With a many of webmasters switching to Virtual Private Servers (VPS) from shared hosting and preferring them over costlier fully dedicated servers, the main issue is memory and resource optimization. Most VPS packages have dedicated memory constraints of 128MB to 256MB. Apache and MySQL are known to be the most memory (resource) intensive applications that tend to crash or slow down a low to mid range VPS often. While OpenVZ or Virtuozzo based VPSs can have a memory limit in addition to the dedicated RAM to high memory needs, Xen based VPSs can not use more than the stipulated amount of dedicated RAM, adding to the problem.

In this short do-it-yourself Apache and MySQL optimization guide, I will present some small yet useful tips that I have collected from the net and will also share my own VPS settings and experiences that I hope would be very useful to first time and newbie VPS owners. I would also like to make it clear that I’m not a system admin or server guru of any caliber, but a techie and geek who loves to try and do things himself. So, always make a backup of files concerned and don’t hold me responsible for any kind of loss incurred. Try at your own risk!


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