Hi everyone,
I'm quite new to Linux and looking to host with Linode as I have heard many good things.

One question I have is what spec I need. I have a PHP/MySQL application I need to host. It will probably will have no more than 200-500 users a day, with each of them running several searches, although these need to be quick (around 1-2 sec max). They are only single table queries on around 200,000 records, with some full text searches.

Its a bit of a push on the budget to go to 4GB so do people think something less than that would work?

Also is it just a couple of clicks to upgrade my VPS to add more memory if I find I need it?

A properly configured 512 should have no problem with that load.

I don't know - having almost 1 visitor per 172 seconds is a pretty ginormous load.

Best start out with a 512M system and then scale up (it's very easy) if and when it's needed.



//my apologies to the Linode sales manager who is probably pulling his hair out yelling "no you morons, tell him he needs the 4G product!!!"//

I can't say which linode will fit best for you, but linode 512 is a good start.

From linode manager you can upgrade quickly:

Hi eknow

As others have said go for the 512MB option and upgrade if you notice a problem, however I think you'll be very impressed with the speed of Linode - even their 512MB plans rock!

It's very easy to scale a linode up. It just takes a few minutes (It took 20-30 for the linodes I scaled from 768 to 512). When you don't know how much RAM you need, it's always best to start with the small one, tweak it properly, and then go from there.

And the tweaking part is especially important. The default configuration of Apache can gobble gigabytes of RAM without being any more efficient for a given workload than a configuration that uses a few hundred megs.