Slow site loading - try my site pls.

Hi guys im just setting up an install on http://www.unitmodels.com
The site is hosted at media temple (new hosting). The problem im having is extreemly slow speeds can a couple of you verify this for me by checking the site? Im pretty sure this is a server side issue but any ideas are greatfully recived. And yes i know i might have a few too many images on my landing page.

also

has anyone else had bad problems with media temple? I moved to them recently after i read good things about them and the digg effect.

thanks in advance :)

I just ran some tests and heres the results.
Firefox
Parse Time: 7.827 - Number of Queries: 323 - Query Time: 1.1158737466
Parse Time: 9.416 - Number of Queries: 323 - Query Time: 0.330378234818

internet explorer

Parse Time: 2.593 - Number of Queries: 323 - Query Time: 0.902499425079
Parse Time: 7.026 - Number of Queries: 281 - Query Time: 0.873740424866

does this shed any light? im on a 10mbit connection but have tried from another location with similar issues.

My suggestion: Switch to a Zen Cart certified host.... click on "hosting" at the top of the page.

I have 12 images on my front page. no issues.

Your testing tells the story.

The Server your Hosting account is on is slow. Doubt things will improve so best to start looking for another Hoster.

As to questions in general for a Hoster, start making a list of questions that are important to you. Then keep a list of potential Hosters in Spreadsheet format, easier to track why you like or don't like, someone's Service. Once you have a shortlist of about 5 names you start getting serious. Contact them by eMail, phone, whatever, and ask a few questions about their packages. That should give who to start with now and who to immediately move to, if plan B is required. And don't lose that list!

With any potential Hoster, Features / Price / Support can be checked out before signing up. The last point to consider, Service or Uptime, cannot usually be determined until one actually starts using it or, unless the Hoster has a link to their Uptime stats.

To help overcome that, there are various places that provide Free or Paid uptime monitoring and the following three provide both:

http://easymonitor.com/
http://siteuptime.com/
http://host-tracker.com/

Using a combination of all on one Hoster or each on different Hosters, can give you a good idea on their Service before using them.

Overall, research and patience are two important tools when checking most things, Hosting or otherwise. ;)

hehe yes i know i should go sash but i like the gs idea and was impressed up till now with their performance. I can only assume they are upgrading or something and have submitted a ticket. In an ideal world id be on a dedicated server but at the moment Gs (if it starts to run at acceptable speeds) is a satisfactory Host. If it does not i will have to re-loacet all my sites to another affordable host. Up until now i was at Psychz and to be honest will probably end up back there.

Just wondered if i could verify that its a server issue not something ive messed up. Ow and whilst people are looking a appreciate advice/criticism.

cheers

Hi rob thanks for the reply i replied before i got to read what you wrote. Its a shame but looks like i might have to hop to another server. Ive still got my fingers crossed though.

Ill have a wonder round those sites.

cheers

ow also to give a good comparrison heres the current site

https://www.unitmodels.co.uk

new site

https://www.unitmodels.com

eeeeeeeek @ parse figures etc.

-=====
edited

ow and i just found the edit button lol. sorry :)

We have a Client who had the same problems with media host and realized that price is not everything. When checking out a new Host do not always look for the most you can get for your buck. Some Hosters play the numbers game, offering wildly huge packages for cheap but put so many accounts on a Server (because they have to to make any money) that everything slow downs.

Not saying that is case with media temple but if your site loads slow and the situation will not be improving, you now have more information to think about when considering a new Host.

agreed rob size doesnt always matter its what you do with it ;) i thought tech chrunch being on a media temple server was a good enough reference. The next few hours/days will either teach me a lesson or burn me lol. Once again thanks for the advice :)

Well i just got a response from them

"
o begin troubleshooting this situation I strongly recommend analyzing the speed of your dynamic pages using one of the many website performance analysis tools available such as; Pingdom Full Page Test and the Firebug browser extension for Firefox. Below I've included links to these resources along with more information on how to use these tools to determine what code on your web pages takes the longest time to load.

Many times calling external javascript includes or using seemingly small website plugins (that may not been written efficiently) can dramatically increase the time it takes your web pages to load. Understanding the time it takes each item on your page to load will help you determine what code is having the biggest impact so you can quickly begin looking at ways to reduce your page load times.

http://tools.pingdom.com/fpt/
http://www.codestore.net/store.nsf/unid/BLOG-20070326
http://getfirebug.com

We've seen many cases where a page may take a long time to load and it turns out the main reason why this is happening has to do with calling an external javascript include or loading an inefficient web application plugin. In these cases the power of the server won't make a difference as the results will be the same anywhere the site is hosted. Eliminating these potential causes of slow loading pages will help us both understand the specific problem so we can help make your pages load quickly again.

Best Regards,"

Its not looking good though imo. :( maybe a default zencart install into a different directory will help clear up jscript issues not being the problem....

Ok ive also got this site https://www.shop.lifeopia.com running on the same server. I didnt think of this before doh but i think i may of spoken too soon about it being the host.. any ideas/ thoughts?

ow and the lifeopia domain is hosted with gdaddy
the unitmodels.co.uk and ,com domains are hosted at telivo with their name servers pointing to their hosts.

SOLUTION TO SLOW PAGE LOADING

I have turned off the tabs plugin "TPP - Config" and my pages are now loading alot faster. This is a strange one for me and its a shame because i really liked it. :( if anyone comes up with a fix for this id appreciate it.

my pages are still slow though but not 7-14 seconds loading now theyre at 4 sigh :(

https://www.shop.lifeopia.com

Although a tad on the slow side, I would say the load time or wait is acceptable.

Trouble is, it's only using the default / demo database provided with Zen Cart. I'm pretty sure that once a real database is used and with a few modules added in, the slowness will be back.

I'm curious how this turned out. I'm also using media temple Grid Service hosting and have not been satisfied with the speed.

I'm running zen-cart 1.3.8 with zenmagick on top of that. I'm seeing very slow page load times (7+ seconds or longer).

When I contacted Media Temple (mt) tech support, I got the same reply, almost word for word!:laugh:

In a followup email, their tech support guy said that he was sure it was my php code (zen-cart) and not their server causing the slowdown.

Just for laughs, I signed up for an account at zen-cart certified host and guess what? The site is BLAZING FAST! Yikes! I didn't even realize how slow the mt site was until I switched.

I'm not talking about the default z-c installation, I actually migrated my whole cart over there. Click on a link --> BAM! it loads. Add something to the cart --> BAM it loads. :clap:

WOW. I am humbled. Now I just have to figure out how to tell my client why I chose mt in the first place.

I wish I would have checked the forums here before I signed up at mt. Fortunately, I haven't put any other sites up at mt yet.

The information provided by MT Support was spot on and can be very helpful.

Unfortunately, their information is only helpful if it has already been determined that the Server itself is not the problem. And in the case of Media Temple sites it will most always be because their Servers are overloaded -- too many sites on one Server.

Zen Cart provides a feature that allows one to see if the Server is the problem.

Admin > Configuration > Logging : Display The Page Parse Time = true

Then look to the bottom of your Zen Cart pages for results.

You can trust the information as it is coming directly from the Server.

I did turn on the logging. Time to access the database was relatively quick, but the time to load the page was waayyy too slloooowwwwww... something like 15-20 seconds consistently, whether the page was a category with dozens of images or an info page with mostly text.

I'm as pleased as punch with the new host, except for a few minor headaches. Support has been relatively responsive, and the site is BLAZING fast compared to mt.

FWIW, mt is probably a good host for plain old HTML websites, but now that I've tasted real speed, I can't go back. Once an animal tastes blood, he's a killer for life... :)

thank goodness for these forums!!

Glad i stopped by again. I switched hosts and have a reseller account thats as cheap as MT but imo far better. I know Mt might be good for some type of hosting, cms's just arent included in them. I just wished instead of going round the houses they would answer with

" sorry our web hosting does not support most of the one click installs that we offer. if you want to host a 1 page html page with a guestbook though we can deffo help"

if anyones looking for hosting coming from Mt id really look around at the banners on the zencart forums. After all its your business we are talking about :)

Website Rob:

The information provided by MT Support was spot on and can be very helpful.

Zen Cart provides a feature that allows one to see if the Server is the problem.

Admin > Configuration > Logging : Display The Page Parse Time = true

Then look to the bottom of your Zen Cart pages for results.

You can trust the information as it is coming directly from the Server.

I enabled the parsing time display. In both IE and Firefox parse times are I think acceptable and quite similar.

My problem is in slow loading product pages when viewed with Firefox. IE is OK
My site
http://www.all4coffee.com/
loads home page fast and also category pages quite fast
http://www.all4coffee.com/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=66

But when I try to load any product page itis very slow. Here is one of them:
http://www.all4coffee.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=66&products_id=37

Could please someone have a look with Firefox? I tried to analize with Firebug plug-in but I couldn't tell anything from that...