Server Not Responding: Troubleshooting Guide

When your VPS does not respond — website down, SSH timeout, or ping fails — use this systematic checklist to find the cause on your Hiddence server.

Step 1: Check network reachability

From your computer, test if the server IP is reachable:

ping YOUR_VPS_IP

# If ping fails: check VPS status in client area,
# possible network maintenance, or IP change after reinstall

Step 2: Check open ports

SSH (22), HTTP (80), or HTTPS (443) may be blocked by firewall:

# From your PC (if nmap installed):
nmap -p 22,80,443 YOUR_VPS_IP

# On server (via console/KVM if SSH works):
sudo ufw status
sudo ss -tlnp | grep -E ':22|:80|:443'

Step 3: Verify services are running

The server may be up but Nginx or SSH stopped:

sudo systemctl status ssh
sudo systemctl status nginx
sudo systemctl status mysql

# Restart if failed:
sudo systemctl restart nginx

Step 4: Check CPU, RAM, and disk

Out of memory or full disk often causes hangs:

top -bn1 | head -20
free -h
df -h

# Kill runaway process if needed:
kill -9 PID

Step 5: Read logs

Logs usually explain crashes and OOM kills:

sudo journalctl -xe --no-pager | tail -50
sudo tail -100 /var/log/nginx/error.log
sudo tail -100 /var/log/syslog
dmesg | tail -30

Prevention

• Enable swap on low-RAM VPS
• Set up monitoring (Uptime Kuma, Netdata)
• Configure automatic backups
• Use Fail2ban but whitelist your IP
• Contact support with VPS ID if hardware/network issue suspected