Seeking guidance for ERR_CONNECTION_TIMED_OUT

  • I’ve set up my first self-hosted web server with WordPress. When I’m working in wp-admin, I often get the timeout error ERR_CONNECTION_TIMED_OUT. The page will usually load if I refresh, although it sometimes takes multiple refreshes. When viewing the site, it takes longer to load each page than I think it should. As of now, it is a very simple site with just a couple of pages and one blog post. I’m hoping to get some guidance on how I can improve the performance of the site.

    My RPi is sitting 2 feet from me. But it is headless and I do everything in WP from another workstation. I’m using the DNS name and I know that the traffic is leaving my router and coming back in, rather than being resolved by the LAN.

    I’m using a dynamic DNS service (Dynu Services). Although I would expect the Windows DNS cache on my workstation would eliminate the dynamic DNS as the cause of the timeout error. Or am I overlooking something here?

    – The server is a Raspberry Pi 4 Model B (1.5GHz 64-bit quad-core ARMv8 CPU) with 4GB RAM, Raspbian 10 installed OS.
    I decided to use a Pi 4 rather than one of my Pi 3s for improved performance. Is a RPi 4 powerful enough to run a single WordPress site?

    – Apache 2.4.38 – I haven’t made any changes to Apache expect what WordPressed needed (allowing redirects via AllowOverride). Based on my online searches, my Apache instance is not doing any caching. Is there anything I need to change in the Apache configuration to improve performance?

    – PHP 7.3.14-1~deb10u1 – I haven’t adjusted the PHP configuration. I’ve seen posts about increasing the WP/PHP memory limit. But I have not had a memory related error while working in WordPress. Are there PHP settings that I should check or change to improve performance?

    – WP 5.4.1 – I have not yet installed any cache plug-ins. I was waiting until I was a little more comfortable with WordPress and my site. From what I’ve read online, a cache plug-in can sometimes cause problems and the cache needs to be cleared occasionally. So I was waiting until I had more time to research WordPress caching. Should I go ahead an install a cache plug-in?

    – I don’t have a lot of active plug-ins yet. My active plug-ins are Akismet Anti-Spam, Classic Editor, Health Check & Troubleshooting, Page Builder (SiteOrigin), SiteOrigin Widgets Bundle, UpdraftPlus – Backup/Restore, and WPForms Lite.

    – I’m currently using the Potter theme (version 1.1.6), although I have seen this issue with other themes as well. According to the web page for the Potter theme, it is supposed to be lightweight with great performance. Does anyone know of performance issues with this theme?

    My apologies for all of the questions. I have two WP books and I’ve been reading a lot of online articles to learn as much as I can. But I haven’t come across answers to these questions. It seems like they should be in a FAQ somewhere. But I haven’t found it if they are. ??

    Thank you for any advice you can provide!

    • This topic was modified 4 years, 6 months ago by t-p. Reason: Moved from Everything else WordPress

    The page I need help with: [log in to see the link]

Viewing 10 replies - 16 through 25 (of 25 total)

  • no luck upping the allocated PHP memory to 256MB Jon?

    Thread Starter jonrobertson

    (@jonrobertson)

    Increasing allocated PHP memory to 256MB did not resolve the issue. I don’t think it helped at all. I’m using a PHP script named opcache.php to view PHP memory usage and cache utilization.

    opcache opcache.memory_consumption is configured at 128MB. opcache is using 39MB with almost 89MB free. There are 72,162 cache hits versus 1,145 cache misses (98.44% cache hit rate). Seems to me that the cache is working well.

    There is also a 6MB buffer listed. I thought this was opcache.interned_strings_buffer, but that is configured to the default of 8MB. What is the 6MB buffer and should I be concerned about it?. Of that 6MB, 4.47MB is used and 1.53MB is free.

    I ran the script at memory_get_peek_usage docs in CLI and it reported 717 MiB as my max memory usage.

    hmmm, opcode is a different thing; it’s where PHP caches parsed code to allow for faster execution. you need opcode, so it’s good you have it but it rarely needs tweaking (I haven’t).

    re. memory; let’s go crazy and try 512MB?

    but bottomline; I’m afraid I have no idea what is going wrong here Jon, it _should_ just work esp. as phpmyadmin does which proves there isn’t a generic HTTP/ PHP/ DB-issue :-/

    Thread Starter jonrobertson

    (@jonrobertson)

    I ordered a WD_Black SN750 500GB NVMe SSD and a USB 3.1 enclosure from Amazon. They will arrive on Thursday. I’m going to copy my SD card to it and configure Raspbian to use the SSD for my root partition.

    I’m anxious to see how much of a performance improvement this provides and whether that resolves the timeout errors.

    Thread Starter jonrobertson

    (@jonrobertson)

    The WD NVMe SSD came in today. I followed a process I found online to copy my SD card to the SSD and set the SSD as root. The SSD is 5.6 times faster according to the bookmark I took of the SD card (James A. Chambers Raspberry Pi Storage Benchmarks).

    Unfortunately, I still see several ERR_CONNECTION_TIMED_OUT errors on every page of my WP site, both the user site and the admin pages.

    I think my next step is to try to replace apache with lighttpd.

    Thread Starter jonrobertson

    (@jonrobertson)

    Still getting ERR_CONNECTION_TIMED_OUT errors using lighttpd instead of apache, although not as many. Oh well, I’m just talking to myself at this point. If I really want a site, I should probably create one at www.ads-software.com and forgo the idea of running a web server on my pi.

    Oh well, I’m just talking to myself at this point

    nah, I’m still reading this ??

    If I really want a site, I should probably create one at www.ads-software.com and forgo the idea of running a web server on my pi.

    well, you can create a site on wordpress.com (the service) or install the www.ads-software.com software elsewhere. the weird thing is I found several articles online about how to install WordPress on a PI, so it _should_ work (or at least it should be do-able to make it work) ..

    Thread Starter jonrobertson

    (@jonrobertson)

    A friend (and a Linux guru) suggested that I try accessing my site from outside my LAN because the issue may with my LAN rather than the Pi itself. Over the weekend, I was able to do some testing from another friend’s house. And, lo and behold, I did not have a single ERR_CONNECTION_TIMED_OUT while accessing my site or the admin pages.

    After a bit more Googling, I’ve learned that the AT&T U-Verse router/gateway that I have (nvg510) has an issue with DNS. (How to change dns settings to fix nvg510 issues). The nvg510 does not wait long enough for a response from the DNS server. This makes sense, as I often would see the ERR_CONNECTION_TIMED_OUT immediately, as though the request never made it past my router.

    It appears the best solutions involve configuring the nvg510 to be a bridge (modem only) and either buying another router, or, perhaps configuring my Pi to be the router for my LAN.

    I’m still very green with Linux networking and don’t do network configuration often enough to be that proficient at it anyway. So I’ll likely try buying another router.

    interesting, but surprising as phpmyadmin was working? or did you use the IP instead of a domain for that?

    Thread Starter jonrobertson

    (@jonrobertson)

    Nope. I used my domain name. Bitdefender and Chrome get cranky with my SSL certificate if I access my server using the local IP address. ??

Viewing 10 replies - 16 through 25 (of 25 total)
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