Want to go with Vservers, (semi-ded this time) BUT...

[SonnetCelestial]

Kathy, Susan, wandrer I'm wondering whether or not you can provide me with more information about running your servers. Also...I'm curious. Does your site support itself or do you have to actually pay for most of it out of your own pocket?? I want to know how ad options help and if they, in fact, can pay for the server.

Thanks and I would love to have something semi-ded or simply half way there.

Currently my forum is no where near it used to be since I shut it down, however, after I get it up, it will be TEEMING with life and sucking up resources like crazy.

[Kathy]

Lets see....we are safely tucked away on a semi-dedicated server and have had some great months of service. Last month was stinky. Some guy was using his mysql to check his email every 8 minutes or so....and with his 8 mg database, was managing to suck out 80% of the servers resources. It took the tech team a while to shut him down and make him behave. They never figured the culprit would be an 8 mg database when there were two good sized mysqls on the server that were gigantic. VBulletin is a "kinder and gentler" system for sure. I think the vserver people were shocked at how big we were and yet how few resources we were using (we are at 3% resources almost constantly, I think is what they told me)

The VServers run the tech side with the help of a fantastic control panel on our end. We can set up the mysql databases, set up our own vhosts to host other domains (I've brought with me all my other domains and their websites....and it works nicely). When I need help, I call them on the phone. Otherwise, their online support documentation walks you through set-ups and so forth.

As for the cost...it is spendy. Right now I'm kinda freaky about the costs because of the ad revenues across the net. Our site falls into the smaller end of the larger sites (Or larger end of the smaller sites )...getting about 600,000+ page views per month. We depend on advertising banners (one at the top, one at the bottom) and in addition to these we are a successful affiliate of amazon.com (my visitors are readers and my own book, surrounding the website, is for sale from amazon.com and it sells well....I get a commission for selling it plus the royalty from the publisher). Add to that the search engine I put on the site which pays per search and we cover expenses plus a bit to pay for a bit of tech help when I need it.

I'd love to have regular "sponsors"...but I'm not a marketer. By day, I'm a public high school teacher. By night and weekend (and summer vacation) I'm a webmaster. I'm just grateful that the costs for the vserver has not dug into my pocket personally....I couldn't do it if that was the case.

HOpe I didn't leave anything out. Let me know if I did!

[wandrer]

I'm wondering whether or not you can provide me with more information about running your servers.
Does your site support itself or do you have to actually pay for most of it out of your own pocket?? I want to know how ad options help and if they, in fact, can pay for the server.

While a few of my sites are running forums, the forums are for (generally) their own clients/customers and do not carry advertising - except their own advertising.

As for Vservers, maybe someone who knows something can post some interesting information anonymously ...

[anonymous1]

During the past 5 months, and with your help, the UNIX
Product Development Department has been working hard in the creation of our new HostPro Freedom product line. Now, as we near the initial launch of this new generation of virtual server products, we are working furiously to polish up our user documentation and last minute development to the product.

...snip...

In this message, I would like to share with you some
additional information about what is now called the HostPro Freedom product line and give you a sneak at the proposed specifications and pricing for the four Freedom products scheduled to be made available to our customers beginning next week.

...snip...

The four HostPro Freedom products, which are now based on FreeBSD version 4.1.1 (yes, we’ve merged our source into the FreeBSD.4.1.1 release which came out last week a partial reason for the delay in getting the products up for you to test) will eventually replace the current VServer Lite, VServer Pro, VServer Merchant and VServer Ultra products. For the immediate future both product lines will be available to our customers, with the Freedom line phasing out our legacy products as time goes by.

...snip...

Some of the other prominent features and product
distinctions among the four HostPro Freedom products, as well as their proposed pricing and product names, are as follows:

Freedom 200


      Base Price:                   $59.95 monthly
        Setup fee:                    $40.00 one-time
        Free space on virtual disk:     300 MB
        Email Accounts:                 unlimited
        Initial Virtual Hosting 
        allowance:                      5
        FTP/Shell users:              1
        Root Access:                    No
        Software package library 
        (vinstall):                     Yes
        Software Ports Collection:      No
        FrontPage 98/2000 Extensions:   Yes
        SSL-Enable Apache web server    Yes
        with PHP, mod_perl, and other
        apache modules
        Complete MySQL database 
        Server:                         Yes
        Anonymous FTP access:           Yes
        Bandwidth transfer limit:       10 GB
        Allowed to run private 
        RealServer:                     No
        
Freedom 300


      Base Price:                   $99.95 monthly
        Setup fee:                    $40.00 one-time
        Free space on virtual disk:     400 MB
        Email Accounts:                 unlimited
        Initial Virtual Hosting 
        allowance:                  10
        FTP/Shell users:              10
        Root Access:                    No
        Software package library 
        (vinstall):                     Yes
        Software Ports Collection:      No
        FrontPage 98/2000 Extensions:   Yes
        SSL-Enable Apache web server    Yes
        with PHP, mod_perl, and other
        apache modules
        Complete MySQL database 
        Server:                         Yes
        Anonymous FTP access:           Yes
        Bandwidth transfer limit:       20 GB
        Allowed to run private 
        RealServer:                     No


Freedom 400x


      Base Price:                   $149.95 monthly
        Setup fee:                    $40.00 one-time
        Free space on virtual disk:     500 MB
        Email Accounts:                 unlimited
        Initial Virtual Hosting 
        allowance:                      20
        FTP/Shell users:              unlimited
        Root Access:                    Yes
        Software package library 
        (vinstall):                     Yes
        Software Ports Collection:      Yes
        FrontPage 98/2000 Extensions:   Yes
        SSL-Enable Apache web server    Yes
        with PHP, mod_perl, and other
        apache modules
        Complete MySQL database 
        Server:                     Yes
        Anonymous FTP access:           Yes
        Bandwidth transfer limit:       30 GB
        Allowed to run private 
        RealServer:                     No



Freedom 500x


      Base Price:                       $249.95 monthly
        Setup fee:                    $150.00 one-time
        Free space on virtual disk:     1000 MB
        Email Accounts:                 unlimited
        Initial Virtual Hosting 
        allowance:                      40
        FTP/Shell users:              unlimited
        Root Access:                    Yes
        Software package library 
        (vinstall):                     Yes
        Software Ports Collection:      Yes
        FrontPage 98/2000 Extensions:   Yes
        SSL-Enable Apache web server    Yes
        with PHP, mod_perl, and other
        apache modules
        Complete MySQL database 
        Server:                         Yes
        Anonymous FTP access:           Yes
        Bandwidth transfer limit:       40 GB
        Allowed to run private 
        RealServer:                     Yes

What does “virtual hosting allowance” mean? Well, it works like this. The provided, supported Apache server on Freedom products has been slightly modified to enforce a limit on the number of <VirtualHost> tags that it will allow. This limit is in place both to reduce server load and to maintain optimal performance for all HostPro Freedom accounts. That allowance represents the number of distinct virtual hosts that can be served by the provided Apache server. Additional virtual host allotments can be added to a HostPro Freedom product for an additional $5.00 per month per host.

The following additional product add-ons can be applied to these products as well:

...snip...

On the Freedom 400x and Freedom 500x, you will have root-access enabled. This means in addition to the expanded freedom that you have to “tweak” the server to operate as you require, you can also replace any of the applications that we’ve provided something else. However, if you do replace our provided applications with alternate ones, you do so at the cost of moving out of the supported configuration and our Technical Support staff will not be able to assist or support you with the configuration or operation of your customized server environment. This is the case for all of the provided, supported applications and services on these products: stay with our configuration and get technical support when you need it, or stray from the provided configuration and let the product become more of an “unmanaged” hosting solution it’s your choice.
Freedom!

Another nicety is that the stated virtual disk sizes
represent available “free-space”, not the total size of the virtual disk. Through the magic of a file sharing
technology that we call “3FS” (Freedom Flexible File
Sharing), we’ve preinstalled over 300MB software and system files into 50MB of disk space, and left the stated free space for you. Thus, the size of the virtual disk on a
Freedom 200 product, for example, is actually a bit over
350MB, contains over 300MB of preinstalled software, and still leaves you with 300MB of free space for your own data and applications. Isn’t technology grand?

...snip...

[Kathy]

So, anonymous1, what does this mean for an Ultra user? DOes this mean that my "ultra plan" will be the freedom 500 and I'll go on from here? Will the server be protected from having more people on my box? FOrgive me for asking the questions that may seem answered in your post, but as a non-geek (and I use that term lovingly for I happen to love the geeks in my life.. ) its hard for me to know how the changes will affect me and my relationship with Hostpro.

BTW, When I've called Vservers to get help with my box...when we were having such a tough time figuring out who was sucking resources, the guys I spoke to, while nice, knew nothing about a VBulletin. They had me dump database since they really thought it was me who was using up all the resources, even though I knew it wasn't. We've had 50+ users accessing the vbulletin at times with no slow up in resources and page loads....but with 12 people accessing the vbulletin during other times it was impossible....

It was hard trying to get help since it concerned a part of my website they seemed unfamiliar with. The performance team was kind and I've asked about tweaking the mysql configs to help us all and they couldn't do it since they "knew nothing about the vbulletin needs".

So, anonymous1, thanks for the info...and any help you can give me would be appreciated. :-)

[SonnetCelestial]

Hey you two!

Thanks for the information!

After learning about what you said Kathy I think I will wait for ads and also perhaps affiliations with art sites to increase my current income for the site.

Also anonymous I'm still trying to grappel what you posted. I sort of understand the advantages of the system, but I'll look at the vservers now to get a better "understanding"

bbl

[politistock]

HostPro NETplus is ok

We've been using HostPro as our provider since July, and overall they've been very good. We chose their NETplus package because we were very small and just starting out, and most importantly because it supports Java servlets. (Our site is a game that's based on servlets.)

We did have some problems with them, along the lines that Kathy described earlier, but in our case they had a very limited understanding of Java servlets.

We're still pretty small, and our forum is brand new, but so far it's working quite smoothly on HostPro's shared server. We were even able to integrate vBulletin into our game (so our servlets control login/logout, registration, and profiles).

As far as ad revenue goes, I'm convinced we can make more than we're currently making, but we're doing decently well compared to our operational costs.

I hope this helps!

[Kathy]

Any idea on when these four new hostpro &quot;freedom&quot; plans are coming out?

I'm ready for the new hostpro packages.....

I participated in an online survey abuot my needs....I think it was in prep for the revealing of these new freedom packages but they have still not appeared.

Any news here? Thanks!

[wandrer]

http://hostpro.net/hosting/shared/unix_freedom500x.html

http://hostpro.net/hosting/shared/unix_comparison.html

[Edited by wandrer on 01-23-2001 at 06:10 PM]

[fastforward]

I'm confused about this new freedom line. What exactly is the difference between this and a vserver account.

I see the extra disk space and the limit on bandwidth, but this is still a shared virtual server solution right? And how do they give root access if it is a virtual server?

Regards

[wandrer]

but this is still a shared virtual server solution right? And how do they give root access if it is a virtual server?

From my understanding, it is a single very-high-end computer with 'virtualized OS'. You are given control of your own 'virtual OS' and within that segment, you can do just about anything you can do with a regular dedicated system - install your own apache (or other webserver), compile the latest mysql / php / sendmail / imap / ssl / sshd / whatever. I believe i posted the server specs a while ago and they were quite impressive. I guess it falls one step above semi-dedicated, and one step below dedicated.