Daily Backups Schedule Time / MYSQL Overload

I have some questions if anybody has the time or patience to answer them. Firstly I would like more than anything a good website for noobs on managing their own servers. More specifically I would like to find good websites for noobs on using putty and SSH commands, Cpanel and MYSQL.

If you dont know any good websites but can offer advice on the following I'd appreciate it


1 - Using WHM, how would I go about changing the time of my daily backups? If its not possible through WHM how would I do it with SSH?


2 - Every day at 1:00 am my server craps out. I can load my sites most of the time but anything MYSQL dependant is shot and unusable. During this time when I use top through Putty to monitor the goings on I see pdflush often and then later a lot of rebuild.cgi (I have a few mysql databases on my server). My very ignorant theory is my server can't handle backups and run my mysql processes at the same time. I made it so backups were weekly at one point and didnt have the daily problem I have now. Also, I have always had this nightly problem, but it used to only last 20-30 minutes and now takes 1-2 hours to complete. (log files have grown? would deleting them be a good band-aid fix?)


3 - I have no idea what top is telling me and would love to decipher it. Does anybody know a good website detailing the following?

EDIT - Here is a look at it when its running fine...

and another look, load seems better...

4 - I have disabled server stats except for 'latest visitors'. How do I delete all the logs on my server of the different cpanel stats programs? I may wish to turn them back on again and dont want them bogging me down when they update or do whatever it is that can kill a server.


5 - How do I check to be sure Cpanel is properly backing up my server? I had switched to weekly backups a while back and one day I deleted a mysql database. Unfortunately as my admin discovered, the last backup was my monthly and was almost 4 weeks old. The weekly backups were not saving properly. I want to ensure this will not happen again.


6 - Are these SSH commands to stop and restart mysql safe to use?