By lionheart8 on

Hi

I have been having some "resource over-use" issues now & then & think, especially with plans to do sites with considerably more traffic to move away from shared hosting.
I however do not know much about VPS. I, for the beginning need an affordable host. Later on, I can get something better if it pays to. I'm sure just like most cheap things, there are often compromises, regarding quality, etc that one has to make, but I think it does not mean all cheap things are necessarily bad.

So after a preliminary search, I found some hosts including https://www.hosteasier.com/managedvps.html that I find affordable, at least at this time.
I would like to sign up for the VPS1 package.

How does someone with VPS experience find this package for a beginner?

I plan sometime, to host some sites like openpublish module based http://openpublishapp.com/ or http://drupal.org/project/recruiter requiring Apache Solr, and probably considerably more memory than any shared host can offer, in addition to my mentioned existing small low-traffic Drupal-based community site.

Is such a package appropriate?

Are these features good?

  • Guarateen RAM: 1024 MB
  • Burstable RAM: up to 1536 MB
  • Guaranteed CPU: 1.2+ Ghz
  • Number of CPU': 2
  • IP Addresses: 3

I looked at other hosts in that price range & the above values where the best, though some had more HDD space.

What should one look out for in a VPS host? [That price range is key, at this time!]

Here is what would be paid for 2 years (domain, 1 year):

Order VPS Package - SolusVPS-1 (server1.abc123456.com)
» Operating System: CentOS 5 / WHM/Cpanel (Recommended) $240.00 USD
» Extra Ips: Not Selected
» Reaction Monitoring Service: Not Selected
» WHMCS Billing Software: Not Selected
» Tomcat Installation and Support: Not Selected <===== What would this be good for?
» RVsite Builder Pro (375+ Website Templates): Not Selected

Domain Registration - abc123456.com - 1 Year/s
» ID Protection: $21.90 USD
Subtotal: $621.90 USD
Total Due Today: $621.90 USD
Total Recurring: $21.90 USD
$600.00 USD Biennially

Is that a fair price for that package?

I assume "WHM/Cpanel" (at $10/month) is indispensable, or not? If it is not, how would one manage the different tasks? [I have no Linux experience. I hope that's not a disadvantage for this].

I would appreciate any helpful information on VPS hosting in general & about this package in particular

Regards

Comments

jamesoakley’s picture

jamesoakley
Primary language English
Location North Yorkshire, UK
commented

For hosting, always start out paying month-by-month. You can always save money by moving to an annual or bi-annual package later, once you've tested them out and know they're solid. $600 is a good price for that kind of spec of VPS - but only if you get a good service.

There are two reasons to be wary of as to why it's cheaper. 1. Do they oversell their nodes. It's possible to do that. Or you could get neighbours on the node who overuse resources, and it all depends on how much hosteasier tighten up on that kind of thing. 2. What level of support do you get? They aren't explicit (anywhere I could find) as to what their "managed service" does and does not include. Given you say you have no Linux experience, in your shoes I'd be looking for a host that quite explicitly says they will install this or do that on request.

But, if you start out monthly, you might satisfy yourself after a few months and move to annual packages.

You don't need to use cPanel. You could use something like webmin instead if you wanted. But if you're familiar with cPanel you might choose to use that.

Also, I'd always strongly advise registering your domain with a different company from your web host. Register your domain with a company like namecheap, then if you need to change hosts you can do so safely knowing that you have separate control over the domain.

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jaypan’s picture

jaypan
Location Victoria, BC
commented

The main thing you should be looking at is whether they are offering a fully managed service or not. If this is your first VPS, and you don't have experience with server management, you will most definitely want something fully managed. They will help you when you break things. Otherwise you have to figure it out yourself, and this can be really difficult at times when you don't know what's happening.

As a side note, James (the above poster) wasn't self promoting, but I'll promote him. One of my clients is using his services, and I've found him to be extremely helpful, so if you want to explore your options, you may want to check what he has to offer.

Contact me to contract me for D7 -> D10/11 migrations.

jamesoakley’s picture

jamesoakley
Primary language English
Location North Yorkshire, UK
commented

Thanks Jay.

I should say that I don't offer VPS packages, so am probably not what the OP wants. (Although, that of course depends on whether the resource limits they've hit are because they've hit the limits of shared hosting per se, or whether there might be other shared environments that don't have quite the same limits ;).)

Yes - fully managed is what I was trying to point them towards. I just found the host they mentioned somewhat ambiguous as to how fully managed they are.

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seanray’s picture

seanray commented

For VPS, go with Hostgator or VPS.net, both of them reliable and quite affordable. You could also find some coupons to save more.

jaypan’s picture

jaypan
Location Victoria, BC
commented

If you are willing to spend the money on quality, I use MDD hosting. They have been excellent. I went through five hosts in five years before I ended up with MDD, and I've been with them for over two years now without any troubles, and lots of great extras.

Contact me to contract me for D7 -> D10/11 migrations.

lionheart8’s picture

lionheart8 commented

Hi all!
I'm very grateful for each of those comments.
I am going to carefully look at each of the suggestions.
I forwarded some of the questions raised & some more to the host & within about 50 minutes got the response below:

1. overselling - We do not oversell our VPS nodes.
2. management - We offer VPS management for cPanel issues, and basic help with server questions and script installs.
For example, if you needed an apache module or php extension installed, we could help you install that as part of the VPS management.
If you wanted or needed a script, such as a cPanel addon, installed we could help with that installation. Although if the script didn't work as planned we would ask you to reach out to the developer to get troubleshooting steps, but we would take care of the troubleshooting steps if you were unable to do this yourself.
As far as script support, for scripts like drupal, wordpress, etc., we offer "best effort" support for these scripts, but if you read the drupal forums it is likely that you already know more about drupal than any technician you would talk to about it. If you have any server questions, cPanel questions, we can help with these because this is our area of expertise.
Some of our technicians have experience beyond basic experience with some LAMP apps, but they are not within our general area of expertise.
The bottom line with support is that it can't hurt to ask, and we'll try to help you as best we can, but if it is outside of our area of expertise the worst thing that can happen is we recommend contacting the script developers or support community.
4. cPanel setup - We actually setup your VPS as part of the account setup, so you only need to login to WHM and setup your server name, and nameservers. We can do this for you, just open a ticket with support once the VPS is setup and let us know you'd like the cPanel setup finalized.
5. support response - We answer all tickets within 1 hour of receiving them. Escalated tickets may take longer, but if they do we can always let you know why it is taking longer if you ask for an update.

On the first question, this information is in the FAQ:

Question: How many clients on one VPS node?
Answer: Depends on average load on server, usually no more than 30.

So I would be interested to know what you think, with these responses assuming they are to be taken at face value.

Once again, many thanks!

jamesoakley’s picture

jamesoakley
Primary language English
Location North Yorkshire, UK
commented

Always good to hear a web host get stuck in and answer the questions. The other place I always look for reviews is Web Hosting Talk, where again reviews for hosteasier.com seem to be positive. I'd still advise the OP to start month-on-month, though. Always a good idea.

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lionheart8’s picture

lionheart8 commented

Ok, thank you all for your advice. I will see what to do as I feel I'm much more informed than before.