Virtual server hosting

[renderman]

So my personal site has grown beyond the size of the pipe I have at home and I can't justify anything faster. I'm also having issues with the netblock I'm on being listed in various RBL's causing much frustration with email.

I've never liked webhosts that force you into using their control panels, etc. I always liked having a shell and the ability for full control

Been looking at virtual servers and they seem to be the trick. Found one host, www.westhost.com (unfortunately in Utah) that for $10/month would solve all my problems. Hell, I'd probably save that much a month in my power bill.

Anyone have any experience with virtual hosting or know a good company? Particularly one with good security and is'nt going to freak out at my content?

[Shinobi]

Re: Virtual server hosting

Particularly one with good security and is'nt going to freak out at my content?

Nothing to do with pictures of donkeys, right? I'm looking to move my website as well, my current hosting company in the UK are crap. Not only that but a law soon to be passed over here will make content of my site IE tools illegal. I'm looking at moving to a server hosted in the US.

From experiences people I know have had of VPS solutions, they mostly seem to be positive.

[DaKahuna]

Re: Virtual server hosting

I currently have two sites that are being hosted. One inside the US the other Outside. The biggest issue I have come across is that of size. You are talking serious cash when you start wanting to host things like Rainbow tables or even the COWPATTY hash files. Most economical plans appear to be for people with 2 to 5 GB of space as their requirement.

[converge]

Re: Virtual server hosting

Interesting the topic is up, because I'm in a similar boat at the moment.. looking to transition sites and seeds. Unofrtunately I don't have the money to drop for exactly what I'd like. I'm still tossing between simple web/mail hosts, VSPs, (dedicated probably out).. or buying a cheap box and shipping it to colo.

First off.. if you're searching out plain webhosting you'll find a good dozen places that will give insane offerings (300GB space, 3T bandwidth, unlimited farting, etc), each place with retardedly slightly different terms that don't make much sense from a limitations perspective. I immediately fell prey to this and ordered up hosting from hostmonster.com. DON'T. I was initially pleased.. they reg'd up hackedyour.com and within a couple hours it was resolving to their host.. I began setting up a few things.. playing with the cpanel (hate em, but finding places that will even give you a locked shell is hard enough).. even pointed nameservers on a couple other domains over in prep.

The next morning I ran a whois to see if the DB updated.. to my surprise and investigation the domain was still available for reg... hmmph. I went to login to my account at hostmonster.com and discovered that my account was gone. grrr.. I opened up a chat session and asked what the hell was going on with my account? I was told by the rep that my order was suspected of fraud and cancelled. ... This was a hard line for me to chew, since I provided 100% valid personal information, billing information, and in spite of their site warning that they personally call and verify.. I received 0, null, NONE calls, emails or communication outside of the initial order confirmation (that notably was flagged as spam). I pressed on, but the tech insisted that the only way to resolve the issue was to email billing@hostmonster.com. I questioned their responsiveness (being on a Sunday) .. he gladly pointed out that I would hear nothing back until at least Tuesday because of the holiday. Nice.

So on Tuesday I received an email back, requesting that I create visual copies of my license/ID and credit card front/back .. then FAX OR EMAIL it to them. Ummm... No! I sent a nastygram back thanking them for fucking up the hosting relationship this early on so that it saves me the pain of dealing with it later.. and expressed that I was grateful that they cancelled the order for me already.

One should note, if not visually or contextually obvious.. that a few seconds of perusing will return that bluehost.com is one and the same as hostmonster.com, with slightly different terms attached.

[renderman]

Re: Virtual server hosting

I'm not looking at hosting the CoWF torrents, I can do that from home. I'm just wanting to host my site and email services the way I want and not have to do things 'their way', hence why a virtual server I have root on makes sense.

My site (with photo's etc) is about 2 gig (alot of crap in there I'm sure) and monthly transfers are about 10 gig (/. effect not withstanding)

Lately my provider has been tinkering with QoS and traffic shaping, jsut absolutely killing my upload, so it's advanced my plans to move offsite.

[converge]

Re: Virtual server hosting

So for similar control reasons as renderman, I began down the path of VSPs .. asking around yielded http://www.arvixe.com/ .. which seems to be on the down-low and is partially technically bandaged by a couple folks that I know. Good start.

My only concern was that of bandwidth.. and OS. It seems like the standard trend for VSP or dedicated hosting is that you can have pretty damn near full control of the box, but the box is running Redhat, Fedora, Cent, or some other RH bastardization. I swore no less than 5 and probably closer to 8 years ago that I would never personally run with a RH box (professionally I'm a whore that will put up with any environment). This is something I have to come to terms with.. or pursue option 3.. colo.

Then enters the question: At what monthly rate does the bandwidth + virtualserver equation make it more intelligent to purchase my own box and send it to colo? .. likewise, at what point does depreciation and repair offset that determination? ..and at just what price do I want to avoid running Redhat? ... this is my current consideration,.. and I think VPS is winning on overall ROI.

The other hit is that none of the hosting seems to adequately, economically cover my bandwidth usage of an approximate sustained 2Mb/s per month. I know I have it good right now by keeping that for only around $60 a month, but the attempt to achieve through VSP or colo seems to get *considerably* more expensive .. when you'd think that bulk bandwidth would actually lower the cost (obviously not lower from what I'm paying now, but in general).

seconds * minutes * hours * days = approximate seconds per month
60 * 60 * 24 * 31 = 2678400

* 1.5Mbps = 4017600Mb ~ 3924Gb ~ 491GB /mo
* 2Mbps = 5356800Mb ~ 5232Gb ~ 654GB /mo

I can confirm these numbers are probably pretty accurate, considering last month my torrent seeds and website transferred approximately 200GB of data combined, *excluding* all network overhead, torrent overhead, etc.

[converge]

Re: Virtual server hosting

The solution I've chosen for the next year breaks functionality across two different companies.

For greater control and server features (ala shells, trackers, apps) I have ordered up the smallest VPS package from Arvixe. Smaller system specs but it meets all the needs for what I would creatively use it for (ie, I won't be transoding video on it). I also recognize that for me, 200GB/mo transfer will get easily demolished within the first week of service without strict throttling on my part ... so to suppliment the VPS I ordered up a year plan from Hostpapa, like most power-hosters touting 300GB space and nearly 3T transfer.

Combining the two services to complement weaknesses with the strengths at each, in addition to committing for 1 year (compromise between pricing for monthly and 2-3 years most places want).. I have achieved greatness for appromixately $42/mo. I have also distributed basic web hosting functionality across two unique sites for that cost.. meaning low-bandwidth (limitation primarily on Arvixe side), redundant sites can be achieved if desired.


Unbiased information about these places was difficult to find, so I'll keep folks posted on how well they work out for me. I would also like to point out something interesting to those that haven't caught on to the running numbers:

There are no less than 7 or so of us .. that semi-know each other on different levels.. from Defcon, from the Forums .. that are in VERY SIMILAR boats searching for hosting. If anyone wants to hop on board with my setup, PM/msg me and we'll see what we can work out for what you need. I'm pretty sure I can throttle my stuff to ensure SLA hosting for others as well.. yes, I can share :p Or.. if you seek other options, you may consider hooking up with other folks you know more than me. fwiw, the irc chan seems to be a popular spot to find other folks host-hunting, at least over the past couple nights.


--update 15:53PDT -- Score 1 for Arvixe! Unlike hostmonster.. that cancelled my order on suspicion and waited for me to contact them to prove I was a real person, Arvixe contacted me via phone within hours of hitting the submit button on my order. They spoke with mfreeck and in no time my box was being built with Debian running on it (unsupported, but VPS customers are _not_ limited to the RH-based defaults) .. and yes AlxRogan, they will even drop OS2/warp on the box if you want !

--update 19:48PDT -- Score 1 for Hostpapa! Apparently hostmaster/bluehost are just a bunch of slighted douches that don't do their job. Same courtesy as Arvixe for Hostpapa.., personal call to confirm identity, shortly following my account is set up and ready for trouncing. No need to fax/email copies of my personal ID, credit card, birth certificate ... just plain old hosting service with a smile. Meanwhile I'm totally rocking out on my Arvixe box, prepping it to test some app and site migration tactics.

[LosT]

Re: Virtual server hosting

Nice 'verge....

Please do keep us posted....

LosT

[audit]

Re: Virtual server hosting

Render's got new hosting now.

[Shinobi]

Re: Virtual server hosting

I was given this VPS hosting company by a friend,

cheapvps.co.uk

Servers in the UK and the US.

[renderman]

Re: Virtual server hosting

Audit was kind enough to step up and offer his services. I do admit that it is much nicer to have a host whom you can yell at without any feeling of guilt :) That and I'd rather give money to a friend than to strangers in Utah.

On another note; I've been playing around with snort/mysql/base and it really opened my eyes to how much crap was flying at me on a day to day basis.

I've been bitten by a monitoring bug. Any suggestions for system monitoring programs or host monitoring that I should play with? Preferably free/open source?

[Thorn]

Re: Virtual server hosting

I've been bitten by a monitoring bug. Any suggestions for system monitoring programs or host monitoring that I should play with? Preferably free/open source?

One word: SGUIL

[Shinobi]

Re: Virtual server hosting

Take a look at OSSIM too.

[DaKahuna]

Re: Virtual server hosting

One word: SGUIL

Ditto. Richard Bejtlich sings its praises and I have been intrigued by it since Richard demo'd it for the ISSA Nova Chapter two years ago.

[Thorn]

Re: Virtual server hosting

Ditto. Richard Bejtlich sings its praises and I have been intrigued by it since Richard demo'd it for the ISSA Nova Chapter two years ago.

Yeah, Bejtlich demo'd it at Shmoocon 2 and I was amazed. His book, The Tao of Network Security Monitoring has a great howto on getting SGUIL setup and running.