How to make point about unacceptable hosting performance?

[Rarst]

Yes, I know that you get what you pay for with shared hosting (and I don't pay). :) Still there are budget issues, and there are issues that render site unusable.

Lately something is spiking resources on my server. cpanel reports 80%+ memory load and 9+ CPU load (8 cores) while it lasts (from 12-14% and 2-4 regular values).

I wasn't too worried when it lasted some minutes, but last time it lasted ~10 hours, on and off. Pingdom reported up to 15-30s on checks with multiply downtimes (sequential >30s).

WordPress pages took 30-40s to generate or failed half-way.

I've mailed support about performance, cpanel readings and added my Pingdom logs. They replied that everything is fine twice (both when server was back to normal performance) and asked for screenshot of trace via some third party software (???) which is kinda hard to provide when server works normally. cpanel readings and Pingdom logs were ignored.

So how do I proceed? Can I use some script to make log of server load or something?

I just want support to understand there is an issue, most probably with some idiot on server. I seem to be plagued with that.

[brandingdavid]

Is this where I tell you that you need to pay for hosting if you really want to be able to hold a company accountable for anything?

Otherwise, why should they listen to any request made by you? Even if it makes sense...

[Rarst]

Is this where I tell you that you need to pay for hosting if you really want to be able to hold a company accountable for anything?

It is not a free service. It is paid service that I use for free because of hoster's obligations to me.

[davecoveney]

Out of curiosity - how much does that service normally cost?

We had a slowdown recently, but there were over 100 visitors surfing around on our server at that moment. It was just a busy period. And that's a dedicated machine. We're working on some things to enhance performance, but ultimately with shared hosting you just don't have many resources available to you, and the level of support is going to be basic at best.

[Rarst]

Out of curiosity - how much does that service normally cost?

$8/month, typical budget hosting. My blog is relatively small so I don't need more.

hared hosting you just don't have many resources available to you

Most of the time resources are perfectly sufficient for my blog. These recent slowdowns are atypical. If they were regular occurence I'd be long gone to better hosting.

So for now I treat them as problem that needs a fix.

level of support is going to be basic at best

This is more of a universal issue. It is hard to keep competent professional and stream of endless (mostly reatrded and repetitive) questions in one place. :)

[MiroslavGlavic]

Hello Freetard

[Rarst]

Hello Freetard

Oh, yeah I should have probably downloaded source code, made a fix myself and submitted the patch...

Ops, doesn't work like that with commercial hosting. :)

[MiroslavGlavic]

How big is the gun that is next to your skull forcing you to stay with your current host?

also, free = you get what you pay for.

[conorp]

also, free = you get what you pay for.

From what I can gather, it is a paid host, but he is getting it for free. Competition?

[Rarst]

How big is the gun that is next to your skull forcing you to stay with your current host?

Economics of losing free (until mid-2011) hosting and hassle of move. Nothing deadly, but subject issues aren't either. For now.

also, free = you get what you pay for.

See above. If you have trouble with the fact that no money exchanged hands then for the purpose of this discussion consider that I had paid for two years in advance. This would be accurate equivalent.

So now that we poked my relationships with hosting several times, could we please get back to idea of resource consumption logging? :)