Concurrent Users

Concurrent Users

by Udit Sawhney -
Number of replies: 3
Hi,

I have loaded Moodle on Windows XP machine with Pentium D 3.40GHZ and 2GB RAM and 160 GB HDD.

I wanted to know how many concurrent users can this system handle without any speed loss?

Please let me know

Thanks
Udit
Average of ratings: -
In reply to Udit Sawhney

Re: Concurrent Users

by Martin Dougiamas -
Picture of Core developers Picture of Documentation writers Picture of Moodle HQ Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Plugin developers Picture of Testers


42

(Just kidding ... the real answer is dependent on how you have the server configured, how you have the database configured, how you have Moodle configured, how many courses/users you have, and what the users are doing on Moodle)
In reply to Martin Dougiamas

Re: Concurrent Users

by Udit Sawhney -
Users will mainly be directed to different links like WebEx and just 1 course is loaded... the main usage will be assignment loading by the users and discussion forums.

Server and db configured as default... no tweaking...

Now, any estimate based on my machine configuration... how many users will be able to access it smoothly?
In reply to Udit Sawhney

Re: Concurrent Users

by Gary Anderson -
Udit:

From your description, it sounds like you are new to running a Moodle class and are wondering if you can use your desktop machine using something like XAMPP to run a single course with, say, a few dozen students. Sure, that should not be a problem, especially if your students are not all trying to load pages at the same time. Even if they are, it might be a little slow at that moment, but it should still work. You should check Moodle documentation on how to tweak it, however, for better performance.

On the other hand, on the type of machine that you describe, if loaded with something like Ubuntu's free Linux server, you can run a whole school with dozens of classes and hundreds of students and perhaps several dozen students loading pages or taking a quiz at the same time. So, in other words, a desktop Windows machine, while it will let you do things on a small scales, is not the best system if you get any larger than I described. You should think of it as a temporary solution to try things out.

The term "concurrent users" means different things to different people. One workable definition is the number of machines trying to load a page that requires basic database access within a 5 second period. By that definition, many courses may peak at only a few concurrent users, and even a desktop PC can handle that for somebody starting out, although few people would recommend that as a long term solution for using Moodle for classes.

--Gary