I mentioned just before Christmas, that my hosting company support has been getting worse and worse.<\/p>\n
I’ve looked at moving a few times over the last eighteen months, but now I’ve decided that it has to happen.<\/p>\n
Since I’m moving, I’m also going to take the opportunity to create a better structure.<\/p>\n
This means I want a web server and a database server, which allows me to optimise each for their specific function and provides better security.<\/p>\n
I will also create another mail server. Currently I use a small one with my current hosting, a managed one (through a great email consultant), and Amazon SES.<\/p>\n
However, I can’t use Amazon SES for our gambling emails as they don’t like them.<\/p>\n
So why another one?<\/p>\n
Because it’s a good idea when emailing is your primary source of income, to have a few delivery servers for your emails. It means if one goes down you still have backups \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n
Anyhoo, the choices for hosting are…<\/p>\n
1) Amazon AWS
\n2) Liquid Web Private Cloud
\n3) Unmanaged Dedicated Server from Hetzner<\/p>\n
I’ve played with Amazon AWS, I’ve used LiquidWeb in the past and I’ve been recommended (and know someone using) Hetzner.<\/p>\n
I’ve been mulling over these options for the last few days.<\/p>\n
Amazon AWS is very tempting, the ability to auto-scale and keep everything separate is appealing.<\/p>\n
However… it’s also very complicated, will require a lot of managing (which will cost) and on price\/power comparison it’s by no way the cheapest. I also understand that the auto-scaling isn’t quite as automatic as it sounds and the companies that do it successfully have to design their code and structure specifically to use Amazon’s platform.<\/p>\n
LiquidWeb provide a private cloud. This is essentially a dedicated server which you can create your own virtual servers on. You can then split the power of the dedicated server up amongst your virtual servers.<\/p>\n
Pretty neat.<\/p>\n
Because it’s a cloud based platform, if one of your virtual servers is under-powered you can move it out onto a dedicated cloud server.<\/p>\n
Oh yeah, and it’s managed \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n
The server I would need to start with would be $389 per month, plus backup costs. And, to be honest, I’m not sure it will be powerful enough once split.<\/p>\n
Again, like Amazon AWS, I like the idea, but it seems like it could end up costing me more than I’m paying currently, and part of the plan is to reduce costs.<\/p>\n
So… it looks like I’m going to end up with two servers at Hetzner.<\/p>\n
I’ve been looking at their pricing, and for about $70 I can get a server that’s pretty much equivalent to the LiquidWeb server.<\/p>\n
Of course, that’s unmanaged, so I’ll have a $29 management fee and a $20 cPanel fee on top, bringing to the total $119.<\/p>\n
Still… that means I can get two of those, one for a web server and one for a database server, and still be paying $151 less per month than one equivalent server at LiquidWeb, which would need to then have it’s resources split up!<\/p>\n
In fact, I don’t think I need quite that much power for my web server, so I may reduce that a bit lower and increase the RAM on the database server.<\/p>\n
Overall this is going to be an interesting process. Having been with my current hosting for around eight years, it’s a big move, and slightly terrifying.<\/p>\n
Hold you’re breath, and I’ll keep you posted.<\/p>\n
Ciao,<\/p>\n
Michael<\/p>\n
P.S. Oh… I’ll probably use Amazon AWS for an mail server because I know there’s no gambling restrictions on their EC2 platform for the mail that goes out. This means you won’t be shut down, but your mailing reputation is in your hands.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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