Okay, without all the gruelling history about why I want to move to a VPS provider I'm putting this out here. Affordability, stablity and speed are the key factors. So far it's down to slicehost.com and linode.com with hotdrupal.com still in consideration. I don't want to go to an oversubscribed VPS and wind up paying more than I do or my current shared hosting plan and get the same response time from an oversubscribed virtual. Since I'm a sysadmin I'm not worried about having to install and set up my own server, but I really want to see how the various providers perform with real working drupal installations.

So, will some of you be kind enough to share some of your sites and hosts here? I know that's getting somewhat personal but I'd like to take some of them for a test drive just to see how the different hosts perform.

I know, it's a bit of an odd request, but thanks for those of you that will share and if you don't I'll understand.

Specifically I'm looking at the 360 plan, so if anyone cares to share their site on that plan I'd love to take it for a test drive, especially if you are running drupal and/or SMF.

Thanks,

- NP -

I don't use Drupal, but since you're an experienced sysadmin, have you considered just setting up a test Linode with your specific environment (even to the point of duplicated what you can from your current shared hosting) and doing some real world testing? It would probably be more accurate a test than using data from other sites though you could also incorporate data you may get that way.

If you do it within the 7 day trial period it's completely risk free, but even past that point, if you cancel, you'll get a refund pro-rated for the remainder of the month so your out of pocket for the test would be minimal.

For myself, that's essentially how I did some trials, and I had a Linode running with a mirror of my database and applications in less than an hour of my first filling in the Linode subscription form.

-- David

I may do that. It's a good suggestion. Of course I'll have to figure out how to test it out. I'm currently with a very capable shared hosting provider (hostmonster) however the limitations with shared providers are ones that I don't really want to deal with.

I'd still like to test drive an up and running site or to just to get a feel for what linode performs like. I've done it with a couple of at slice host and they perform quite well. I'm expecting the same here, but I'm still the guy in the lot kicking the tires and looking in the windows at the moment.

If you browse through the forums, you'll find some regular posters who post links to their sites.

You'll also probably run across a thread or two (or more) about performance. I haven't completely moved my sites here yet (I'm slow), but I've been very happy with the performance here.

My decision to join Linode over Slicehost was based on:
price (more bang for your buck)
community (Linode's community seems to be a bit higher on the geek scale)

They also have a presence in 4 data centers across the U.S. where Slicehost is in 2.

Slicehost is also now owned by a huge corporation, not just a big company, but a huge publicly traded company. Publicly traded companies are owned and driven by their stock-holders, not their customers.

This could improve Slicehost, or this could degrade Slicehost, or make it disappear and slowly swallowed up into some "new" Rackspace offering. In my industry, I've seen huge, international conglomerates buy up private companies for their name and product. Every single time this has happened, they've taken a quality product and turned it from a product that independent retailers would carry, ruined the product and moved into the mass market grocery stores. That right there was pretty much reason number 1 why I decided against Slicehost.

However, Slicehost does (currently) have better documentation for tutorials and such. Though it appears Linode is going to be working on that since they've just hired a new technical writer:
http://blog.linode.com/2009/06/16/linod ... new-hires/

With some of the hints dropped and the ways some of my questions have been answered by Linode staffers, it appears there are some great changes coming down the pipe.

Last time I checked, Slicehost was 64-bit only, whereas Linode has both 32-bit and 64-bit Linuxes available. When I have a lot of RAM, 64-bit performs better. But when I have less than a GB to play with, I'd go with 32-bit any day.

The other difference I've often seen in these forums is that Slicehost uses RAID 10 whereas in Linode it's RAID 1. But according to what the owner (caker) posted in these forums yesterday, Linode is also using RAID 10 on newer hosts.

Ah, yes forgot about that. 32bit was the other reason I choose Linode and the forum software Slicehost is using is just absolutely abysmal if you want to actually make use of them. Getting back to the support and community.

nightmarepatrol, you can check out the following thread for some sites that are hosted on Linode.

http://www.linode.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=2967

I have been here since early this year.

I have filed three support tickets. They have all been addressed in less than an hour. They always follow up at a later time to insure satisfaction.

My disk space availability was increased at no cost since my original purchase.

Speed and response of my server are as good as a quality dedicated server.

The control console is the best I have ever seen.

Give Linode a try. I don't believe you can go wrong.

Jeff

Been using multisite Drupal on Linode for going on a year now, best service I've ever had the pleasure of being with.

1. The "few" support tickets I've opened with them have been addressed quickly with always a follow up.

2. Simple, smooth upgrades to a new host "if" you need them. I mean just a simple reboot to move to a new server, how easier can you get?

3. Excellent reliability and stable

4. Outstanding console for configuring your VPS

5. I boot strapped Gentoo for my Linode, I've yet to see a VPS provider that allows you this much control

Bottom line you cannot go wrong with Linode

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