Product Pages loading slowly

I'm running 3.9h on a Windows Server - MySql 5 - and our cart has always been a little slow, but now it really drags. I've followed the recommended article for this issue and thought it was a necessary sacrifice for showing "specials" and "featured items" or for having a lot of categories. I turned off search by manufacturers and instead created a page for the information side box with clickable logos for searching.

In monitoring the parse times today I realize that the specials and featured items are not causing a problem as the parse times with them on or off are the same.

Also, the only thing unbearably slow are the product pages at anywhere from 6 to 9.2 per product page, customer logged on or logged off.

Category links average about 2.7 and query counts don't seem to affect this.

I turned of "Customer's also purchased" reluctantly but was relieved to see this made no difference in the Product page parse time.

I'm on a MySql 5 and there is another application sharing this database that screams by the zencart in speed....so I don't think it is the server.

Any ideas on how to speed up my product display pages deeply appreciate. Customers are starting to complain. Add to cart is 2.7 like the other links in the site.

Thank you

Apologize for the word "Compromised" sounds like I was hacked...but that's not an issue.

Should also have said my Medium images average about 24KB in size; 200 x 200 pixels at 150 dpi.

Care to share a link to the site in question so that we can see how it loads for us and make comment/give suggestions?

Thank you....I can pm that as I have had some band width issues in the past with posting our site link here.....but by all means answer online in this thread. I will be sure and follow up with my solution.

I have had some band width issues in the past with posting our site link here
Post your url with spaces to avoid it being indexed on this site

Like
http :// www .zen-cart.com/

athena:

I have had some band width issues in the past with posting our site link here

I'm going to go out on a limb here, and suggest that this being the case, your have some serious issues or limitations placed on your server above and beyond what is acceptable for an eCommerce system and that this is probably/possibly the ultimate cause of the apparent slowness of the site.

In all the years I've been frequenting these forums I don't recall a single other instance of anyone having 'band width issues' as a result of posting a link to their site here. One has to wonder how the site would cope if you managed to get a high google ranking (something we all desire).

Yes, ZenCart can be very server intensive (especially with some of the add-on modules), but IMO if the server can't handle it, then you really should consider a better server. Trying to 'tweak' zencart to minimise server load is a temporary fix at best.

Just my 2cents worth.

Cheers
Rod

Thanks....our hosting company has been super professional, secure and reliable for so many years.

The only zencart ad-on specific to the product pages is Lightbox. I'll fool with that and see.

I tested the page load times at a pubic internet location and the site loads zippity fast but those product pages were as high as 12 seconds per; never under 9.

OK...you think I'm being silly so we'll see.....do appreciate the insights.....here goes: top kayaker dot net / top kayaker shop

I just tried your site and pages load fine for me. There is a slight delay after clicking a URL whilst the server request is sent but im assuming that's because your in a differnt country to me? I'm in the UK.

Where are you and where is your sever?

I'm not seeing a significant difference when turning off lightbox. Shucks, thought that'd be an easy fix.

Phil, do you see no difference between the product info pages and the categories? There is a consistent difference on my end in New England U.S.A. Product pages take at least double if not triple the time to load over categories.

When looking at a product with attributes
Parse Time: 22.494 - Number of Queries: 300 - Query Time: 1.0655643905182

The query time - while not fantastic - is not the major bottleneck
It is the time the server takes to parse the page

Yes, I agree as I've seen no pattern there. I've recorder parse times of 2.7 with a large variety of Query numbers from 216 to 488.

I do see now that the few items we have with attributes are even slower....from 6.4 no attributes, to 16.7 w/ attributes in the same category....but that 6.4 is bad enough.

Your host needs to tune your server - specifically the apache section

The host spent a lot of time looking with me at the server settings etc. and said everything looks good but my page load times. I'm mystified but realize after skipping through the showcase of zencarts that the product pages are loading instantly for others, so it is something I've done to the cart...must be.

I'll attempt a clean install on my hosts Linux server AGAIN....sigh.... and see if rebuilding the site completely with the newest mods and 1.5 solves the issues. Still appreciate any insights...but will post back when I solve this.

athena:

The host spent a lot of time looking with me at the server settings etc. and said everything looks good but my page load times. I'm mystified but realize after skipping through the showcase of zencarts that the product pages are loading instantly for others, so it is something I've done to the cart...must be.

I'll attempt a clean install on my hosts Linux server AGAIN....sigh.... and see if rebuilding the site completely with the newest mods and 1.5 solves the issues. Still appreciate any insights...but will post back when I solve this.

Before you go rebuilding have you checked that this is nut a template issue by seeing if the same happens if you set the default template temporarily?

While you clearly "love" your host, I don't think the feeling is reciprocal...

Time for you to go host where the provider knows eCommerce, and has the capacity to host it.

I worry about hosts that still advocate WINDOZE servers for programs that are better-off on LINUX.

I would sooner host sites on my microwave oven than trust a windoze server.

Template change is an interesting idea, but i believe I'm just using the default...at least there is only one choice under Admin > Tools > Template Selection and that is for 1.3.9h Classic Contemporary Green

philip937:

Before you go rebuilding have you checked that this is nut a template issue by seeing if the same happens if you set the default template temporarily?

As the default is being used as the actual (bad mistake), there is no way to do this diagnostic...

athena:

Template change is an interesting idea, but i believe I'm just using the default...at least there is only one choice under Admin > Tools > Template Selection and that is for 1.3.9h Classic Contemporary Green

If you are using the default then you have made a lot of changes to the default theme as your site is blue etc.. If you have made changes without creating a YOUR_TEMPLATE theme then you won't be able to revert to default to test if its something you have done..

The site is taking ages to load on my browser(s) (I tried in firefox, chrome and MSIE). Interestingly, the HTML part of your site is loading quite quickly.

My guess is that it's primarily a server issue... Not handling the complex functions of php >>> mySql very efficiently.

Why not get some hosting on another provider (linux) and creating a full CLONE of the webshop, and loading it onto that server... ?

That's what I would do.

If you need (free) temp hosting to do the test, PM me... I have a very fast server (one of the fastest in the UK)... All you will need is a "spare" domain name... or I could put it into a sub-directory on one of my domains.