stephenbrown said:
I am relatively new with dedicated servers so this may be a easy question to answer, but my server load is extremely high, and i have not got a clue why, attached is a screen shot of top in ssh, but i cant see why the load is high.
There are many reasons for server high load. Possible Causes of High Server Loads
a.. High server loads could be caused by just one or several resource-intensive application(s).
Examples include very high-traffic Web sites, database-driven Web sites,
forums, gaming sites, file download sites and so on.
b.. A high server load can also be caused by a malicious script or a "runaway script" which can continously loop, dragging down the server's
resources.
c.. Too many websites on the one server - with the cumulative resources resulting in high server load.
d.. Running out of memory and swapping to the swap file.
e.. Server backups or server updates are taking place.
f.. Misconfigured software causing errors.
g.. Users sending large mailing lists.
h.. Users trying to bounce spam.
i.. Users/spammers sending spam email.
j.. Hardware issues including memory leak, bad hard drive, and network card.
I suggest you harden, properly configure, and optimize your server and network, Install system based firewall including APF, BFD, Mod Security, and Mod Evasive.