Results tagged “wiredtree” from Ye Olde Rad Blog III

WiredTree VPS Plans: 256-MB + 512-MB RAM

Today I paid for our second month of hosting at our new web host .. WiredTree (using half the refund I received from cancelling my annual subscription with Lunarpages).

During our first month of service, I've been closely monitoring resource usage .. at our new VPS server. So I have a good idea where we stand.

Everything in the world of Virtual Privates Servers, I learned, boils down to memory usage (RAM). Our hosting plan dedicates 384-MB to the site. (256-MB standard plan, plus a 128-MB upgrade).

If we exceed 384-MB, we would have to purcha$e more memory .. at a rate of $7.50/month per additional 64-MB RAM.

Here's what I found » the highest amount of RAM we've used thus far is 366-MB (see here), which equals 95% of our allowable limit. Kinda close, but this was only a short-term transient (1 hour).

Our highest *sustained* memory use is ~325-MB (lasting a few days), so that number might be more meaningful (85% max). Our average memory use tends to be in the range of 270-to-290 MB (75%)...

.. which is actually pretty comfortable. And it's not uncommon, following a reboot, for our usage to drop down to the 220-240 area, tho these low numbers tend to creep up over time (as Apache caches more pages).

WiredTree Virtual Private Servers (VPS)Biggest problem I had moving the site (to our new VPS server) .. was the blog not working.

Readers could still view pages/entries, but the blog-interface (which allows me to create new entries) would not load.

Instead of launching the interface, the master script-file (mt.cgi) prompted a *download*. ("Would you like to download, open or cancel?")

That suk'ed .. cuz I make much use of the blog .. to help keep the home-page lean-n-mean.

(Tho I create these entries in Dreamweaver, cuz it's a far superior tool to what you find in the MT interface, far as web page creation goes. Then I copy-n-paste into MT. That's why the blog entries always come after you see/read it on the home page.)

Normally I have a plenty of tools in my Troubleshooting bag-of-tricks, but this problem left me scratching my head.

I'd never seen this type of behavior. And neither had anyone at the Movable Type forums. (I use the new Open Source version of Movable Type » v4.1.)

Not being able to use the blog was a major bummer. Fortunately, I found an article that offered a solution .. even tho it appeared to address a different problem.

First thing I did after moving the site to a new server is .. find out if the move was really necessary.

WiredTree VPS Plans: 256 & 512-MB RAM

You'll recall that Lunarpages support told me the site used too many resources to qualify for their VPS plan, and that I needed a dedicate server (something I found hard to believe).

So now that we are here, I've been pinging the sppt techs at WiredTree, asking them exactly what resources we're using.

You can find all the gory details here » Resource Usage at New VPS Server .. but they basically said our CPU usage is "minimal."

Surprisingly however, they also said our allotment of memory would've already been exceeded .. had it not been for the free 128-MB RAM upgrade ( .. for which I found a coupon).

WiredTree offers two VPS plans. One comes with 256-MB ($49/mo), the other 512-MB ($89/mo). So it seems we already exceed the 256 .. currently using 270-MB, and the specs of our current plan (with 384-MB dedicated memory) are half-way between the 256 and 512-MB VPS plans.

WT offers incremental memory upgrades at a rate of $7.50/mo per 64-MB. So it seems my (free) 128-MB upgrade is worth $15/mo. Plus the coupon also provides a 10% discount .. equal to $5/mo. So the coupon is worth $20/mo (total) .. without which we'd be paying $65/mo.

Welcome to Chicago! .. "the Windy city." If you can read these words, you are resolving to the NEW server.

Chicago - Radified's new homeMy registrar says it's normal for locations to go back and forth between old and new servers for the first 48 hours.

This is Radified's first venture into the world of VPS hosting. We've always used Shared hosting before (way cheaper). VPS is definitely a step up in the web world.

I changed DNS pointers at 2:30 PM (Tuesday afternoon). My registrar is located down in San Diego, so I think the closer you are to San Diego, the faster you'll resolve to the new server. (Not sure if that's how it works, tho.)

The site was backed-up (at OLD server) at 8AM (Tuesday). So any posts made between then and now are lost.

I feel good about the move, having done considerable research, and getting everything I wanted.

Moving the Site Today to New VPS Server

|

Moving the site today .. to our new server (physically-located downtown Chicago). You can read some of the details in this thread here » Heads up - Preparing to move the site

Allied Moving TruckThis is the final entry I will make at the old server. It will take a day or so for the new DNS to resolve. When I'm set up at the new server, I'll add a note to this page indicating so.

This is currently the *NEW* server. It's 7:30 AM Pacific time right now. By tonight, hopefully, we should be done moving.

I'm on the steeper slopes of the learning curve, so it may take longer than expected. They sent me lots of "New account" PDFs to read ("Getting Started"). I stayed up 'til midnight, last night. Then my eyeballs started falling out, and I passed out (with the laptop still on my lap).

WiredTree VPS Web Hosting, based in ChicagoBeen reading so much about VPS servers that my dang eyeball fell out. Hate it when that happens.

Been learning new words like Xen and OpenVZ. I could totally write a Rad guide to VPS.

For example, here's a great post about how to move the site from Shared server (where we are now) to VPS.

First thing that needs to be answered is » Managed or unManaged? For noobies like me, with no Linux admin experience, they recommend a Managed VPS.

All things being equal (disk space, memory, bandwidth, etc) a Managed VPS cost about double what you pay for unManaged.

For example, the unManaged Link-3 plan at VPSlink that comes with 10-GB disk space + 256-MB RAM costs $25/month. The same plan (10 + 256) from Spry is fully managed. It costs $50/month. ($45 if you pay for 3 months.) Both are located in Seattle, part of the same company, and probably the most popular VPS host.

Tags

Find recent content on the main index or look in the archives to find all content.