intermittent site slowness

[HollyKNY]

Any help is welcome! Would you say that sporadic site slowness is a hosting company issue? I have built several sites for customers using Genesis and PixelHappy. All are small sites, many don't have blogs, very limited plug-in use. On a few sites we have experienced excruciating sporadic slowness - like 30-60 seconds to open a page on the admin side, another 60 seconds to publish a change, 30-60 to upload a graphic (small, under 200kb), and often it just hangs, 30-60 to refresh the site in a browser, etc. Hours later, the site will be fine and fast.

Each hosting company has told me I need to optimize the DB and install caching plug-ins. Optimizing the DB has not always helped and I don't want to use a plug-in if I don't have to, because my guess is that this may be their issue. If it was a caching issue, wouldn't it be consistently slow and would a caching plug-in help with dashboard side issues? My guess is not but would love some advice.

Thanks!

[NicktheGeek]

Mostly likely you are using shared hosting. This means that the server is hosting potentially hundreds of other sites. Even if your client sites aren't heavily trafficked it can experience big time slow downs when other sites on the server are getting lots of traffic.

Using a caching plugin can be a very good solution as it limits php and SQL processing time. That means the page will be delivered more quickly even if the server is being hammered. The other option would be better hosting.

[HollyKNY]

Thanks, Nick - that was a fast response! Yup, shared hosting. Forgot to mention that. Would the caching plug-in help increase our speed while editing the site on the Admin side, too? Better hosting is our next step. I've been using this company for years but in the past 6 months or so, it seems I am running into more issues with them.

[NicktheGeek]

Most cachign plugins do not cache the backend, rightly so. It may help some by reducing the site load overall, but in a shared host environment you aren't likely to capitalize on that. Fewer plugins is your best bet there.

[HollyKNY]

Thanks, Nick. Much appreciated. Have a good weekend!