I've been using VSControl only for a short time, so this is only a review of the last 2 weeks.


If you didn't already know, VSControl allows you to create, edit, manage, and monitor virtual private servers using your web browser.


Functionality
It does what I would like to see a VPS control panel do, plus more.

Overall Rating
90/100

If you've never seen what VSControl looks like, here's some screen shots. I am sorry that I paint brushed out a lot of stuff, don't want my info/clients info out on the interwebz.


Administration:
http://grandioshost.com/imgs/vscontrol/PCB.jpg
http://grandioshost.com/imgs/vscontrol/admin_home.jpg
http://grandioshost.com/imgs/vscontrol/manage_backups.jpg
http://grandioshost.com/imgs/vscontrol/manage_ips.jpg
http://grandioshost.com/imgs/vscontrol/manage_plans.jpg
http://grandioshost.com/imgs/vscontrol/new_vps.jpg
http://grandioshost.com/imgs/vscontrol/node_health.jpg
http://grandioshost.com/imgs/vscontrol/node_health2.jpg
http://grandioshost.com/imgs/vscontrol/os_templates.jpg
http://grandioshost.com/imgs/vscontrol/traffic_log.jpg

Client's View:
http://grandioshost.com/imgs/vscontrol/vps_detail.jpg
http://grandioshost.com/imgs/vscontrol/action_log.jpg
http://grandioshost.com/imgs/vscontrol/client_home.jpg
http://grandioshost.com/imgs/vscontrol/client_monitoring.jpg
http://grandioshost.com/imgs/vscontrol/client_traffic.jpg
http://grandioshost.com/imgs/vscontrol/manage_account.jpg
http://grandioshost.com/imgs/vscontrol/powerpanel.jpg
http://grandioshost.com/imgs/vscontrol/traffic_log_overall.jpg

Misc:
http://grandioshost.com/imgs/vscontrol/admin_to_vps.jpg
http://grandioshost.com/imgs/vscontrol/login.jpg

Good design, After HyperVM issue and High cost Virtuzzo -- everyone expects some budget control panels to manage VPS solutions.

How is it pricing wise ?

<<snipped reference to removed post>>


Good design, After HyperVM issue and High cost Virtuzzo -- everyone expects some budget control panels to manage VPS solutions.

How is it pricing wise ?

The pricing right now is $39 per/month, but they have a 30% off coupon on their forum

Limitations? What limitations?

I might be wrong, but based on the screenshots that I have seen:

- 3 IPs per VPS max
- OS install based on templates (why not pull with yum or debootstrap?)
- The panel seems to be based on ONE NODE
- only one VPS per customer/admin
- There are plans, but you got to write by hand the params of a new VPS
- No customer registration form
- No expiration of VPSes
- No renewal managements
- No support tickets
- No billing
- No invoice
- etc.

The pricing right now is $39 per/month, but they have a 30% off coupon on their forum

THAT much, for SO FEW ? Good luck to the author for the sells when so many open source app do that for free... enomaly (in order not to talk about our own free software products) have been released as free software for YEARS with more features.

Thomas

- 3 IPs per VPS max That's only when creating them, you can add more at a later time, for example one of my VPS's has 10+ IPs

- OS install based on templates (why not pull with yum or debootstrap?) They're based on templates, just like every other control panel. VSControl sits ontop of Xen, it's not it's own Hypervisor

- The panel seems to be based on ONE NODEYup, it's only a letdown if you have tens of nodes.

- only one VPS per customer/admin Yup, only 1 VPS per/customer, I don't mind it though. Most customers don't have more than 1 VPS.

- There are plans, but you got to write by hand the params of a new VPSYou have to write 256mb ram, 20gb disk, 50gb transfer, it's not that hard.

- No customer registration form There is custom info, and I bet you could add more tabs to it if needed

- No expiration of VPSes When did anything have expiration of VPS', HyperVM, FluidVM, etc don't have that.

- No renewal managements I don't understand

- No support tickets You can create pages so they can submit tickets and feed it into WHMCS

- No billing WHMCS

- No invoice WHMCS

Limitations? What limitations?




The pricing right now is $39 per/month, but they have a 30% off coupon on their forum

Actually its $29 /mo before the coupon. And yes we do still have the 35% off introductory coupon available.

Thanks for the praise Jacob, we are excited about the future of this product as well.

I might be wrong, but based on the screenshots that I have seen:

- 3 IPs per VPS max
- OS install based on templates (why not pull with yum or debootstrap?)
- The panel seems to be based on ONE NODE
- only one VPS per customer/admin
- There are plans, but you got to write by hand the params of a new VPS
- No customer registration form
- No expiration of VPSes
- No renewal managements
- No support tickets
- No billing
- No invoice
- etc.

Thomas

My friend, thats not entirely accurate but you are welcome to demo or trial it. Its a vps manager not a client/billing/support center :). An upcoming whmcs module will take care of those other parts by utilizing the api.

- OS install based on templates (why not pull with yum or debootstrap?) They're based on templates, just like every other control panel. VSControl sits ontop of Xen, it's not it's own Hypervisor

Not like EVERY other panel. We do have the feature of pulling distributions with yum / debootstrap. I even took over maintenance of yum in Debian because we needed an up-to-date yum binary and the old maintainer was not doing his job:

http://qa.debian.org/developer.php?login=yumpackage@gplhost.com

- The panel seems to be based on ONE NODEYup, it's only a letdown if you have tens of nodes.

So, it's only a toy for one node, not a real panel for doing VPS business??? Exactly what hosting company will run on a single server?

- only one VPS per customer/admin Yup, only 1 VPS per/customer, I don't mind it though. Most customers don't have more than 1 VPS.

MANY of our customers have MANY VPSes.

- There are plans, but you got to write by hand the params of a new VPSYou have to write 256mb ram, 20gb disk, 50gb transfer, it's not that hard.

I didn't say it was hard, but then what's the point of having plans if it's not even used?

- No customer registration form There is custom info, and I bet you could add more tabs to it if needed

I was talking about a customer registration form, so they can register themself and use their VPS after registration. I didn't see any screenshot of that!

- No expiration of VPSes When did anything have expiration of VPS', HyperVM, FluidVM, etc don't have that.

WHAT ??? None of them are capable of managing such simple thing as the expiration date of a VPS ??? Unbelievable.

- No renewal managements I don't understand

After a period, your customers will have to renew their contracts, no?

- No support tickets You can create pages so they can submit tickets and feed it into WHMCS
- No billing WHMCS
- No invoice WHMCS

What's the point of having a control panel if it does nearly nothing, and all is handled by WHCMS ? Why selling it that expensive then ? Plus WHCMS doesn't even know what VAT is, so it's not adapted to any country that has VAT on internet services (unless newer versions of WHCMS evolved and can handle it...).

So, basically, I was right to all my assumptions...

Thomas

Not like EVERY other panel. We do have the feature of pulling distributions with yum / debootstrap. I even took over maintenance of yum in Debian because we needed an up-to-date yum binary and the old maintainer was not doing his job:

http://qa.debian.org/developer.php?login=yumpackage@gplhost.com

Yes, you rock!



So, it's only a toy for one node, not a real panel for doing VPS business??? Exactly what hosting company will run on a single server?

Your just being disparaging and offensive now. Its unclear how you have your own servers setup but we'd be happy to show you how its done. Cpanel is installed on single servers all over the world, would you classify it as a "toy". other systems can make perfect use of the api to manage an unlimited number of systems.


MANY of our customers have MANY VPSes.

Super, so do ours. :)



I didn't say it was hard, but then what's the point of having plans if it's not even used?


I was talking about a customer registration form, so they can register themself and use their VPS after registration. I didn't see any screenshot of that!

Nor did you ask for one my friend, nevertheless this is not a billing system, we aren't reinventing the wheel here. Use the api and tie into whatever system you want for automated everything.



WHAT ??? None of them are capable of managing such simple thing as the expiration date of a VPS ??? Unbelievable.


After a period, your customers will have to renew their contracts, no?

Again, with all due respect sir, its not a billing system. It is a vps management system.



What's the point of having a control panel if it does nearly nothing, and all is handled by WHCMS ? Why selling it that expensive then ? Plus WHCMS doesn't even know what VAT is, so it's not adapted to any country that has VAT on internet services (unless newer versions of WHCMS evolved and can handle it...).

So, basically, I was right to all my assumptions...

Thomas

VAT? Whats that got to do with a xen vps management system?

Thomas, I'm not going to be drawn into an argument. Cpanel runs on one server at a time, you just clearly aren't getting it and out to start something I have no interest in entertaining. You are being argumentative and offensive now. Good luck with your own panel. Take care

The panel looks nice, I'm not sure why GPLHost is complaining about it so much. It does 90% of the things most hosts require. Some people want a minimalist panel, which uses very little resources.

Hell... we use WebVZ and it's more than enough for us and our clients.

The panel looks nice, I'm not sure why GPLHost is complaining about it so much.The only reason I can think of is he is jealous of the paid products being more successful than his...

It does 90% of the things most hosts require.:agree:

How could you check the success of one commercial control panel? It's more easy to check open source things. Just see the number of registered users in our forum, that I guess is representing not more than 10% of the user base. That number correlates with what I see in the debian package popularity contest (according to Debian, 1 to 5% of Debian users are installing and agree to the popcon). These numbers are public and easy to check. It shows that we have already tens of thousands of users. So, as far as popularity, we are fine, thanks.

No, I'm trying to get ideas here, and see what people think, why they like this or that panel, and understand why people would pay 30 USD per month for a fraction of the features you can have for free elsewhere, including the source code (and not especially with our product, this is more in general, I mentioned enomalism which is quite a good product as well). I'm NOT complaining.

Thomas

Thomas, I've used your product and think it's great. My one wish is that you would release the VPS hosting package as a stand-alone product, so I wouldn't have to install the full DTC Web Hosting control panel in order to have a Xen hosting panel.

The other thing that I'd appreciate would be an easy way to install from templates, as there are times I'd rather not bootstrap.

I do understand Subigo's statement that some people prefer a more minimalistic panel, but I'm amazed at how much people will pay for that, rather than use a full-featured open source product and just put up with the fact that it has more features than they will use.

Thomas, I've used your product and think it's great. My one wish is that you would release the VPS hosting package as a stand-alone product, so I wouldn't have to install the full DTC Web Hosting control panel in order to have a Xen hosting panel.

Thanks. If by "I wouldn't have to install the full DTC Web Hosting control panel" you mean not having to install all dependencies, we have a stripped-down flavor where you don't even need a mail system to work, it's called dtc-core (in both Debian and CentOS).

Now, removing the non-VPS feature would be too hard, and maybe a useless effort. I think it's more easy to let people not use the features for shared hosting if they don't need it, so we can keep only a single product. After all, the final users wont even see it, so it's not a concern for them at least. Also, I have seen some users getting confused about using the same software for different usage, and even sending support tickets in their own VPS instance and not on the VPS controler server, which of course, never reaches us. That is a true concern, and until now, it's unclear in my mind how to fix this (maybe have a feature to switch off support tickets by default?).

The other thing that I'd appreciate would be an easy way to install from templates, as there are times I'd rather not bootstrap.

We have this also for: Gentoo, Fedora, Ubuntu... Not for Debian and CentOS, as I thought it was a bit silly and so much less convenient (as anyway, you can use approx to cache all Debian packages so they are downloaded only once, and that it should be fairly easy to implement a cache for yum as well).

I do understand Subigo's statement that some people prefer a more minimalistic panel, but I'm amazed at how much people will pay for that, rather than use a full-featured open source product and just put up with the fact that it has more features than they will use.

That was exactly what I was saying, I'm happy that my words are backed-up by a user.

Thomas

P.S: I hope this post wont be remove and I wont get 10 warning points again. This forum rules are really unclear. It seems I can't tell our product is good, but it's ok to discuss about it and it's features...