On the (gs) Grid-Service platform the following limits are in place for all PHP and CGI processes on your website(s):

• 120 seconds of CPU time
• 100MB of RAM usage
• 36 processes per node
  

Any attempt to exceed these limits will result in a "500 Server Error"

You can override the default PHP configuration to ensure that your max_execution_time and memory_limit are below these values.  This will ensure that you receive PHP error output information, rather than the very brief description of a script execution error from Apache.  For information on modifying your php.ini please consult our article How can I edit php.ini on the (gs) Grid-Service?

Notes/Supplemental Resources:

• php.net

Revisions:

09-24-2009: Added process limits
09-21-2009: Grammatical changes
01-21-2009: Article creation