[falko]

Take a look at the KeepAliveTimeout setting. I use

KeepAliveTimeout 4

Also take a look here: http://www.howtoforge.com/configurin...um_performance

And maybe you should set up monit on your server. It detects if a service (such as Apache) isn't running or reacting anymore and restarts it: http://www.howtoforge.com/server_monitoring_monit_munin