| Posted by catfished, 11-01-2007, 12:40 AM | | Well this is probably the first ever Dotable review that is not 100% positive. I was with Dotable (Aussie Bob's hosting company) from approximately April 1, 2006 to the end of September 2007. Overall, it was a good experience, especially compared to my three previous reseller hosts ( Surpass Hosting, then CredibleHost and finally Site5 ).
The Short Version:
The first 14 months were great but when they moved the Venus server to another datacenter, I started having problems:
Suspended pages due to them suspending the account on the old server after only 8 hours.
Email problems caused by old MX entries that I had done at their suggestion being carried over to the new server.
Slightly high server loads (1.90 - 3.00) slowing down my sites.
Spam Assassin Spam Box problems caused by a change from whatever they were using to maildir. This caused one of several exchanges with their tech (Steve Gore, known as Dotable Steve) that ended in my looking for a new host.
Using a scale of 1 - 10, I'd rate them as a 7/10 for the following reasons:
Pros:
They're totally up front about everything, very trustworthy, you know they will still be around in years to come.
If a server goes down, they're normally on it in minutes.
Aussie Bob, being very personable on the forum and in support tickets gives it a very nice community feeling.
With the exception of my problems with Steve, their support is good.
Cons:
Since Bob is in Australia, Steve in New Zealand and Sumith in India, I usually had to wait until evening here in California to get a support ticket answered that I submitted in the morning. This is not the case in a server going down, they have alerting system/systems so they can be on top of it immediately.
If Steve Gore (Dotable Steve) handles your support ticket, you better be smart enough to understand what he's talking about or he will become very intolerant, bordering on rude.
A bit pricy by today's standards but considering it's a reputable company and they don't grossly oversell, it's probably worth it for some people.
The long version:
The first 14 months were great but when they moved the Venus server to another data center, I started having problems. Only about 8 hours after they moved all my files over to the new Venus, Bob suspended the old Venus account so I started getting suspended pages on my accounts as the DNS had not completely propagated to the new one. This was very embarrassing for me as a lot of people thought I wasn't paying my bills. When I contacted support, Bob unsuspended the old account and said that they always suspend them after 24 hours but this was after only about 8 hours????
I started having email problems right after the move that were evidently my fault according to their #1 support tech, Steve Gore (Dotable Steve). I had changed the MX records on the old Venus of all my accounts as per Steve's advice to get good DNS reports and they (MX records) were carried over to the new server which caused the problem. Evidently I was supposed to remember that I had changed them and therefore should have corrected the issue myself. At the time I changed them, I didn't even understand what I was doing, I was just doing what they suggested but still I was supposed to know to change them again after the move????
After the move, Venus server loads started running a bit higher than they did on the old server, not at all too high for a 4 CPU server (1.90 - 3.00) but high enough for me to notice it on my sites, especially forums. I got the way overused by all hosts that I've dealt with "backups are running" excuses. When I pointed out that this was occurring at all hours, I got "The server load is really low and has been all day, there's no issue with the server". When I then checked the load it was 6.01 4.04 3.73 so I posted that, only to receive this reply from Steve:
"You must have been sat refreshing the server to get the highest load to post on the forum Sure, the load spikes a bit now and then, backups ARE running right now and when a large account comes up, load can spike a bit, but we do have to back data up. The load average as shown in your post is around 3.5-3.7 (15 minute average) which is perfectly fine while backups are running. I've been watching and logged into venus all day with no problems to report."
My reply approximately one month later:
It's been over a month since you replied and my sites are now loading worse than ever!! It doesn't matter what time of day or night, there are huge spikes that cause page loads of 5 to 15 seconds with less than 20 queries. Before the move, my sites loaded in 0.120 - 0.160 seconds most of the time. Loads were normally below 1 and rarely more than 2, now 3 to 5 is normal with frequent spikes of over 7-8. I really don't care how high the loads are as long as my sites load reasonably well but that is certainly not the case since the move. I never received a reply to this so at this point I started looking for other hosting options.
I ended up getting a fully managed VPS with Liquid Web in September and canceled my Dotable reseller account a couple of weeks later. Even though Dotable Steve made me feel like an idiot, I managed to move all my accounts to the VPS with no problems other than getting a little help from Liquid Web with one big account. Maybe I'm not quite as inept as Steve seems to think.
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| Posted by Adam H, 11-01-2007, 05:21 AM | | I think this steve guy needs to go on a customer service course
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| Posted by ldcdc, 11-01-2007, 09:42 AM | | Too bad that such a detailed review isn't overly positive. Looks like your encounters with Steve did weight quite a bit in your decision to leave.
How's the VPS' performance so far?
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| Posted by Rochen, 11-01-2007, 10:57 AM | | I must say I was really surprised to read some of your comments above regarding Steve. I have obviously never had any dealings with Dotable but have known Bob very well for years now even before WHT and have dealt with Steve in the past on a few matters as well.
I must say that Steve is probably one of the most technically able and smartest people that I have come across in this industry. Trust me that's saying a lot. I think you perhaps just caught Steve on a bad day or his crate of Red Bull hadn't arrived from Toowoomba!
From my prospective, if we could poach Steve from Bob we would
- Chris
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| Posted by @Matt, 11-01-2007, 01:04 PM | | I think I would rather have someone technical behind the scenes rather than a friend :-P
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| Posted by Aussie Bob, 11-01-2007, 07:08 PM | | Steve is genius, and I don't say that lightly. He's by far the best sysadmin I've ever worked with.
Ed, glad your VPS is working out, and thanks for the review. I was wondering if I missed it. Hope you're still catching some big catfish too.
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| Posted by catfished, 11-01-2007, 07:28 PM | | Hi Bob,
First of all, I don't believe I implied that Steve was not a good tech/sysadmin, in fact he's probably the most experienced and qualified that I have ever dealt with. That's the problem, he's like most techs, the smarter they are, the more intolerant they are of noobs like me. They assume everyone is already at a particular knowledge level and if not they would prefer not to deal with us.
I'm catching a few catfish but not big ones, mostly in the 5 to 6 pound range.
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| Posted by Nnyan, 11-01-2007, 07:56 PM | | I was with Dotable for a good part of a year (I'll have to look up my records) and I found Steve to be very to the point. Being an east coaster myself I really appreciated this. I do think (like some east coasters) this can be perceived by some people to be a touch on the rude side, but I never saw it that way.
In fact the only reason I left Dotable was to find a reseller with more local support and that offered a few features that Dotable did not offer at that time.
I'm sorry to hear your experience was bad with Dotable/Steve, they are one of the better hosts out there and Steve is an amazing admin. Glad to see that you landed on your feet with Liquidweb.
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| Posted by Aussie Bob, 11-01-2007, 09:52 PM | | Over here in Aussie catfish are considered vermin, and we don't eat them. Must be a different type of fish we have here, if you eat them over there.
Anyhoooo happy :fishing:
[edit] We need a fishing smiley Dennis.
Attached Thumbnails
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| Posted by Bloory, 11-02-2007, 03:16 AM | | I've found Steve's attitude to be first class, often going the extra mile.
Rob's not too shabby either
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| Posted by StevenG, 11-02-2007, 08:20 AM | | I'll admit I can be a bit to the point, but there were circumstances here that I'm not going into. I'm not really all that bad (of course that is my humble opinion)
My biggest fault, is that I tell it like it is, even if its not really what you want to hear.
Good luck ED, we wish you all the best for the future.
Last edited by StevenG; 11-02-2007 at 08:27 AM.
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| Posted by CretaForce, 11-02-2007, 09:36 AM | | First of all thanks for your review and the time you spend to write it :-)
It takes a lot of system resources to backup big cpanel accounts. If 2 people try to backup their files at the same time then you may see server loads up to 15.00. That's why some providers disable the backup function.
Are you sure that your website load slowly because of the server and not the new datacenter connections?
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| Posted by catfished, 11-02-2007, 11:41 PM | | I don't know what circumstances you're referring to but don't hold back on my account. In my opinion, I did nothing to cause your responses to my tickets and Dotable forum posts. I am not as inept as you inferred.
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| Posted by BigBison, 11-03-2007, 02:20 AM | | Steve, there's a big difference between being direct/blunt, telling it like it is even if it isn't good news, etc. and this:
"You must have been sat refreshing the server to get the highest load to post on the forum."
Strictly speaking, this is a failure in terms of customer service as it appears to have cost your employer an account. This is inevitably the result when the tech rep, knowing far more than the customer, levels a passive-aggressive accusation at a customer in order to avoid dealing with the issue.
Even a genius can be guilty of such behavior, so I find Bob's response here rather non-responsive. Yeah, so your guy Steve knows his stuff -- but this doesn't mean the customer wasn't right. From my perspective, Ed had a problem with slow page loads, which was not addressed at all, causing him to find other hosting. That's understandable, and thanks for the detailed review, Ed.
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| Posted by Aussie Bob, 11-03-2007, 02:48 AM | | Eric, to claim that server load issues were never addressed with Ed, is wrong. Of course they were. Folks push their sites hard these days, and Ed came from Site5, which back then had horrific server loads, so if I may, Ed was very paranoid about server load. The loads of the server Ed was on were very low, but occassionally they spiked and they were dealt with. We love nothing more than low loads, but all it takes is one script to go a bit haywire, and loads spike.
Ed was a great client and we had any interactions, both on the Dotable forum, through email/PM and on the Dotable helpdesk. Ed wasn't happy with the service he was receiving, so he went elsewhere. That's ok. We issued a full pro-rata refund and wished Ed all the best. I occassionally click on Ed's fishing website for pics of them big catfish.
As far as my "non-responsive" reply, I was not responding to Ed but to Rochen. Steve can speak for himself. He doesn't need me to nor will I speak for him.
BTW Steve's not employed by Dotable. He's Dotable's part owner.
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| Posted by ergo, 11-29-2007, 06:46 AM | | Hmm, there are some very good things i could say about dotable, as ive been with them over a year now.
And one of things i learned in past - i dont give a f**k if the tech stuff is nice to me, i care all about my tickets being solved and maybe a bit of explanation what was the problem. And i got satysfying results those only in 2 companies so far - dathorn ( some ppl consider andrew rude too ) and dotable. I dont expect the stuff saying to me how nice customer i am to share my money with them, how they love me etc. i need things to work, and steve does a great job , and is a fun person to talk to . And i talked a bit with him on im so i guess i know what im writing here. and btw. i dare anyone to point at me another sysadmin that would upgrade postgresql for me just because i wanted to ( on shared hosting), among some things i wanted.
Steve does a great job, he is a tech guy, and in my opinion if you want to chat or argue with him be prepared to know what you are talking about - or you waste his time and your's too - there are tickets to solve ;P .
I worked with few dotable clients so far as i develop web apps - and they really have very strange requests ( at least some ), if they request same strange things from steve like some insane replications, small eshops connecting to 3 dbs cross sites ( ROTFL ), i guess he jut was tired of those.
Steve is really helpful guy and at least for me he always provided a top notch service and was never rude - but i like ppl that go straight to the point.
The only thing i wish is to dotable to drop costs a bit because i need to switch to vps and they are to expensive for me atm. ;-).
And BOB get a new website already !! ;-)
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| Posted by ldcdc, 11-29-2007, 11:48 AM | | The world is moving and changing too fast, even when it's not actually needed. I like to know that there are still sites where you instantly get that feeling of "I know this place, I've been here before".
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| Posted by ergo, 11-29-2007, 11:49 AM | | yeah, but on the other side website IS the face of company ;-)
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| Posted by catfished, 11-29-2007, 10:54 PM | | As far as Steve Gore is concerned, I'm sure he gets along great with technically advanced people like yourself but for people like me who are trying to learn as they go, he's downright impatient, intolerant and bordering on rude.
Aussie Bob on the other hand, while not as technically savvy as Steve, is the most friendly, understanding and helpful gentleman I have ever done business with in the hosting industry.
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| Posted by adam, 11-30-2007, 01:25 AM | | Personally I would rather have someone that is right to the point and gets the issue fixed then have it take longer to figure out.
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| Posted by Aussie Bob, 11-30-2007, 02:04 AM | | I'm not speaking for Steve, but I think you caught Steve having an off day or two. He is usually really diplomatic and I've seen him go waaaaaaay beyond in tickets for specific issues etc, but he's prone to having a bad day. No excuses, but it happens.
Thanks Ed. The check's in the mail.
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| Posted by Bloory, 11-30-2007, 04:17 AM | | Steve has been more than pleasant (over and above others I have worked with) and tolerant of my level of learning compared to his. He's certainly been happy to go the extra mile, to explain things at a low level and to educate me as we go along.
I much prefer my tickets addressed by Steve or Bob to their other staff, but accept that even they are allowed time off!
Hopefully Steve puts up with my dumb questions because I am polite and appreciative!
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| Posted by catfished, 12-01-2007, 01:32 AM | | I never made any strange requests, I just required an explanation on how to deal with the change to maildr and configuring IMAP but never got an explanation that I could understand, just impatience.
I was always polite and appreciative until near the end.
I've said all I'm going to say about this matter, I have moved on but I would still recommend Dotable to the more technically advanced people on here but not noobs.
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| Posted by Vinno, 01-19-2008, 03:49 AM | | Ive been with Dotable for 15months now (according to how many payments I made)
Ive only had few request in the time and each was answered within the hour. No issues with server uptime, server runs pretty well.
Bob knows how to take care of customers and provide support! Its hard to find a host like this, once you find it, its a keeper.
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| Posted by SecureAX, 01-19-2008, 05:25 AM | | Hi everyone,
I have used Dotable's service for only 6 months. When I signed up for their services, I paid them for the whole year as I was confident at Aussie Bob as I had an account with HTTPme previously/
Unfortunately, things didn't turn out great. Instead of enjoying the close to 100% uptime throughout the year like at HTTPme, Dotable gave me nothing but horrible downtime. I was put on their Enterprise server and you can check out the downtime recorded by Alertra. In conclusion, the server went down almost every month and I finally gave up hope on them and moved away.
Anyway, when I requested to move away, Aussie Bob was kind enough to arrange the refund for unused credit for me since I paid 12 months in a row, after I requested for a refund.
I was expecting them to pay me back for 6 months' credit but unfortunately, that wasn't the case. Aussie Bob charged me for the migration done from my previous VPS to them. When I signed up for their services, they were happy to migrate the accounts over for me for FREE but when I decided to leave, this is when I was billed for migration. I was billed for hourly basis instead of per account (http://dotable.com/showthread.php?t=699) and take note that the migration was actually done from a VPS but not typical shared hosting account. Anyway, I didn't argue with them as $$ wasn't my main concern.
By the way, I'm not sure whether this applies to all their reseller hosting accounts but for your information, Enterprise is actually a VPS node. I was convinced by the good specifications but unfortunately it is only a VPS with limited resources hence I believe became the culprit of the unstable experience that I had with them.
I believe most people prefer Reseller Hosting over VPS hosting is because of the "burstable" resources, in which you may use the whole server resources when the others are not using it. This is the case at HTTPme and because they do not crowd their servers, I actually enjoyed very good uptime with them even with the high traffic sites that I hosted previously (note that I did not move these sites to Dotable)
However, at Dotable, I actually gave Aussie Bob 2 of my reseller hosting clients so 3 of us were hosted on the Enterprise VPS node, and with downtime occuring every month, I have nothing but really terrible experience with them.
In conclusion, Dotable didn't give me good uptime and the incident on refund really makes me think twice before recommending their services to anyone, especially those who wish to pay in advance more than 1 month.
Thanks.
Last edited by SecureAX; 01-19-2008 at 05:26 AM.
Reason: Added title
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| Posted by catfished, 01-19-2008, 02:55 PM | | Hi michaelfoo,
Sorry to hear you had such a bad experience with Dotable. I hope Bob will respond with his side. As the originator of this thread, I certainly did not have such problems with Dotable. When I left, Bob was more than fair with my refund and offered to move my sites to my new provider at no cost to me but I chose to move them myself to learn how. The only difference that I can see is that I had a reseller account on Venus instead of a VPS on Enterprise.
As I said in my original post, "They're totally up front about everything, very trustworthy, you know they will still be around in years to come. If a server goes down, they're normally on it in minutes.
Aussie Bob, being very personable on the forum and in support tickets gives it a very nice community feeling. With the exception of my problems with Steve, their support is good."
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| Posted by SecureAX, 01-19-2008, 07:42 PM | | Hi,
Looks like you were treated very well by Aussie Bob.
Yeah, I was quite surprised when he included the Migration fee from my previous VPS to them, charged in hourly basis.
Anyway, I'm quoting the original email from him to prove that I'm not embellishing my own story here:
If I'm not mistaken, they transferred around 60 accounts for me last time from my VPS to them, with root access on the VPS.
I've removed sensitive information like the amount he refunded me.
Anyway, the intention for me to bring this topic up in WHT is not because I am trying to demand more refund from him (as I mentioned, $$ isn't my main concern) but I seriously do hope my experience with them will help those who are shopping for reseller hosting account
Thanks.
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| Posted by ldcdc, 01-19-2008, 11:51 PM | | Only 3 months are in their records, with the month of December showing indeed rather extended downtime, but overall I see 99.907% uptime for the two months monitored in 2007, which isn't so bad. That though clearly varies with the expectations, and given the amount you've been paying, they might justly be on the higher end.
Or rather, shopping for VPS, if I read things right?
Last edited by ldcdc; 01-19-2008 at 11:56 PM.
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| Posted by layer0, 01-20-2008, 12:34 AM | | I'm rather confused by that myself.
enterprise doesn't appear to be a VPS node.
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| Posted by Tina J, 01-20-2008, 12:48 AM | | We always host our own website on a network other than any of our servers, so that customers can always reach us if there's a problem. Dotable's servers aren't in any of the datacenters that we use. Also, I've been with a few hosts over the years and I am *very* picky about the hosts I trust my website with.
That said, until recently, we had our main and support websites hosted with Dotable for quite awhile. I've dealt with Steve several times and always found him to be very direct and detailed in his responses. I don't want warm fuzzy rainbow helpdesk replies - I want to know what's going on and why. Steve always answered appropriately. There was one time that Steve made a minor mistake with our email and as soon as it was sorted out, he apologized and we all had a good laugh.
The only reason we're still not hosting with Dotable is because of their outgoing email limit (totally understandable) - and Steve/Sumith not understanding that "what solution can you offer me?" didn't mean "make the server allow me to send more emails", but "SELL ME A VPS!". Good sysadmins never make good salesmen.
Anyway, if we would have had a timely sales pitch, I have no doubt that we would still be hosting with them today. Top notch support.
--Tina
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| Posted by SecureAX, 01-20-2008, 08:40 AM | | No, I meant reseller hosting. I used their reseller hosting but not VPS
The uptime of 99.907% in 2007 isn't for the whole of 2007 as the VPS was started since July. Downtime of 0.093% within 6 months is equivalent to 0.093/100 * (6 months *30 days *24 hours) = 4.0176 hours, which is around 40 minutes of downtime per month.
Whether that amount of downtime is acceptable or not, I believe it all depends on the individual.
I admit I have very high expectation on Dotable simply because I enjoyed nothing but close to 100% uptime with my previous hosting at HTTPme (you can check Aviator server uptime) and also, before moving to Dotable, I enjoyed 100% uptime with a VPS managed by myself, for 13 months. Unfortunately, I cancelled my Hyperspin account when I moved to Dotable.
Anyway, if you compare Dotable's Reseller Hosting price to the other players in WHT, they aren't among the cheapest and so I believe it isn't too much to hope for reliable service from them.
No, I'm afraid enterprise is indeed a VPS. I was informed by Bob prior to be put on it and was convinced by Bob with the advantages of being hosted in VPS mainly in terms of reliability.
ps: The reason why I "downgraded" from VPS to Reseller Hosting is because initially I wanted to concentrate on my new commitment hence I gave my Reseller Hosting clients to Bob and used Dotable's Reseller Hosting service which doesn't put me on the hassle of managing my own server. Unfortunately, I made a very unwise decision as the amount of downtime I had with them gave me great impact on my clients.
Last edited by SecureAX; 01-20-2008 at 08:47 AM.
Reason: Added last line
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| Posted by catfished, 01-20-2008, 02:48 PM | | I don't need "warm fuzzy rainbow helpdesk replies" either but I don't need to be treated like I'm an idiot.
Like I said in my original post: "A bit pricey by today's standards but considering it's a reputable company and they don't grossly oversell, it's probably worth it for some people." Looking back at this whole affair today (almost 3 months since my review), I would probably recommend Dotable to most people except those that are technically challenged like myself.
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| Posted by Tina J, 01-20-2008, 03:45 PM | | Oh, my comment wasn't directed towards yours or meant to discredit you. I was just stating my experience. I know that different people can have vastly different experiences with the same host.
Hope I haven't jeopardized my pending status with you in 'the club'.
--Tina
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| Posted by catfished, 01-20-2008, 05:52 PM | | No problem Tina, your club status with me is fine.
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| Posted by Aussie Bob, 01-26-2008, 06:39 AM | | Sorry, totally missed this thread. I've been travelling a bit this last week.
Michael, sorry things didn't work out for you. We did have some issues with that server, but they're fully resolved now.
Regarding deducting the many hours spent migrating your 60+ sites over to the Dotable server, we do this to cover our time spent on migrations, (and on all the post migration issues too) should a client cancel and ask for a refund. I'm not going to be out of pocket by spending 5 hours on a migration, only to have the client cancel soon thereafter and expect a full refund. It's mentioned on our How to cancel page. We also deduct cc processing prices too.
Hope things are going well for you.
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| Posted by SecureAX, 01-26-2008, 01:32 PM | | Hi Bob,
Thanks.
I'm just wondering, if I didn't sign up for your service for one year, instead, I paid you monthly and I realised that your service is below my expectation hence I cancel my service with you. When this phenomenon happens, will you bill me that large sum of migration fee before you let me go away?
By the way, another thing that concerns a lot of people here is, is Enterprise server not a VPS?
Thank you.
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| Posted by Aussie Bob, 01-26-2008, 06:52 PM | | Then you wouldn't receive a refund as per our "Cancel your Dotable account" procedure -
No refund shall be given if we have spent time in migrating your domains over into your Dotable account. We won't spend several hours on migrating domains for you, only to have you cancel the account and request a full refund. Migrating domains is a time consuming act, and this voids any refund.
We specifically setup Enterprise as a VPS for you and your 2 reseller clients. You were thrilled with this setup, so not sure why you're claiming you didn't know Enterprise was virtualised.
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| Posted by Brian-de-vie, 01-26-2008, 10:36 PM | | I just wondered if anybody else had noticed about Dotable/Aussie Bob
So much Bigger than most ! - -
There small print / terms etc. are realy physicaly very large - nice.
Now peoples understanding of them, or there ease of comprehension is always going to be a matter of opinion, but at least you don't need a magnifying glass to read them.
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| Posted by SecureAX, 01-27-2008, 08:02 AM | | Hi,
I never said I did not know Enterprise is a VPS. If you read a few posts back, it was the Community Liasons here who want the clarification
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| Posted by Brian-de-vie, 01-27-2008, 09:08 AM | | The OP said:Language is great isn't it, just so easy to not know what people are actualy saying.
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| Posted by SecureAX, 01-27-2008, 01:08 PM | | Thanks for the highlight
As I said earlier, I just need the word from Bob to clear the Liasons' doubts
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| Posted by ldcdc, 01-27-2008, 02:28 PM | | No doubt, just a failure to understand. My English language abilities sometimes show their limits. That, and at times I can be quite dense.
Thanks to all your efforts, I have a clear picture of the situation now. Just for the record, my interest in the situation was personal, not official.
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| Posted by Aussie Bob, 01-27-2008, 10:29 PM | | Ah right, sorry, I must have missed that. Old age and all.
But seriously, what is a server? Is it just hardware or a combination of hardware and software, to deliver a product to an end user?
You could virtualise hardware and create smaller servers and each "node" is still a server. That's a big trend right now, virtualisation. Say you had some nice big chunky hardware, now instead of just loading your OS/Cpanel etc to that, you could virtualise that hardware and create 2 or 3 smaller servers, and thus creating a more insulatative platform for your clients, as compared to them all being on the one server.
However the insulation is not perfect, as one VPS "node" (server) can still bring down another server sharing the same hardware. This was the case with enterprise downtimes, which we resolved by moving one of the other VPS nodes to a full dedicated server by themselves.
Sure, it prices you more in licencing for each server, when compared to licencing for the 1 large server, but you could create more stable platforms for your clients using virtualisation in this manner. I predict virtualisation will become more and more common place.
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| Posted by SSHocker, 01-28-2008, 03:22 AM | | No predicition required, it's already happening
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| Posted by rois, 01-28-2008, 03:45 AM | | I have been using Dotable for just over 13 months and its been nothing but great friendly service (including Steve Gore) and great uptime. So I have not experienced anything negative though I am sure Steve/Bob/Dotable in general, will have their off days
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| Posted by tanfwc, 01-28-2008, 10:31 AM | | Bob, correct me if I am wrong. If you are talking about cPanel license, i believe a VPS license cost much more cheaper than a full server license. As for my experience, I still think that a full server is still much more stable than a VPS node. If your business model is to put your customer on a VPS instead of a full dedicated server where more resource can be used, then I do not have much to comment about.
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| Posted by Aussie Bob, 01-28-2008, 07:37 PM | | That is true, they are a little cheaper. But you have all the other licenses too, apart from cpanel. Then you have extra admin time in managing each server, when it comes to various upgrades etc. It adds up.
That's simply not true. It depends on a few factors there. A more stable and insulative platform could be less clients on smaller servers, virtualised, as compared to a lot of clients on a single server. It comes back to creating inventory and you can create excellent inventory by utilising the benefits of virtualisation technology.
It's not our business model, as we only have 2 servers that use a VPS as inventory, and one of those was setup especially for Michael and his 2 reseller clients. The rest of our servers are standard, but there is nothing wrong with virtualising hardware and creating smaller and more insultative servers with less clients on them, as a source for your general inventory.
So if you have a full server, you might have 60 clients on it, but if you virtualised that server into 3 smaller servers, you would have 20 clients setup on each server, and thus improving the insulative properties between those 60 clients. But like I said before, the insulation is not perfect, but it' still much better than all those 60 clients on the same server.
I think it's going to become common place in the hosting industry, as we try and improve the shared hosting experience for our customers. Virtualisation is one such method to achieve this.
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| Posted by SecureAX, 01-29-2008, 04:18 AM | | Hi Bob,
I can be wrong again but in fact cPanel & Fantastico VPS licences are more than 50% cheaper than the price for the license of dedicated server. Even RVSkin and RVSitebuilder have great costs for VPS. A rough estimate tells me that a complete set of these licences on a dedicated server is equivalent to the cost of licences on 3 VPSes, so I don't think it is more expensive in terms of licences.
Yes, you are right on the time and money required to manage separate guest nodes of the VPS. However, things like kernel upgrade is only performed on the host node. Managing a VPS takes a lot less effort than managing a dedicated server so when virtualization is concerned, the extra time to manage VPS doesn't play much important role in overall operation of the business I believe?
Last but not least, I believe it is not fair to compare with the number of hosted clients. The factor that affects the performance of a server, as everyone knows, is the activity of the hosted sites. Since reseller hosting you do not have direct control on your clients' hosted sites, assume that the reseller put an active site into his account.
Let's say both the dedicated server and VPS host the same active site, which receives high traffic on particular time of the day. The site would have more resources to use on dedicated server whereby in VPS, it would kill the VPS node easily. I'm not talking about constantly bursting the amount of resources that the server has, just a period of time in a day when it takes the visitor hits.
Would this analogy be more appropriate to compare the overall performance of VPS and Dedicated Server?
Thanks a lot
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| Posted by Aussie Bob, 01-29-2008, 04:50 AM | | If a site is killing a VPS, then it doesn't belong on a shared server. Simple as that. It would require its own server and if that server is built utilising virtualisation technology, that's ok too. Your definition of a server is too narrow. I've seen VPS's built to have 8GB RAM and lots of CPU and disk, so tell me that's not a server.
If you build your business to the point where you have many servers for your inventory, then we'll talk about the total cost of inventory management. You're only seeing a small part of the big picture.
But I digress. We wish you all the very best of success with your business. I hope the hosting industry is as good to you as it's been to me.
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| Posted by Woooo, 01-29-2008, 05:33 AM | | Last I checked vz kernel supported 4GB max RAM in SMP/PAE for a certain VM in node, may it was year ago.
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| Posted by Aussie Bob, 01-29-2008, 09:00 PM | | Well I might have the exact amount of RAM mixed up, but my point was just because a server has been built with virtualization technology, this does not limit its performance over a non virtualized server of the same specs.
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| Posted by FHDave, 01-29-2008, 10:16 PM | | We put 32 GB of memory on our nodes and they are fine. In order to get more than 4 GB, you need to use the Enterprise kernel if the kernel is 32 bit. The 64 bit kernel will address memory up to the OS limit.
Edit: sorry, I did not realize it was memory allocation per VE that you are talking about. Well, I have never tried making a VE with more than 2 GB memory. So I can't tell. I would be surprised if there is any problem with it. The problem you described may be related to the incorrect vz kernel loaded.
Last edited by FHDave; 01-29-2008 at 10:23 PM.
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| Posted by Outlaw Web Master, 01-29-2008, 11:00 PM | | IMHO mate...that's got to be the best way always.
I hate grey areas....it's always better to be explained in black and white, that way there's no confusion.
I'd be surprised if Aussies and NZ's told it in any other way.
Thanks for the review catfished.
owm
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