I recently switched from a web hosting plan with IX Web Hosting to a Virtual Private Server (VPS) plan with Rose Hosting.
I had the “Business Plus” plan with IX Web Hosting for 2 years. The service stability was always a little spotty, but the price-benefit ratio was acceptable for most of my time with them. My plan was set to expire, and the site’s performance and stability were becoming noticeably worse, so I decided to check out other options.
Beyond the degradation of stability and performance on IX Web Hosting, I found that I had trouble accessing files whenever they were generated by the web server processes. My user owned the directory structure, but backups and file uploads were owned by the web server user. Due to this, I had issues with deleting files and/or changing file permissions. To work around the issue, I had to write a PHP script that would execute as the web server owner to delete files.
Considering the limitations of a web hosting provider, I decided I would rather have full control over the services by having a dedicated or virtual private server. Because this site is not exactly “critical” to anyone, I concentrated my search based on price rather than uptime. I ruled out a dedicated server based on the higher cost, leaving me with Linux virtual private servers.
The main open source virtual environments offered on Linux at this time are OpenVZ and Xen. OpenVZ and Xen are different but not different enough for me to pick one over the other. I continued my search primarily on provider reviews and price points. The Debian Wiki site offered a list of Linux VPS hosting providers, and I started looking at the plans that several of the providers offered. I was leaning toward using VPSLink when I came across the Rose Hosting virtual server specials. The prices seemed too good to be true, but after searching for reviews, the provider seemed legitimate. They may not be as big or as stable as some of the other providers, but the price is right for a blog like mine.
I ordered the Rose Hosting service late night on a weekend, and I did not receive an email reply providing my connection information. I contacted the provider’s support personnel via email and a chat window. It turned out that their email had been marked as spam by Gmail. After pulling it out of my spam folder, things have been going well.
I moved my MySQL database and website over to the Rose Hosting server and reconfigured my DNS entry. The best thing is that I can now monitor the server’s performance and uptime using all the basic Linux utilities. As of this time, the site has gone down once for 30 minutes as a result of a server outage. I did not inquire with support as to the cause, but the site has been stable otherwise.
If anyone is interested in having a cheap virtual private server for development or fun, I recommend Rose Hosting. I have only been with them for a month, so if my recommendation changes, I will post an update.