Hi All,

As a lot of you have noticed, the downloading situation on MTS2 has gotten... well, pretty annoying, of late. This post will explain the reasoning behind why and also what we are doing about it.

First off - a bit of history and explanation about websites. You may skip this part if you are not so technically inclined.

In all large sites, there is a balance between database usage, cpu usage and bandwidth. One of them will always be used up quicker, and depending on the site and the software that it runs, will be the failure point. This also applies to hardware - one machine that is less powerful can be the "weakest link".

In the past, this has primarily been either the database server, or the actual front end webservers (the www.modthesims2.com ones). Optimisations to the backend code and upgrades have improved the database side. This year, some of you may remember that I implemented download caching, which essentially takes a huge load off the front end webservers and speeds up the site as a whole. Those of you who have been here a long time will probably remember times of slow refreshes and getting stuff. Given that the average amount of members online has increased, optimisations are always needed but here is the catch:

Since I optimised the webservers and implemented the caching, that means that the vast majority of people using the site are actively using it. This is in contrast to, say, 6 months ago when those using the site experienced a lot of waiting for pages and generally just browsing about. What this translates into is simulatenous file downloads. Essentially, if the general getting to pages is slow, this limits the number of clicks on the actual download links, which in turn limits the number of concurrent users on the fileserver. By speeding up the rest of the site, however, this means that the failure point then becomes the fileserver - and thus we see the connection timeouts, 503 errors and so on, and more and more as the people online increase.

Essentially, due to optimisations and other changes on the rest of the site, we have reached the limits of the hardware that we are running to serve files.

(End Technical Section)

To combat this, I have today placed an order for a secondary fileserver with unmetered bandwidth that I will be installing alongside the existing main fileserver, bringing the total up to 4 (files1, files2, thumbs and special). This will basically mean we can handle double the amount of people downloading at any one time, and thus less complaints and less grey hairs for me. That is not to say that, at some point in the future, we wont encounter capacity issues again, or that all the 503 errors will go away - just that they will drop in number.

I will be updating this when the new fileserver is installed and configured - so please bear with us until that happens.

Short version:

• New fileserver ordered
• Will update when it's ready to go
• Mucho fastness yay

In other news, we've also changed the following:

• Added the capability to some forums to sort by age prior to sorting by gender (for example in BodyShop clothing)
• Added categories to the MakeUp section and sorted them
• Filtering by category now shows the category at the end of the breadcrumbs in the download details

Update! New fileserver is online!

Thanks
Delphy

Thank you for these updates Is there any specific date the fileserver will arrive or is it unknown at this point? Anywho, thanks again for your hardwork in nurturing this place

Hi Delphy, just wanted to thank you for all you do for this site and its users. I noticed that if I refreshed that sometimes it helped though I didn't know why that was happening. Great explanation and I actually understood a whole paragraph of it :0). But I just want to thank you in advance for what you're doing to fix the problem. There are so many awesome things to download from here that make the game just that much better....thank you, thank you!!

Thank you Delphy for all the nice things you do for us and this site.

Thank you Delphy for all your hard work and all the MTS2 people. Do we have a Welcome Party for the new server? I will bring the bubbly. lol

well thats good to hear

zookini, I only placed the order tonight, so I have no ETA yet. Probably be in a week or so though, hopefully.

Okey doke I think we can wait, well some of us at least...

Thank you so much for your hard work.Hope you didn't get too much grey hairs....

Whoa!, thanks for the short version - tried reading the 'Techie bit' and nearly went cross-eyed - have you tried re-aligning the Quantum Phase Inverter module yet? - just a thought...

But seriously!, thank you Delphy (and staff at 'MTS-2') for all your hard work - it's greatly appreciated!.

Hey Delphy! Thanks for keeping all us end users up to date on the status of problems most of us don't even think about. You're doing a great job, and it's really appreciated!

Can cleaning out old files from two years ago that are outdated in such help aswell? I know plenty of stuff still is on that is far surpassed in the download section.and Good work strenthing the requirement and rules for uploading, It screwed my at first, but Its all for the greater good

wow Delphy, you're working really hard on every problem. thank you

Thanks for keeping us up to date, MTS-2 provides a great free service for all us sim lovers. Thank you to all who put in many many hours of hard work in trying to keep us all happy, it cant be easy.

Great news Delphy, thanks for keeping us up to date and doing
so much for the site.

Thanks for keeping the site an absolute joy!

Great Job

Joebart,
The problem is not disk space, we have that covered. The reason people are having problems is bandwidth and server overload (the connection to deliver the files from mts2's hard drive to their computer). There's only so many files the server can send out at the same time. Once the 2nd server is in place, then the pipeline for downloads will be about twice the size, which should help a great deal.

all I can say is YAY

Its always something eh? Thank god we have such a dedicated person like you Delphy. If it were me I would have thrown the whole lot out the window by now lol. Thanks for the updates!

Thanks to and all who created and constantly maintain this site. I was wondering how y'all find the time for yourselves and your families with all that everyone does.

I don't mind waiting to download at a later time. I just bookmark the item and return to try another day, and also at an hour that I think the site will be less populated. It's also fun just browsing around. I've found some great downloads that I might have overlooked if not for my aimless wanderings. However, I know not everyone is as laid-back about having to wait to download as I am. A great move on your part, Delphy, if anything, for your own sanity in this must-have-it-and-must-have-it-now world.

good news for sure!

I had a similar problem when I was hosting a site last year which I stopped doing... unfortunately. Well I was just going to say it worked for us if you download stuff by right clicking and doing so and so... on the file hlink I meant. So go do that, and... Long live MTS2.

Thanks Delphy! Have you got some hours for sleeping?