PBase is faster now.

[jwkramer61]

The lack of speed on the PBase site has been a concern for me for at least the last 9 months. It's such a shame, because I really like the other aspects of the site. I like the way it looks, I like the ability to customize, and I ***REALLY** like how PBase is so closely tied to many of the search engines. H-O-W-E-V-E-R.... I am going to have to give very careful consideration when I come up for renewal this time... it's just not the site it used to be. I suspect there is less hardware, and bandwidth than there needs to be to support the traffic. It's a shame - really!

Hell, I'd consider paying a bit more, if I knew for sure that I would get SPEED in return. I suspect many of my visitors simply leave the site when they get to it, because of how pizz-poor the speed is. I would.

-Jim

[dinny]

Jeez, tough crowd.
Speed's fine over here in the UK (I'm on 20mb). Never been an issue really, or should I say it's not one I've had problems with. Been here for 4 years now.
Look at the positives guys, it's cheap, it's got no ads, it's got a sensible easy to use search facility, customisable galleries, lively forum, easy to navigate from page to page on full size images (I hate flickr for not doing that).
Flickr and Picassa are neither of these things all at the same time.
Mike

[akmc_in_au]

Jeez, tough crowd.
Speed's fine over here in the UK (I'm on 20mb). Never been an issue really, or should I say it's not one I've had problems with. Been here for 4 years now.
Look at the positives guys, it's cheap, it's got no ads, it's got a sensible easy to use search facility, customisable galleries, lively forum, easy to navigate from page to page on full size images (I hate flickr for not doing that).
Flickr and Picassa are neither of these things all at the same time.
Mike

I wouldn't disagree with you on most of the points that you made except for:

it's got a sensible easy to use search facility

That one had me devoutly glad that I wasn't drinking coffee for the sake of my monitor.

If by "sensible" you mean "crippled and frequently non-functional", then...

I'm afraid that even the admins acknowledge that the thing is broken; a Google search is the best stop-gap:

viewtopic.php?f=6&t=37074&p=241557

viewtopic.php?f=6&t=36169&p=230477

viewtopic.php?f=6&t=32873

etc, etc, etc...

[paulsilkphotography]

Jeez, tough crowd.
Speed's fine over here in the UK (I'm on 20mb). Never been an issue really, or should I say it's not one I've had problems with. Been here for 4 years now.
Look at the positives guys, it's cheap, it's got no ads, it's got a sensible easy to use search facility, customisable galleries, lively forum, easy to navigate from page to page on full size images (I hate flickr for not doing that).
Flickr and Picassa are neither of these things all at the same time.
Mike

[paulsilkphotography]

Jeez, tough crowd.
Speed's fine over here in the UK (I'm on 20mb). Never been an issue really, or should I say it's not one I've had problems with. Been here for 4 years now.
Look at the positives guys, it's cheap, it's got no ads, it's got a sensible easy to use search facility, customisable galleries, lively forum, easy to navigate from page to page on full size images (I hate flickr for not doing that).
Flickr and Picassa are neither of these things all at the same time.
Mike

Well at this moment 10 pm UK time it taking 10 second to display my 800px images inbetween clicking next. going straight to Zenfolio the same images are dispaying instantly when I click next.

I started migrating my pbase collection a few months ago, in the past because I love pbase I have bit the bullet and renewed each year in the hope things would improve or at the least get no worse.....it saddens me to say that next renewal I will be cosidering my options very carefully on which one gets renewed.

[dhughes]

If this is PBase being faster the you guys need your bleeding heads tested, it's pathetically slow!
pull your fingers out and get it sorted will you.

Dave...

[fishit]

Slug we all appreciate what you have been doing to make the site faster. But I have to agree of late, month or so, it is s l o w ....
A long time subscriber and I were talking about it at a photography show, he sees it as well, not sure what the problem is but it needs some work.
You might ask Oscar over at Photopoints about some ideas, he just upgraded and the site is very fast, maybe a new server is needed?

[jwcoffman]

I know people that are planning to leave Pbase because of the performance. I have had friends tell me that they came to look at my work but were unable to get the pictures to come up! How in the name of common sense do you ask someone to view your work when it will take all day!!

[bret]

I've been on pbase for many years (since 2002) and I've never seen it consistently slower than it has been the past few weeks.
I regret that I'll have to switch to SmugMug, but I really have no choice if I want people to see my pics.

[djwixx]

I've been on pbase for many years (since 2002) and I've never seen it consistently slower than it has been the past few weeks.
I regret that I'll have to switch to SmugMug, but I really have no choice if I want people to see my pics.

I joined smugmug as I found a coupon online (YaHoO) that halves the cost for the first year so it seemed worth a try, especially as they have unlimited space so I can upload full size images for my family to download. The same price on smugmug meant I didn't need to go above the 500MB price bracket I'm in at the moment on Pbase.

In the few days I've been there, there have been slow downs and on Sunday they were down for about 6 hours, so don't have wild expectations that being somewhere else will give you something better.

[ed_k]

I've been at SmugMug a few months (and PBase for about 5 years). The December problem mentioned by djwixx was the first during my time at SmugMug - although I know it won't be the last. What djwixx didn't mention were the status notices posted during the problem period (on your website, not just at their forum) and the fact that someone is immediately available to answer questions if you needed additional info. You didn't have to sit staring at a unchanging screen & wonder why nothing is happening or when it might be fixed. There's a difference between being "better" ("...so don't have wild expectations that being somewhere else will give you something better...") as opposed to "perfect". Have no doubt that in terms of speed and availability SmugMug is better. Do the operators demonstrate communicate with their customers? - the best that I've encountered. Do they keep you informed? - absolutely. Is it perfect? - absolutely not, but it is better.

I have been posting in parallel at SmugMug and PBase for these several months and will continue to do that at least until my PBase subscription expires. Once getting past the differences between the two sites (apart from speed and reliability) your choice will come done to personal preference & style. For myself, I could easily live with either - or better (dream on) a hybrid of the best of both.

No flames needed; just trying to pass on one person's experience.

[djwixx]

What djwixx didn't mention were the status notices posted during the problem period (on your website, not just at their forum) and the fact that someone is immediately available to answer questions if you needed additional info.

Absolutely - that was one thing I did particularly like. I also had a question prior to joining smugmug and sent an email in the evening and got a response within several minutes with the answer I needed. So, yes, there is a big difference.

Thanks for the correction/clarification.

[akmc_in_au]

I have been posting in parallel at SmugMug and PBase for these several months and will continue to do that at least until my PBase subscription expires. Once getting past the differences between the two sites (apart from speed and reliability) your choice will come done to personal preference & style. For myself, I could easily live with either - or better (dream on) a hybrid of the best of both.

No flames needed; just trying to pass on one person's experience.

Just out of curiosity, Ed, do you find that you're getting more hits / comments from your SmugMug or your PBase galleries, or is it about the same? It'd be interesting to know since you're posting in parallel.

[ed_k]

I have been posting in parallel at SmugMug and PBase for these several months and will continue to do that at least until my PBase subscription expires. Once getting past the differences between the two sites (apart from speed and reliability) your choice will come done to personal preference & style. For myself, I could easily live with either - or better (dream on) a hybrid of the best of both.

No flames needed; just trying to pass on one person's experience.

Just out of curiosity, Ed, do you find that you're getting more hits / comments from your SmugMug or your PBase galleries, or is it about the same? It'd be interesting to know since you're posting in parallel.

I'm getting far more hits and comments (both) at SmugMug on my daily photo than at PBase for the same photo posted in my PAD gallery. SmugMug offers "communities", one of which is Daily Photos, and the gallery where I'm getting the hits is connected to the Daily Photo community. I get well over a hundred hits & usually 5-15 comments per daily photo at SmugMug - at PBase the comparable numbers are 25-40 hits and 0-4 comments. I don't comment myself at either spot and make the identical post (including descriptive text) so in that sense it's a fair measure. Here's an actual recent example -
SmugMug - 0ver 500 hits & 9 comments >> http://ed-k-photo.smugmug.com/gallery/6 ... 7723_jtPU6
PBase - 20 page views & 1 comment >> http://www.pbase.com/ed_k/image/107408317

It took me almost four years to get 1,000,000 page views at PBase (that's probably pretty slow but I don't belong to any of the "gangs" where a dozen or more reciprocal "wow's" are exchanged daily - nothing wrong with that, just not my style & takes more time that I have). I would expect to pass 1,000,000 hits at SmugMug well before the first year is up.


There are many display & community options at SmugMug - almost none of which I've pursued in depth yet, so this isn't a "scientific" test. I suspect if my daily gallery were not connected to the SmugMug Daily Photo community the results would be far different (but PAD at PBase versus Daily Photo at SmugMug should show apples versus apples figures). On the other hand, tie the SmugMug gallery into multiple active communities and I suspect the numbers would soar.

I hope this helps.

[rubinphoto]

Unfortunately, PBase from here (Los Angeles) is nowhere near fast, especially when one loads "profile", "all galleries", or any gallery with more than a few pictures. These are the first landing pages one tends to get to when looking for a particular photographer. They take up to 10-15 seconds to load! By the 3rd second, most people have quit the page if they are just browsing the web to find images (creatives, ad agencies, etc). This has lasted for the past few months, so it is not overloading resulting from this Christmas time when people would upload family pictures. There really should be some testing made from important sites around the world to monitor differential loading times. Perhaps in England these problems are not seen to the same extent. I am on both Cable and T1 networks, so speed on my side is not an issue.