Ask Slashdot: Best Inexpensive VPS Provider?

David Greene writes "After many years of waiting for my provider to upgrade DSL service from the measly 1.5 Mbps I have now, I've decided to go another route. Unfortunately, no other provider in the area (Twin Cities) offers static IPs and permission to run servers. I am looking for a VPS solution to host the public parts of my personal site. What can the Slashdot community recommend as a good, inexpensive VPS provider for personal use? This will mainly be hosting a blog and a couple of Free Software projects (wikis, git repositories, etc.). I would prefer something with KVM so I can manage my own OS install but I am open to other options. Root shell access is essential."

Comments

FDC Servers

[InterestingFella]

I can't but recommend FDC servers. I've used them off and on since 2008. I've also tried many others but there's always been something wrong with them. Never had problems with FDC tho. They also give unlimited bandwidth so you don't need to worry about extra costs, and they have three datacenters. Two in US (Chicago and Denver) and one in EU (Czech). Servers are also quickly set up. They're an established company too. I've had a few porn sites hosted there, and anyone in the industry knows how demanding those can be on hardware and bandwidth. Never had any problems with FDC tho. Their VPS plans start at $9/month which is hard to beat. Even shitty providers have higher price.

I would avoid any unknown company. While there most likely are many good ones that are less known, it's a hit or miss. Sometimes they just close, either because it was unprofitable for them or just for no reason. There's many VPS providers who are just run by some guy, who leases the servers from DC's. So go with established company that has their own datacenters and years of experience. You save lots of headache.

Linode

[Anonymous Coward]

Been very happy with Linode and PV-GRUB (PV-GRUB allows Xen guests to boot their own custom kernel)

http://www.linode.com/
http://www.linode.com/wiki/index.php/PV-GRUB

for 20$ per month
RAM 512MB
Storage 20GB
Transfer 200GB

Re:Linode

[smed]

I too have been very happy with Linode.
Currently I manage about a dozen Linodes for various clients and the performance and support have exceeded my expectations by a long-shot.
On occasion when there was a minor problem, Linode support staff contacted me quickly with instructions and pointers to documentation for handling the issues.
Performance is much better than what you might expect by using the memory/disk-space metrics for each server plan.
Linode support is excellent. The Linode Library has the best documentation, they have how-to docs for most common projects and they are updated regularly and the commentary is also very helpful. And dont forget the forums - if you're having an issue or need to figure out how to do something - most likely someone has written about it in the forums. You can extract some very valuable information for troubleshooting and project planning in the forums.
And last but not least - the IRC channel is staffed by Linode support personnel and lots of really helpful volunteers. The community is awesome and friendly and helpful to-boot.
Linode's got my vote and my continued business.

linode

[Aighearach]

linode is by far the best, it is not even close.

They don't over-sell (far from it!), the service is great, uptime is nearly perfect, excellent tools like remote shell over https.

You're asking in the wrong place

[afabbro]

You should be asking on WHT, which is the best-known forum for discussing web hosting, VPS, and dedicated servers.

I would echo the linode suggestion, particularly if it's the first VPS you've ever used. However, they are not KVM. If you want KVM, try 6sync. Another fine choice is BuyVM, though you have to wait until they have stock, which is a minor media event.

I would ignore the suggestions to look at lowendbox, unless you are willing to trade price for stability (which is not always a bad tradeoff, just be sure to do it consciously)

Danger, Will Robinson

[Zocalo]

I guess you don't use them for outbound email since FDC Servers has a terrible reputation for hosting spammers and having a completely non-responsive abuse department. There are more than a few members of anti-spam lists that advocate a block on sight policy for SMTP as far as FDC are concerned, and I know some that kill them for web as well due to hosted malware.

Of course, that may or may not be an issue for a given individual since it depends on what you want the server for, but I'd strongly recommend a few search queries for "$provider" in connection with "abuse", "spam" and "malware", etc. If they have an entry on Spamhaus, or lots of IPs listed in DNSBLs or URIBLs, then that's generally a bad sign too.

Linode

[DRichardHipp]

I've been running http://www.sqlite.org/ on Linode since 2004. They've been great. Highly recommended.

i moved to host chopper, never looked back

[decora]

after trying FDC, Slicehost, Swvps, & Linode, i finally found a hosting solution that had everything I needed for a good price.

http://hostchopper.com/

Re:i moved to host chopper, never looked back

[KazW]

after trying FDC, Slicehost, Swvps, & Linode, i finally found a hosting solution that had everything I needed for a good price.

http://hostchopper.com/

A publicly posted support ticket they show one their site:

HOLY SHIT... COULD YOUR ENGLISH BE ANY MORE BROKEN? IT REMINDS ME OF A VENTRILOQUIST'S DUMMY AFTER FALLING DOWN ABOUT 12 FLIGHTS OF STAIRS AND THEN BEING CRUSHED IN THE ASS-END OF A GARBAGE TRUCK! YOU COULD USE A PASSROD WHERE THE SUN DON'T SHINE! I'LL HAVE TANGO CONTACT YOU, HE'S INTO SODOMY AND OTHER KINKY SHIT. -NOVEMBER CHIEF EXECUTIVE WIZARD SERIOUS MASTURBATOR HOSTCHOPPER.COM

"Server: wizardfucker.hostchopper.com"

Charlie Sheen started a hosting company?

This hosting company is a good joke, I have mod points but couldn't mod you 'funny' since I wanted to post this, too bad.

P.S. All kidding aside, anyone willing to pay this "company" for services of any type would be brain dead.