Btown slow and 'too many connections'

[kturock]

According to btown's own stats, "In total there are 374 users online :: 204 registered, 27 hidden and 143 guests (based on users active over the past 60 minutes)
Most users ever online was 1114 on Mon Nov 28, 2011 10:04 pm".

Yet I've been slow and hit or miss and getting the 'too many connections' General Error" for the last several hours.

So if it's at 33% of it's max, wtf is the problem?

Here's the error I just got, again.

General Error

SQL ERROR [ mysql4 ]

Too many connections [1040]

An sql error occurred while fetching this page. Please contact an administrator if this problem persists

[MagickalMemories]

It's not at 33% of it's max. The more connections, the higher chance of something going wrong. The 1114 is not a true number. We did a reset on something one day last year, and it caused that day's connections to merge with some previous day's "highest" connection numbers. Our current record is about 500 at a time.
Our current plan is... screwy.
These messages just started happening tonight. It seems we're on a 2 to 3 year cycle. Every 2 to 3 years, this issue pops up unexpectedly. We've already started looking at new plans with the existing host, and are willing to go to a sivveret host if necessary. The Mechanic is on top of this one. : )

Eric