Dave,
I also was curious so I tried it. Here are the highs and lows.
Highs
1. Definitely faster
Lows
1. You will have to change your servers to theirs.
2. With the free account you cant change any of your files.
3. The paid account is pricey at over 20 dollars a month.
Dave,
It is noticeably faster, yes, but sometimes it seems to have “gone to sleep” and needs a sec to wake up. Note that it only caches certain of your records, not all of them.
Changing your DNS server takes about 20 seconds. Since installing CloudFlare I have changed many of my files many times without issue.
The Google Apache module mod_pagespeed may pick up the fine-tuning process where CloudFlare leaves off, and can be used in conjunction with CloudFlare. I aim to try it but have not done so yet.
Let me rephrase the changing of files.
Only through WordPress you can change your files.
If there is something you had to upload directly to a folder, not through WordPress you won’t be able to unless you have a paid account.
Thread Starter
Dave
(@tlwh)
Many thank for the feedback on Cloud flare.
I’ll take a look at the free version based on what you’ve said here. And take it from there.
Always a bit wary when someone else wants to take over your DNS!
Yeah, I thought that too. But what I giveth, I can taketh away. 🙂
I’m currently using MaxCDN. Can cloud flare be used in conjunction/simultaneously with another CDN?
Although I haven’t tried it I suspect the answer is yes, since W3TC has an option to enable MaxCDN in addition to CloudFlare, although that doesn’t prove anything.
I’ve had passing contact with CloudFlare Support, but did not find them to be eager beavers. In fact I invited them to this discussion earlier today.
I’ve been using the free CloudFlare service for a few months now, it did speed things up as far as page load time and it definitely helped with server requests.
Also, I did activate the CloudFlare feature in W3 Total Cache as well. I’ve had decent success with it after a bit of tinkering and can say that I have made a marked improvement on page load time for this site here: kimoverholt.com.
I discovered the biggest factor in slowing the page load is the affiliate ads as well as any of the scripts that need to load.
There’s still more I can do but I’m learning as I go with respect to the pluggins capabilities.
Check out this video: Use W3 Total Cache to Speed Up Your WordPress Site
Hope it helps!
CloudFlare decreased my ping time by a factor of 7, and users said my pages now load “instantaneously.” However, Google Page Speed only went from 89/100 to 90/100. And it is the Google ring that we must kiss. Argh…
Next time I feel inspired I will install mod_pagespeed on my server.
CloudFlare wrote me this AM re mod_pagespeed, “No direct experience with this. But I believe we may look at adding this as an option in CloudFlare settings at some point.”
“The pioneer is the one with the arrows in his back.”
I’ve had good luck with CloudFlare–good increase in page speed and especially, MUCH less spam.
“If there is something you had to upload directly to a folder, not through WordPress you won’t be able to unless you have a paid account. “
Not sure where this is coming from. Having a Pro account doesn’t have anything to do with folders or uploading anything at all (nor does a free account). Are you talking about doing something via ftp?
You should either FTP to your server’s IP (ftp://yourserverip/)
address or to:
direct.yourdomain.com
“You will have to change your servers to theirs.”
You’re only changing your domain nameservers (DNS). You still keep your hosting provider, which means your site server IP address doesn’t change at all.
“I’ve had passing contact with CloudFlare Support, but did not find them to be eager beavers. In fact I invited them to this discussion earlier today.”
Sorry if it takes me a bit to get out to here from a request. We’re experiencing decent contact volumes right now, and I’m in the process of helping train new folks to tackle that load.
“I’m currently using MaxCDN. Can cloud flare be used in conjunction/simultaneously with another CDN? “
There is no conflict with using other CDN services. You would want to make sure that any CNAMEs you have for your CDN are present in your CloudFlare DNS settings (settings->DNS settings).
“Always a bit wary when someone else wants to take over your DNS! “
This isn’t a requirement if you activate via a hosting partner’s cpanel integration. We will also have CNAME pointing available in about 4-5 weeks or so (target is late July).
“Note that it only caches certain of your records, not all of them.”
CloudFlare only caches static content by extension type.
Some other helpful CloudFlare tips.
I can generally free some time up to respond to posts & I just want to advise it will take a little time right now for me to get back to one.
"If there is something you had to upload directly to a folder, not through WordPress you won't be able to unless you have a paid account. "
Not sure where this is coming from. Having a Pro account doesn't have anything to do with folders or uploading anything at all (nor does a free account). Are you talking about doing something via ftp?
You should either FTP to your server's IP (ftp://yourserverip/)
address or to:
direct.yourdomain.com
Exactly, Cloudflare has no effect on your original hosting servers IP address just get the IP address of the hosting server before you switch over, you can easily find it by doing a A record DNS lookup on your existing domain, you can use a simple online tool like http://www.mxlookups.com or similar.
Cloudflare doesn’t give direct access to your site but rather proxies this in a manor. So once your name server records have changed your original domain will no longer point at the hosts IP but to one of cloudflare’s.
During the initial setup a DNS record of direct.yourdomain.com is created. this by default is the only name server record pointing directly to the originals hosts ip. So unless you changed it on setup anyone can bypass the cloudflare service using http://direct.cloudflare.com. So I always remove it, but you could also use this for ftp connection if you still have it.
A bigger concern to me is any potential effect this may have on Google ads? as the originating ips of visitors become those of cloudflare’s, does this have a detrimental effect?
I’m in the process of searching for a answer now. I also have a phpbb site that I use cloudflare on and I read on there support pages a recommended change to the session.php file to allow original IP pass through. I wondering if wordpress has any issue at all, found this thread while searching thought I would reply, so for posting on 3 week old thread.
“A bigger concern to me is any potential effect this may have on Google ads?”
No conflict because this is between your visitor and your site (javascript). The only thing that might impact javascript are the beta features (Rocket Loader, Auto Minify) & you should turn these off if you have them turned on & have a problem.
“I wondering if wordpress has any issue at all, found this thread while searching thought I would reply, so for posting on 3 week old thread. “
You should install the CloudFlare WordPress plugin (if using WordPress). You can also install mod_cloudflare on your server as another option.
damoncloudflare
Perfect, thanks for the info.
