Hitting Host's 500 MB Memory Usage (RAM) Limit

  • Hi Everyone,

    My hosting provider is in the process of upgrading to CloudLinux, which enables them to impose memory usage (RAM) limits on each account on a server. The limit they’ve imposed is a 500MB cap. They’re doing this to keep one site/account from monopolizing resources and slowing down the others and/or causing outages.

    I have multiple wordpress sites hosted with them, a few on differing servers (it’s a reseller account), and now all of my sites are running into issues loading because they are hitting the memory usage limits.

    In any case, the entries in my site’s error log all look something like this:

    [Thu Apr 28 14:50:51 2011] [error] [client 75.xxx.xx.xxx] (12)Cannot allocate memory: couldn’t create child process: /opt/suphp/sbin/suphp for /home/zicl/public_html/wp-content/themes/headway-101/media/css/layout.php, referer: https://www.examplesite.com/wp-content/themes/headway-101/style.css

    [Thu Apr 28 15:00:27 2011] [error] [client 75.xxx.xx.xxx] (12)Cannot allocate memory: couldn’t create child process: /opt/suphp/sbin/suphp for /home/imq/public_html/wp-content/themes/headway-101/media/css/typography.php, referer: https://www.examplesite.com/wp-content/themes/headway-101/style.css

    And the WP errors logs have entries like this:

    [28-Apr-2011 04:32:37] PHP Fatal error: Out of memory (allocated 20447232) (tried to allocate 131072 bytes) in /home/imq/public_html/wp-includes/functions.php on line 3071

    [27-Apr-2011 23:53:05] PHP Fatal error: Out of memory (allocated 18087936) (tried to allocate 78 bytes) in /home/zicl/public_html/wp-includes/formatting.php on line 949

    The host is, of course, blaming the issue on WP and my plugins/themes. However, the sites all use themes from popular providers such as Thesis, Headway, Studiopress, and WooThemes. Most sites only have 1-3 plugins, all of which are popular and vetted by many users. No caching plugins, no cron jobs, etc. Nothing resource-heavy. These are cpanel accounts, and most have fewer than 500 visits/day and between 50-1000 pages/posts.

    My question is, should 500MB RAM memory usage limit be too low to run WP? Or does every one of my sites have some kind of issue that makes them take up more memory than they should? They were built at different times, on different servers, with different themes, and so I am kinda at a loss here.

    If anyone could provide any insight, I would be very, very, very appreciative. I am really stressed right now, as I’ve worked my tail off for years to build a business that supports my family, and right now my income has been cut back to a trickle.

Viewing 15 replies - 1 through 15 (of 34 total)

  • This is most common problem:

    reason Plugin/theme developer uses plenty of resources
    That could be saved to avoid Slow loading sites

    Optimization is highly recommended. Find Some expert level coder with skills of handling Apache.

    Thread Starter browndog82

    (@browndog82)

    Thanks Alok. But plenty of people use these themes everyday without problems, and they perform well for my users.

    Is 500MB a low memory usage limit. And if not, how can I determine why my sites are using so many resources?

    Memory Don’t matter !
    If Matters How much Traffic over your site. And How much the resources your sites are taking.

    Optimization would always helps you to save critical CPU Cycles that otherwise is a waste. Because they are not being used for productivity.
    That is simply a continuous leakage.

    Anyway What’s in general your Traffic stats says.
    In simple terms How many hits you are getting on average.

    Anyway give me your url Just want to check..

    Thread Starter browndog82

    (@browndog82)

    Sorry — not comfortable handing out my URL.

    And I was told by the host and other sources that traffic is not the issue.

    Its Okey
    Check Your Theme / Plugins

    Moderator Ipstenu (Mika Epstein)

    (@ipstenu)

    ?????? Advisor and Activist

    500 SHOULD be fine. I have a pretty busy site (yes, traffic DOES matter) and I use 250 on an average day (with spikes to 350-400).

    Optimization and caching can help. PHP setups can also be problematic. SuPHP sometimes doesn’t share memory well.

    I would start by dumping any plugin you don’t need, and then actually ADDING in minimization and/or a good caching plugin (W3TC or WP Super Cache)

    Alok, please don’t sign your posts. It’s against the guidelines.

    Thread Starter browndog82

    (@browndog82)

    Thanks, Ipstenu.

    The averages for the sites are pretty low, but it looks like they do definitely spike a good bit — making them hit that 500 threshold and not load properly.

    I will try the caching plugin and see what happens. Thanks so much!

    W3TC Or WSC with Minify works
    If You had not invoked them invoke now.

    The simplest way for you to use https://www.rackspace.com or any Good Scalable Hosting.Only If you face problems Even after Those tweaks.

    Make Sure to Optimize your DB too.

    Thread Starter browndog82

    (@browndog82)

    Well I disabled all plugins and added WP Super Cache to a test site, but still won’t load correctly ??

    Theme is Headway 101

    See Until You Share the Url
    Its Hard to anyone to help you..

    Moderator Ipstenu (Mika Epstein)

    (@ipstenu)

    ?????? Advisor and Activist

    mralokkp – Please stop signing your posts. I’ve edited your comments to remove them, but if you keep it up, I’ll flag you as a bozo.

    browndog82 – You’ll need to work with your host to sort out where and what is causing the memory usage. The error logs should tell you what and where. From what you posted, I would say it’s the theme, which means it’s the theme’s functions. So try Twenty Ten.

    Ipstenu
    I am sorry That is just a practice.What’s Bad in that?
    Well! Who are you to flag me as bozo?
    I am just trying to help that guy.

    Thread Starter browndog82

    (@browndog82)

    Thanks Ipstenu — I just wish my host were being more helpful.

    I am going to test Twenty Ten.

    Moderator Ipstenu (Mika Epstein)

    (@ipstenu)

    ?????? Advisor and Activist

    mralokkp – bozo flagging means that your posts are all moderated. Signatures are not permitted on these forums. Oh and saying I’m absuing you in another thread is a bit playing the martyr ?? You’re doing FINE, just re-read the forum welcome.

    browndog82 – That does suck, but at least you seem to have access to the error log! How many sites are you running, and is this on shared hosting or a VPS? Also are they separate sites or a MultiSite?

Viewing 15 replies - 1 through 15 (of 34 total)
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