I originally used SliceHost which was acquired and integrated into Rackspace for cloud hosting since 2010. The services is easy use and rock solid with many advanced features. But then again it is a premium service and cost prohibitive. In 2010 I switched to KVM based hosting using vServer Center and still use it today.
Recently, though I still have vServer Center because of the great cost factor, I have started using Microsoft Azure Cloud hosting.
Gen 3 Cloud
Currently (Dec 2016) evaluating cloud services and techniques,
- Microsoft Azure
- Amazon Cloud
- Google Cloud
The key advantage of the cloud services is infrastructure as code, but let's start with just the minimal hardware, bandwidth requirements. Note I've upped the memory requirements having switched to LXC and also now have a sense of bandwidth utilization (but noting that BonsaiFramework is not searchable yet).
| Comparison Point | Amazon Cloud | Google Cloud | Microsoft Azure | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Product Name | t2.small EC2 Reserved Instance Descriptions very unclear. | Virtual Machine Baisc | ||
| Calculator Website | Useful Links: | Useful Links: | ||
| 2 GB of Memory | 2 GB | 1.75GB | ||
| 1 CPU | ||||
| 50 GB of Disk Space (currently at 33GB) | None must buy EBS (Elastic Storage Blocks) but adding 50GB of General SDD did not seem to increase price | 70 GB | ||
| Bandwidth ~7 GB/Month UnMetered | $0.09 / GB past 1GB = $0.54 | 7 GB/Month without Exposing BonsaFramework website to search engines. | ||
| Download at 20mbps | ||||
| Static IP Address | IP4 | |||
| Monthly | $13.14 | $31.66 (in West Central US) | ||
| Yearly Upfront | $151 |
Gen 2 Self-Serve Virtual Hosting
Log
Aug 2018
Lots of Low End Box, and there are more - I have not looked closely yet.
Note these often use OpenVZ ... which previously had trouble with Java now (Aug 2019) it's better and depends on the hosting provider setting limits on memory / not overselling too. Also restricted to Ubuntu supported by OpenVZ base image which is 16.x at the moment.
Container technology and Docker does not work due to older kernel.
Here are the offers:
2GB-SSD-VPS
| 3GB-SSD-VPS
| 6GB-SSD-VPS
|
These are very inexpensive prices and there's further discount if you pay for the full year up front! However, keep in mind this is VPS hosting which can end up oversubscribing resulting in a very slow system.
Feb 2012
I spent some time to look for cheaper alternatives. This is still best bang for the buck despite Gen 3 Cloud services.
Main criteria,
- 1024GB of memory
- Allow Ubuntu OS Custom Install
- Decent bandwidth 2GB or higher / month
- Allow adding additional IPs
- Console access
- Hypervisor based
- Nice to have ability to do full image backups and restores
Selected Virtual Private Server
vServer Center
http://www.vservercenter.com/
web management: https://vcp.vservercenter.com
support email: support@cybercon.net
KVM hosting $29.95/Month with life-time discount code WHTVDSKV20A (used Feb 2015) reduced to $9.95/Month,
- 2 GB of Memory
- Ubuntu OS
- UnMetered 20mbps bandwidth
- 50 GB Hard Disk
- One dedicated IPv4 IP Address
- Web Terminal
- Allow Custom Installation of number of Linux OS including Ubuntu
Purchased additional IP for $1/Month.
To allow install of your own OS, during purchase select,
Operation System Installation Type: Custom Self Install via vServer Center Control Panel (free)
Operation System: Customer Own KVM Image
Pros,
- Allows full OS install from scratch!
- Console has bandwidth graph.
Some cons found so far,
- No self-serve image backup and restore ability. You must contact support and they will sell you cloud space and you have to call every time for manual backups. When I spoke to the support rep he said they would look into this in the future.
- No DNS Servers (not a big con, most domain registrars provide this).
Virtualization Technologies
In general, there are two main types,
Hypervisor, which is hardware-based virtualization - Xen, VMWare and KVM
Container (software) based virtualization where the host kernel is shared - OpenVZ, Virtuozzo (based on OpenVZ), Solaris Zones.
The following chart outlines the top level pros and cons,
| Technology | Pros | Cons | Implementations |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hypervisor |
|
| Xen, KVM and VMWare |
| Container |
|
| OpenVZ, Virtuozzo (based on OpenVZ), Solaris Zones and recently LXC |
| Ephemeral Container (better name find) | Docker |
Java with Container Based Virtualization
At least with Virpus who uses OpenVZ they say Java does not work well.
Here is a good article that explains the challenges and offers a possible solution..
This looks like it has working solutions http://forum.openvz.org/index.php?t=msg&goto=7057.
Considered
Interserver
$8/month per KVM slice 25GB HD, 1GB RAM, 1TB Transfer
http://www.interserver.net/vps/
OS is a scripted install looks to be minimal install
RAM HOST
Experienced performance issues with server.
http://www.ramhost.us/?page=vps/kvm-los-angeles-west
$15.99/month for container OpenVZ with Mem = 1024, BW = 1000GB, Space = 25GB
BuyVM
$12.95/month for container OpenVZ with Mem = 1024/2048, BW = 3000GB, Space = 60GB
$20.00/month for Hypervisor KVM with 1024MB, 3000GB and 60GB, 2 Core
Only issue seems to be stock.
Positive reviews - http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?t=1107446
Comparison reviews - http://www.lowendtalk.com/discussion/1238/picking-a-vps...-hostigation-vs.-secure-dragon-vs.-buyvm
JaguarPC
JaguarPC is recommend by one of the review sites hostcult.
$29 for VPS hosting with,
- 50 GB Disk Space
- 3,000 GB Bandwidth
- 1024 MB RAM
- 2048 MBBurst RAM
- Equal CPU (1 core min.)
Rejected
YardVPS
This one also looks good with a fast connection speed. Normally $15.95 but with the discount code yardvps it drops down to $12.76. They have a 100Mbit connection,
http://www.yardvps.com/xen.html
$12.76/month for Xen with Mem = 1GB, BW = 20000 GB at 100Mbit, Space = 50GB
Just noticed another coupon, limited sale for today March 1, 2012, YARDLEAP which gave me a 40% discount dropping it to $9.57.
One con, they currently do not offer additional IPs.
Servers are located in Los Angeles, California.
March 4, 2012 - So far not impressed. After fiddling around I found that the system did not notify me it was ready. I booted the system, but so far it's not trivial to get going.
Virpus Networks - Rejected
Xen VPS Hosting - XVM1024 Priced at $24.00 US with a 20% discount for the life of the subscription which gives,
- 1024GB memory
- 1000GB bandwidth
- 40GB disk
There is a much cheaper shared resource hosting option called OpenVZ at $10.00 per month but it won't do Java. Read the comparison chart for more details.
Web chatted with a customer support rep who was quite knowledgeable. Here are the highlights of the conversation,
You can add more bandwidth at $7/mo per 1TB.
$.10 per GB if you went over your max.
cPanel is the more popular option and is feature rich, but uses more memory than DirectAdmin. DirectAdmin uses less memory, however is slightly harder to navigate through. They generally have the same features however.
Can I use directadmin to do a full image backup? Kenneth O [agent] Yes, I believe this is possible - probably on a per account basis It will not do a full VPS image backup But you can use the Quick Backup function which will do this.
Very negative review - http://www.the-best-web-hosting-service.com/virpus-review.php - Virpus wiped their system no backups, downtime.
Another negative review - http://www.hostcult.com/2010/03/review-virpus-hosting.html - Downtime
Consolidated Reviews of Hosting Sites
http://www.web-hosting-top.com/ - reviews from people.
http://www.lowendbox.com/blog/best-low-end-providers-in-2011-q2-its-ram-host-quickweb-and-buyvm-again/ - best low end providers
http://www.similarsitesearch.com/alternative/vpsland.com - lists hosting companies like vpsland.com
http://www.webhostingstuff.com/category/Server-Hosting.html - reviews
3 Comments
Roger Chu
I did some further investigation on the issue and the problem is actually quite complicated. The whole thing is due to different virtualization technologies being used. In general, there are two main types:
The first is called hypervisor, which is hardware-based virtualization. Xen and VMWare fall into this category. In this model the virtual machine has access to virtualized hardware, and controls all the resources allocated.
The second is container (software) based virtualization popularly used by Virtuozzo (based on OpenVZ). I believe Solaris “zone” also falls into this category. In this model the host kernel is share with all VMs, thus VMs will not be able to change anything in the kernel. The advantage is that resources (cpu, memory) can be allocated in a more flexible way by the host, increasing burst power for each VM.
Most small VPS vendors prefer Virtuozzo because they can advertise more (burst) cpu power and memory at a lower price. The cost to them is lower because they can oversell the metrics and there is no way to verify that those metrics can be achieved when VMs are loaded up at same time.
Back to our original issue of ufw not working on box cubewcm. This server is Virtuozzo based (provided by myhosting.com) . For whatever reason (maybe the debian version they use), the host kernel does not include some modules we need for ufw. Inside the VM we cannot install more module or rebuild the kernel. Basically the only way to work around it is to disable some features in ufw (iptables) so the basic firewall can still function. Here is a link on this: http://blog.bodhizazen.net/linux/how-to-use-ufw-in-openvz-templates/. I gave it a try and it worked by disabling all the features that require modules not installed.
Rackspace is Xen based. The Ubuntu release includes all the modules we need for ufw. Even if it does not, we can add more modules or rebuild kernel ourselves. The other two boxes (www.infobasesolutions.com and uat.infobasesolutions.com) are from VPSLand. I remember they used to provide both Xen and Virtuozzo based VMs with different prices for customers to choose. Sometime last year they changed business model and wouldn’t tell which virtualization technology they use. But I suspect it is Virtuozzo. Fortunately they provide Ubuntu templates that have kernel modules we need for ufw. So we never ran into problems with those servers.
I think in the future when we consider new VM providers, what virtualization technology they use is actually a very important factor.
Roger Chu
Saw another coupon for VServer:
Order a KVM Cloud Server for your Cloud VPS hosting needs today: $9.95 per month lifetime.
($20/month lifetime discount with coupon code: WHTVDSKV20)
Roger Chu
Additional Info from ramhost.us site:
Differences between OpenVZ and KVM plans