Looking for another VPS provider?

Locker · 19th March 2008

Hey all, I'm new...

I'm basically looking to move to a different VPS provider for three reasons:

1. My site has grown and now needs 512mb of dedicated RAM from a VPS account to run smoothly at all times, unfortunatly with my current provider I can't afford this.
2. I'd like to be able to restart services remotely, so having Virtuozzo or equivilent would be great.
3. Ideally I'd like the server to be here in the UK, as that's where most of my visitors will come from.

I'm currently with InMotion, who have been very reliable and there support is good too. However, the plan I've ended up on is their $89.95/month one. I started off on a shared plan...

I don't really need that higher specification, I'm looking for:

Disk Space: 20GB
Bandwidth: 500GB
512mb Dedicated RAM
cPanel
Virtuozzo or equivilent

However, reliablity is really important to me. With InMotion I've virtually never seen my site down (in one and a half years), and I wouldn't like to take a step down from that. 24/7 email support is also pretty important to me.

My budget is £30 - £40 per month.

Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

BurtyB · 20th March 2008

If your running low on memory Virtuozzo isn't going to help the situation IMHO as it doesn't allow you to use swap. I know swap isn't the answer but it would probably help to be able to swap out some stuff your not using constantly.

You would probably be best posting in the Requests section if you want people to give you their offerings.

ChrisB.

futurehosting · 20th March 2008

Quote:

Originally Posted by BurtyB

If your running low on memory Virtuozzo isn't going to help the situation IMHO as it doesn't allow you to use swap. I know swap isn't the answer but it would probably help to be able to swap out some stuff your not using constantly.

You would probably be best posting in the Requests section if you want people to give you their offerings.

ChrisB.

Swap and burst ram are awful concepts in general. Swap in a virtualized environment will bring the system to a halt with IO.

Ask your current host if they are willing to work with you on pricing. If not, search around for a company which will provide you the guarantee ram you need.

burble · 20th March 2008

You're on a VPS now? An obvious question perhaps, but have you exhausted all options as far as optimising your site goes? If not, it might be worth posting a quick summary of what your site is; we might be able to suggest a couple of things to reduce your memory usage.

In particular, what OS is the VPS, and what processes are using the most memory? Is the site content mostly static or database driven; is it using custom code or an off-the-shelf solution; what language is it coded in? Are database driven pages customised for each user? Do you have any caching in place, and what db and web servers do you use?

BurtyB · 20th March 2008

Quote:

Originally Posted by futurehosting

Swap and burst ram are awful concepts in general. Swap in a virtualized environment will bring the system to a halt with IO.

If you can't share IO (and possibly even rate limit) use between virtual machines you have a problem anyway IMO.

ChrisB.

JamesSykes · 20th March 2008

Quote:

Originally Posted by BurtyB

If you can't share IO (and possibly even rate limit) use between virtual machines you have a problem anyway IMO.

ChrisB.

Probably true if you are running 400 guests per box.

BurtyB · 20th March 2008

Quote:

Originally Posted by JamesSykes

Probably true if you are running 400 guests per box.

Yes of course - 399 virtual servers all processing logs at 4am will work fine and not cause any I/O issues

ChrisB.

burble · 20th March 2008

Meh, it's 4am, nobody will notice

CrystalVPS · 20th March 2008

Lots of people could provide this service, but you'd need to post in the requests forum for them to actually to be able to offer a service.

andyb28 · 20th March 2008

Quote:

Originally Posted by Locker

I'm currently with InMotion, who have been very reliable and there support is good too. However, the plan I've ended up on is their $89.95/month one. I started off on a shared plan...

I have never heard of your host, but surely if this service is reliable and well supported, you would be a fool to assume all cheaper hosts will be as good?

othellotech · 22nd March 2008

Quote:

Originally Posted by Locker

2. I'd like to be able to restart services remotely, so having Virtuozzo or equivilent would be great.

The VZ Panel for starting/stopping services is "cute" but not functionally different to connecting by SSH and typing "service (name) stop", and doesn't outweigh the disadvantages of swap in the VZ virtualisation technology IMHO.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Locker

3. Ideally I'd like the server to be here in the UK, as that's where most of my visitors will come from.

Posting in the request forum will get you bombarded with offers. If you're afetr a recommendation, the only UK VPS service with VZ I've had good experience from is Transnexis where one of our VPS clints maintains their offsite blog/support status pages.

Cranky · 23rd March 2008

Quote:

3. Ideally I'd like the server to be here in the UK, as that's where most of my visitors will come from.

One thing to consider here is that a UK VPS will typically cost a little more than a US VPS. The difference in price is shrinking and some providers do sell UK and US for roughly the same price. Of course if your target market is the UK then a UK VPS will load more quickly for you and your users.

Quote:

Originally Posted by othellotech

If you're afetr a recommendation, the only UK VPS service with VZ I've had good experience from is Transnexis where one of our VPS clints maintains their offsite blog/support status pages.

Thanks Rob, it's always good to hear recommendations of our services from competitors based on their experiences using us.

Cranky · 23rd March 2008

Quote:

Originally Posted by BurtyB

If you can't share IO (and possibly even rate limit) use between virtual machines you have a problem anyway IMO.

ChrisB.

That depends if swap is on the same array of course.

Virtuozzo 4 has an I/O prioritisation feature we are testing at the moment, but I would say it's not overly practical in the service provider industry, it's probably more suitable for enterprises using the product.

robinbalen · 25th March 2008

Try clustered.net?

jakeruston · 20th April 2008

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