affects the route taken to access the data. For example, the access path chosen when the database is small will be very different to that which *should* be chosen when it gets much, much larger and it sometimes has to be persuaded which route to take.
Just a thought.
yay tis` been fast all today :E
question are we talking about 1) the slowness to load a page relative to say a normal webpage that jsut downloads some html..or are we talking about 2) the major slow down and often connection timeouts?
1)a forum like this will always be that bit longer to load/download than a page that is the same size but html. Each page has to go through the PhP engine, then query the mysql db as needed, b4 sending it. So to a certain extent that is the pause you get when u first hit the button to go to the forums..and then then the point when the info starts coming up on your screen. Have u noticed that i can take 5-10secs while nothing happens and then suddenly lots of stuff appears fairly quickly. This slowness is to do with the php engine and the querying of the mysql database. In terms of getting around this problem you are lookin at hardware upgrades and the load-balanced machines being brought in should help greatly.
2) At or around 6pm on weekdays and on Sunday evenings there is a huge volume of traffic hitting the forums. mysql performs very well, but it tends to fall apart when u get large amounts of simultaneous requests. at or aroun 400-500 simlutaneous connects it starts to have problems and falls on its knees. this is when you get the major slowdowns and teh connection timeouts. You can throw as much hardware as u can at it and it won't help really. The best thing you can do is cut down on the number of queris that are being sent to the db by each page..and afaik this is what the in-house tweaking was when GP got the vb forums. There was initially a lot of slow down b4 they introduced teh faster version which a much fewer queries for each page. Or you can go for a commercial database that has scalability potential. So the more hardware you throw at it the better it gets. but these dbs cost a small fortune to get.
I think thats most of what i wanted to say :)
P.S. the above is from my very small amount of knowledge of DBs/mySQL/PhP. It may be a load of crap! ;)
[Edited by Wazzoo on 18-02-2001 at 08:08 PM]
i think the delphi forums is bigger
Capt Scarlet
19-02-2001, 11:26
Just a suggestion but why dont you move to a clustered approach, use half a dozen old machines running linux, cluster the forums into groups with only one major forum per server and bobs yer uncle and the forums are faster. Although we did suggest that about 6 months ago and it was blown out of the water then too so you probably wont be allowed to do it now. I guess its cos the people upstairs dont understand the concepts.
Capt.
p.s. had enough time away, i back and no one it going to be safe. :)
thats a really good idea
u musta stole it off me:)
Originally posted by T
nah, d33, after the initial 5p from him, there wouldnt be another:)
Yeah, at most you'd get 10p per day off me ;)
ok i give up :confused: ??
tbh they seem fine for me - considering the amount of diff forums and the many users that post here.
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