hello,
we are running newspaper theme the last three years. Never had a problem and when we did it was an attack to xmlrpc which we stopped. The last 2-3 days we are facing really high CPU usage (4CPU = 100%) which we can’t explain!
We are running newspaper theme 7.0.1, PHP 5.3.3, Visual Composer 4.12 and WordPress 4.8
Can you please share any ideas why this is happening?
Awaiting the pleasure of your reply
Makis
Hello,
The main reasons for a high cpu usage has always been Visual composer. That is why in our current theme version we launched our own page builder/front-end editor which is much lighter on the cpu. Lots of complex elements in visual composer quickly increase the cpu usage. Try to update your theme to the latest version but keep in mind you will have to re-create your pages using the new page builder as keeping both plugins active at the same time will not work properly, neither will editing a page with the new page builder which was previously created with visual composer.
Also you after you update you can increse the php version to 7.1 and check the proper memory allocation: https://forum.tagdiv.com/system-status-parameters-guide/
I hope this helps.
Thanks.
hmmmm, am afraid upgrading the theme to the latest version is not an option at the moment.
However, I will consider of updating the visual composer. I think 4.2.1 is a bit old, dont you think? What is the last version before page builder?
The latest version of VC which is tested and recommended is 5.1.1 but it has not been tested in newspaper 7. You can however update the theme to the latest version and update VC along with it, disable tagdiv composer and change the php version.
Thanks.
Also note PHP 5.3 is very very old also, and new version of WP is not optimized to work with it.
https://wordpress.org/about/requirements/
From WP 4.8 onward, it’s optimized for PHP 7, but 5.6.30 would be *highly* recommended if you are running latest WP and cannot start migration to PHP7.
We use PHP 5.6.30 with opcache which is the closest you can get to PHP 7 without actually using it, but retain some backward compatibility while migrating, and planning to move fully to PHP 7 for 2018.
Seriously — 5.3 is ancient, 5.4 is a dog. 5.6 and above is the only thing you *should* be using with WP 4.8 and higher.
You can get up to 30% improvement in PHP speed, and stop those bizarro old CPU spikes from 5.2./5.3 era.
Here are some interesting benchmarks from way back in 2014; and 5.6 has improved since then since some of the work on v7 is backported to 5.6 for security/compatibility:
https://lornajane.net/posts/2014/php-5-6-benchmarks
(( I don’t work here; but we did big PHP upgrade last Sept., and *wow* what a difference. ))
I installed xcache (php opcode).
Also I filtered internal dummy connections so they don’t reach wordpress (.htaccess)
Since these two changes, the behavior of server has been improoved dramatically.
My aim is to update PHP to version 5.6, but I read that is not possible on Centos.
Also, I am not really sure about it as our portal is live with about 20000 users / day.
I guess it will happen one day, after the next WP update …
Since v4.12 is the last version of Visual composer before version 5.0, does it worth to update? Or I will have to update theme and PHP version too ?
Am asking as am not quiet sure and I don’t want to brake things.
Apart that, if you update theme, then you have to use page builder instead of VC.
So what’s the point of updating VC at the first place?
any help will be much apreciated
Hello,
We do recommend using our page builder in the current version but this is not mandatory. Visual composer is still available and can be used.
As for VC the update is worth it but it will not have the impact you are looking for most likely but it’s worth a shot.
I strongly recommend updating the theme, php version, plugins etc. as updates are recommended for optimal performance and stability.
Thanks.
I am having the same problem. I use Tagdiv theme and page builder, including Cloudflare business, and my server CPU, 8 cores, still get 100 per cent utilisation. I host the website on Cloudways VPS, 8cores, 32GB and I get relatively 60k page views weekly.
