- Reaction score
- 198
- Points
- 1,210
Summary
Our Internet service provider is changing their hosting options, and the new choices do not work well for us. We need to come up with a plan to move our services within the next 60 days.
Background
Army.ca is currently on a hosted server at Slicehost. Slicehost was purchased by Rackspace and as part of that consolidation they are no longer offering the hosting plan we use. Their new 'cloud' approach will cost us more and give us less, so it's not an appealing option. What's more, they are migrating all existing customers (that's us) over to the new cloud server architecture.
This conversion process will be complete NLT May 2012.
Rather than be stuffed into a solution that doesn't fit our needs, I thought I would use this as an opportunity to assess our requirements and resources to come up with a plan. I have outlined a couple of high level options for consideration.
For comparison, our current setup includes:
A quick analysis on this comes up with the following important points:
Option 1 - Find another hosted solution
Pros:
Cons:
Option 2 - Run a dedicated server/connection
Pros:
Cons:
These lists are far from exhaustive, and are meant more as preliminary notes at this stage.
Request
There are a lot of technically minded users here and as this change will have a big impact on how we operate, I wanted to open it up for discussion. Some folks may have been through a similar process recently, know where to find a good deal on hardware, have experience with a good hosting company, etc.
Let's get the conversation rolling!
Thanks
Mike
Our Internet service provider is changing their hosting options, and the new choices do not work well for us. We need to come up with a plan to move our services within the next 60 days.
Background
Army.ca is currently on a hosted server at Slicehost. Slicehost was purchased by Rackspace and as part of that consolidation they are no longer offering the hosting plan we use. Their new 'cloud' approach will cost us more and give us less, so it's not an appealing option. What's more, they are migrating all existing customers (that's us) over to the new cloud server architecture.
This conversion process will be complete NLT May 2012.
Rather than be stuffed into a solution that doesn't fit our needs, I thought I would use this as an opportunity to assess our requirements and resources to come up with a plan. I have outlined a couple of high level options for consideration.
For comparison, our current setup includes:
- CPU: Quad-Core AMD Opteron(tm) Processor 2374 HE
- RAM: 3 Gb
- Traffic limit: 1,800 Gb/month
- No backups
- Disk space: 113 Gb
- Throughput: Unknown (slicehost doesn't post this) but at least 200k/s
- We own but a 'slice' of a virtual server
- Monthly cost: $200 USD
- No contract
A quick analysis on this comes up with the following important points:
- Initially the CPU was adequate, though in the last 6+ months, the server load has moved from "frequently idle" to "usually busy". Not a critical issue but as we continue to grow we may start to see performance degrade slightly.
- 3 Gb RAM is sometimes not enough - we could benefit from more and while it's not critical, we would see performance improvements with more.
- 1,800 Gb of traffic/month is far more than we need, we typically use around 100 Gb/mo.
- I am conducting my own backups, but there are performance drawbacks to doing so with a remotely hosted server.
- 113 Gb of disk space is adequate. We currently use roughly 70% of that, with moderate growth over time.
- Our throughput has rarely been an issue; usually some other part of the server tops out first.
- Virtual servers are great for the hosting company as management and uptime are improved. However this often comes at the cost of performance, as your server is competing for physical resources with other virtual servers. This technology has improved drastically over the years, but sometimes problems on one 'slice' can spill to another.
- Our availability (uptime) with Slicehost has been excellent. With a few exceptions, most of the outages have been at my hand.
- Slicehost has no contract, if I cancelled today my bill would be prorated for the portion of the month I used the service.
Option 1 - Find another hosted solution
Pros:
- No startup costs.
- No hardware maintenance.
Cons:
- Likely requires a contract, so we will be tied to a single host for 1-2 years. I tend to like to avoid this type of commitment as it locks us in to a host that may not end up suiting our needs.
- Research is required to find an appropriate host may be extensive.
- No console/physical access to our server. If something goes wrong it could be difficult to diagnose and fix.
Option 2 - Run a dedicated server/connection
Pros:
- Easy management. In the past, managing a server that is in a datacenter has had it's issues. Mostly when I bring it down and can't bring it back up again!
- Local backups are easy, fast and do not sap our performance.
- We can get a significantly more powerful server to help handle load and growth.
- Monthly costs are lower - I estimate half of a typical hosted service.
Cons:
- Initial capital outlay required for new server. I estimate that a decent server will cost us $1,500, though more research is required on my part.
- Hardware maintenance - if something goes wrong, we need to fix it.
- A local fast connection is required, with good upload/download speeds. Bell FiberOP may fit the bill here, but is only now being rolled out to my area.
- Uptime could be an issue; luckily I still have a 2200 VA UPS to help keep things going, at least for a short time.
These lists are far from exhaustive, and are meant more as preliminary notes at this stage.
Request
There are a lot of technically minded users here and as this change will have a big impact on how we operate, I wanted to open it up for discussion. Some folks may have been through a similar process recently, know where to find a good deal on hardware, have experience with a good hosting company, etc.
Let's get the conversation rolling!
Thanks
Mike
)
All kidding aside, while this is mostly a leftover from the days of resource constraints, it is still a 'best practice.' Don't forget, while they allow us to use 1,800 Gb per month, our connection speed may not allow that in practice. See my note above about DreamHost's unlimited traffic; that account would crawl under Army.ca's load because the pipe is not big enough to serve our traffic needs. An analogy would be if someone gave you a lawn tractor and said "don't drive it over 50,000km per month." Probably can't hit that limit even if you drove it at 'top speed' 24/7. In short: you're still competing for traffic with every other user for limited traffic delivery, regardless of what our monthly cap is.
