Hi, I've trialed some cheaper VPS's elsewhere after finding Linode a bit too expensive for my budget. However, I've found that some VPS hosts suspends accounts for prolonged CPU spikes. It may be a coincidence, but the two which appeared to do this were OpenVZ based (which I believe is not true virtualization?). So, I'm thinking of coming back.

My VPS usage isn't CPU intensive, although I do occasionally use ffmpeg to convert some personal videos to .flv, etc - which may produce a long-ish CPU spike for large videos.

But, generally speaking, is it possible to use too much CPU on Linode from a AUP point of view? Or can we use the maximum of our fair share within each node? Is "nice" the way to go for CPU intensive things, or can we put the pedal to the metal?

Richard

UPDATE: I found this in the TOS under "Prohibited Usage":



Can someone define "excessive CPU cycles"?

I suppose running something like BOINC would count. I've got some cpu heavy applications running and I've never had a problem. Probably the best thing to do is contact support and ask them.

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I update my gentoo system once a week, and that means compiling for anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours of 3 x 100% CPU usage, not to mention hitting the disk pretty hard. Other than the automatic notifier emails from linode (which are very careful to explain it is not a complaint) I've not heard a peep from linode about it being a problem in all the years I've been here.

I think your CPU spikes will be fine as long as you are doing something useful and aren't doing anything stupid to saturate the CPU all the time.

There are users who pretty much max out all their CPU cores 24/7, like zunzun. As long as it's legitimate usage (and not something stupid like trying to run folding@home or something), Linode lets you use however much CPU as you need.

My site's CPU usage is heavy, but not THAT heavy. Well, not *usually* that heavy, anyway.

Take a look for yourself: http://zunzun.com

James (my wife's Burmese nickname is zunzun)

For those who are unfamiliar with measuring server load, this is from James' own pages:
(At the time of this post)

http://zunzun.com/

Server Load

ZunZun.com is hosted on Linode 1536 Xen 4-core virtual server.

Load < 4 means the server cores are running with a light load.
Load = 4 means the server cores each average 100% CPU with a single user.
Load > 4 means the server cores each average 100% CPU with multiple users.


Server load average for the past 1 minute:   4.39
Server load average for the past 5 minutes:  4.76
Server load average for the past 15 minutes: 5.28

So pretty much full out
But seriously, that's pretty normal at Linode, so I wouldn't worry.

Site load is usually highest on weekdays when busineses and schools are open, drops during holidays in North America and Europe, and lowest on weekends. The site is rather useless for entertainment purposes, and it makes sense to me that CPU load is heaviest when people are at work or school. I have seen load as high as twenty, but that is exremely rare. I also multiprocessor parallel program the core code and renice the most cpu-intensive activities.

James

Your linode has access to at most 4 cores, and linode hosts have at least 8 cores, so it's impossible for a single linode to seriously impact the CPU performance of a host. As such, Linode doesn't care if you max out your CPUs 24/7. If two users on the same box are doing this and somebody complains, they may require that your linode be migrated to another physical box to spread the load, but that's the worst that would happen.

EDIT: zunzun: Would not your application be well suited to horizontal scaling over multiple linodes? Or is it a cost issue?

This is literally a matter of life or death, because if I spend any more money on it my wife will kill me.

James