This seems to be the most common question, and I've just recently gotten an idea. 

I have the second tier package with an RAM upgrade, so it's their Pentium IV 3 GHz Machine with 2 GHz of RAM.  That's $185 a month if you get CPANEL.

I got an article linked on Slashdot and it drove 80,000 users to the site stretched out over the course of 12 hours.

Crash.

And crash, and crash.  The site went down again and again and again.  I wound up spending a total of three hours on Dedicated Chat trying to figure out why (system resources remained in the single digits throughout).  They tried upping the "Max Clients" setting (too many users on at a time).  Nope.  I came back, they messed with some other settings.  Still no good.  Right now my front page takes TWO MINUTES to load.  The forums are almost unusuable.  Nobody on the Dedicated support staff seems to have any clue what to do.  I have the machine to handle it, it's just not.

I've been sitting on Dedicated Chat for 30 minutes, still no solution, and I have to leave for work.  So I'll have to leave knowing my $185 a month hosting package can't handle a single big traffic day if it ever comes again.

I'm not sure how much money I lost today (how do you measure the number of people who can't access your site?) but it's substantial.   Not good, guys.