My guess is that this is related to the web host.
[Tech talk follows... Mostly for Steinar and Rob]
The Harryproa site has been slow for me ever since the first time
it was reborn, even though I have a 20 mbps connection. At first I
thought this was because the site was overseas, but now I think it
might be related to the server not being powerful enough to handle
the number of shared sites it hosts.
I just had to move a site for a client from Network Solutions to
BlueHost for a similar issue.
The site was never snappy on Netsol because they put so many
shared sites on the same server, but when the client upgraded to a
new site based upon the ExpressionEngine content management system
(based on PHP/MySQL like WordPress), some pages stopped working some
of the time. No explanation, not even an error or a timeout. They
just stopped working.
I worked with Netsol for several weeks on this, and modified every
configuration file there was for Apache, MySQL, PHP, and so forth,
but nothing helped. The company that originally designed the new
site in ExpressionEngine said they have run into problems like this
on shared hosts and recommended we get a dedicated server or a
different host.
Since Netsol wanted $200/month for a dedicated server, and
wouldn't give a refund if a dedicated server didn't solve the
problem, I moved the site over to BlueHost, a company I've had a lot
of luck with over the past ten years.
Now the site is about 50% faster, but more importantly, every page
works without issue. It's the exact same html, php, and database --
just a new server, and at only $10 per month.
So: my recommendation is to keep the current site, which is
brilliant, stop spending time looking for solutions to sporadic
problems, and choose a new host.
For the host, I recommend BlueHost because they are surprisingly
inexpensive, their management UI is very thorough and easy to use,
their support has always been top-notch (I have both dedicated
servers and shared sites with them), and most importantly: their
shared server eliminated a similar problem I was having.
I'd be happy to set up a test site at my expense
(harryproatest.com?) to see if the new host would help.
I can provide also provide links to the two different
ExpressionEngine sites -- the buggy one and the working one -- but
only to the web develper; they aren't for public consumption.
- Mike