I'm currently testing a setup on a dedicated server with Apache 2.2 on CentOS 5 with mod_proxy_balancer and mongrel.
Static files are being served at around 1200 req per second (by apache) or about 600 per second by Mongrel.
The problem is dynamic pages. I can't break 160 req per second regardless of number of mongrel processes (2-12 all yield about the same). It's a simple "hello world" controller.
Then I found this at the bottom of th Mongrel docs:
"Jason Hoffman reports:
Apache's mod_proxy_balancer module is a fully blocking module and with the default httpd.conf you're going to max out in the 120-160 requests/ second range on a decent box. You can tune up its proxying to about a 1000 req/sec. So yes the net result is that you can really only put a couple of mongrels behind apache's proxy engine (about 2 "hello world" rails mongrels)."
Of course it doesn't elaborate any further. I searched around google and found nothing. Is this really the best performance you can get out of it, or exactly what should I be tuning in httpd.conf? I find it hard to believe that the benefits max out at 2 mongrel processes...
Thanks for any help