Lightning Latest Topics

Hardware Migration [04/13/2012] - [04/15/2012]

Wed, 11 Apr 2012 20:01:08 +0000

Starting on Friday April 13th we will be migrating the Lightning server to new higher end hardware as well as better system configuration. We feel this will benefit all users on the Lightning server. We estimate this will be completed no later than Sunday April 15th.

We expect no more than 5 minutes of downtime per account as we will be moving accounts to the new server then re-routing the IP address to the new hardware. This means there will be no changes to DNS and as a result no dns propagation issues. In our experience our migration method means the large majority of users will not even realize that they've switched servers. If you do however run into any issues do not hesitant to contact us as our system administrators are prepared to resolve any issues experienced.

The new Lightning server will be similar to that of our recent deployment of servers:

Old Lightning:

Dual Xeon E5620

24GB RAM

4x300GB Raid-10

New Lightning:

Dual Xeon X5670

24GB RAM

4x600GB Raid-10

So this is a pretty big upgrade as it will have four additional CPU cores with 8 to the operating system counting hyper threading. It will also be using 600GB disks over 300GB disks of the old system.

Once the migration starts as accounts transfer over they will go onto the newlightning hostname until the entire migration is complete when the new hardware will become lightning and the old server oldlightning.

If you have any questions regarding the maintenance do not hesitate to contact us. Our system administration department is available to answer any questions regarding this.

Start Date: 04/13/2012

End Date: 04/15/2012

Estimated Down Time: less than 5 minutes

Duration: 3 days

Network Maintenance [07/21/2011]

Thu, 14 Jul 2011 03:47:11 +0000

Scheduled Maintenance - DAL01 [07/21/2011]

Date: Thursday, July 21st, 2011 (07/21/2011)

Start Time: 12:00 AM CDT

End Time: 04:00 AM CDT

Services affected: Public Network

Location: DAL01

Duration: 4 hours

Event summary:

Datacenter engineers will be performing maintenance on aggregate switches in the DAL01 network. During the window, engineers will be upgrading the firmware on these devices to increase security and stability.

Customer impact:

We expect no more than 10 minutes of downtime throughout the 4 hour window.

Emergency Maintenance - Chassis Swap [07/07/2011]

Wed, 06 Jul 2011 15:30:41 +0000

On Thursday July 7th between 1:00am and 4:00am CDT we will be replacing the chassis on this server. Due to a history of hardware problems we've decided the best route is to fully swap everything out to ensure no more future problems.

If you have any questions regarding this maintenance notice please do not hesitate to contact our support department.

Date: 07/07/2011

Start time (CDT): 1:00am

End time (CDT): 4:00am

Duration: 3 hours

Estimated Down Time: 30 minutes

Memory Swap [06/15/2011]

Tue, 14 Jun 2011 18:37:34 +0000

On Wednesday June 15th between 1:00am and 4:00am CDT we will be replacing memory on the Lightning server. We have reason to believe the memory is failing and causing system crashes so we will be replacing it. While the maintenance window is open for 3 hours, we expect less than 30 minutes of total downtime.

If you have any questions regarding this maintenance notice please do not hesitate to contact our systems administration department.

Date: 06/15/2011

Start time (CDT): 1:00am

End time (CDT): 4:00am

Duration: 3 hours

Estimated Down Time: 30 minutes

Memory Upgrade [05/25/2011]

Thu, 19 May 2011 06:52:23 +0000

On Wednesday May 25th between 1:00am and 4:00am CDT we will be adding additional memory to the Lightning server to improve performance and general system stability. Adding the additional memory will require the machine to be turned off so there will be between 30 and 45 minutes of down time.

If you have any questions regarding this maintenance notice please do not hesitate to contact our systems administration department.

Date: 05/25/2011

Start time (CDT): 1:00am

End time (CDT): 4:00am

Duration: 3 hours

Estimated Down Time: 30 minutes

PHP 5.2 Upgrade [05/12/2011]

Sun, 08 May 2011 20:17:45 +0000

On Thursday May 12th between 1:00pm and 11:00pm CDT we will be upgrading the Lightning server's PHP 5.2.x to the latest 5.2.x version. We do not expect any down time during the maintenance window. We will be upgrading the system PHP to the latest version first then the web servers so for a short time there may be different versions handling cron jobs and web server requests. The reason for this is to get various fixes for LSAPI as well as general PHP fixes as well.

If you have any questions about this maintenance window do not hesitate to contact support.

Date: 05/12/2011

Start time (CDT): 1:00pm

End time (CDT): 11:00pm

Estimated Down Time: None

Duration: 11 hours

Kernel Upgrade [04/07/2011]

Mon, 04 Apr 2011 17:46:29 +0000

We'll be performing a kernel upgrade on on Thursday April 7th between 10PM-1AM CDT. While we use KSplice to keep our kernels up-to-date for critical bugs and security fixes it doesn't pull in new features from the upstream kernel. As a result we perform semi-annual kernel updates to keep everything up-to-date and in-line with upstream.

Date: 04/07/2011

Start time (CDT): 10:00pm

End time (CDT): 1:00AM

Duration: 1 hour

Estimated Down Time: 10 minutes

Kernel Panic [04/06/2011]

Wed, 06 Apr 2011 20:56:19 +0000

The Lightning machine just crashed due to a kernel panic from looks to be bad memory. We will be rebooting them machine now to bring it back online then investigate further as to what we will need to do going forward.

Memory Replacement [12/30/2010]

Thu, 30 Dec 2010 06:00:38 +0000

Lightning had a kernel panic due to bad memory. We're having the bad memory swapped out now and will provide updates / ETA's as we receive word from the data center.

Kernel Upgrade [12/20/2010]

Sat, 18 Dec 2010 20:54:55 +0000

We'll be performing a kernel upgrade on on Monday December 20th between 9:00am and 10:00am CST. This upgrade will allow us enhanced resource tracking to help address resource abuse issues. We estimate the server will be down for about 10 minutes while the machine is rebooting to the new kernel.

Date: 12/20/2010

Start time (CST): 9:00am

End time (CST): 10:00am

Duration: 1 hour

Estimated Down Time: 10 minutes