Hi there, I struggle with some questions and this place seems to be the right one to ask them. What advantages and disadvantages has cloud VPS hosting (with dedicated resources: CPU, Ram) when compared to 100% dedicated? And what about data security when hosting at VPS with cloud storage. Isn't dedicated better for data safety (whole hdd mine and only mine)? And also is cloud VPS good for hosting a forum, or I will get better performance with dedicated.

Thank you in advance for any suggestions.

Here is a small definition of Cloud Hosting :
Cloud web hosting is a term generally used to describe any web hosting that makes use of a network of servers to simultaneously transfer data through a network of sites without any noticeable limits. The hosting company programs a network of servers to work in unison to provide server resources to your site with ease. With cloud hosting, you do not have to worry about the limitations of one web server. You can even set up your own computing network if you have access to the software configuration of several dedicated servers but this is recommended only if you are an advanced user. The billing standard is usually on a per usage basis meaning that you would only be allocated a specific amount of server resources. If you use additional resources, you would be charged based on how much you used. As a result of the billing system, you only have to pay for what you use and there is no need to worry about having too many unnecessary server resources. Cloud hosting is only recommended if you are in need of a robust hosting for your site.
So, the advantages of cloud compared to 100 % dedicated are :
- You use the resources you need. You can adjust them without shutting down your server.
- When you have unused resources, you will not need to pay for them.
- The cloud server is a virtual server using resources of multiple machines. In result, if a machine comes down, your website will be still up and running.
So, when it is 100 % dedicated, you have the following problems :
- If you take a more performant server than you need, you will have to pay for unused resources.
- If you want to upgrade your server RAM or HD, you will need to shut down the server, open it and add memory (operation done by the datacenter, but need to take your website and mail offline for at lease 30 minutes).
- If there is a problem with the HD, or a service, your website (and other services probably) becomes unavailable.
- Finally, the 100% dedicated costs more than cloud hosting.

Both are great solutions and both have their advantages. I'll let someone else take a stab at the advantages of dedicated servers.

I think the biggest advantage of VPS Cloud hosting is the instant scalability and flexibility it can provide. If you are just starting a hosting forum you can't go wrong either way. You might save a little more money if you decide to start on a VPS Cloud so that you can scale your resources more easily with your business needs. Some cloud providers offer great redundancy and fail-over capabilities in their cloud environment.

Finally, the 100% dedicated costs more than cloud hosting.


I think this needs to be looked at in a more differentiated way.

For example traffic is mostly cheaper with dedicated servers.

I think this needs to be looked at in a more differentiated way.

For example traffic is mostly cheaper with dedicated servers.

Yes, but is not a big advantage since the most web hosts do not metter the traffic between servers in the same cloud. They only metter and limit the outgoing traffic to visitors and external servers.

Hi there, I struggle with some questions and this place seems to be the right one to ask them. What advantages and disadvantages has cloud VPS hosting (with dedicated resources: CPU, Ram) when compared to 100% dedicated? And what about data security when hosting at VPS with cloud storage. Isn't dedicated better for data safety (whole hdd mine and only mine)? And also is cloud VPS good for hosting a forum, or I will get better performance with dedicated.

Thank you in advance for any suggestions.

If you asked me a few months ago, I'd still say Dedicated has some advantages. Today, Cloud is gone above and beyond my expectations and does everything you need and more.

Dedicated resources? It's all relative. You can have an entire server's worth of resources in Cloud. Look at the specs.. compare apples to apples. Ie: Nehalem vs Nehalem processor's. One technology may or may not be faster but that is mostly going to be dependent on what the technology is using.

Security? Many storage infrastructure's for Cloud and/or VPS Cloud is using a variety of technologies to secure that data which may or may not include encryption. Just ask the host about this but generally it's not a concern for any modern technology.

Obviously I'm very pro-cloud, but I've been around a long time and for your application you would have many benefits in a Cloud environment over a single Dedicated server. It's all about the technology and like comparing a dedicated server from company X to company Y, Cloud is the same. Not all things Cloud are equal.

If you asked me a few months ago, I'd still say Dedicated has some advantages. Today, Cloud is gone above and beyond my expectations and does everything you need and more.

Dedicated resources? It's all relative. You can have an entire server's worth of resources in Cloud. Look at the specs.. compare apples to apples. Ie: Nehalem vs Nehalem processor's. One technology may or may not be faster but that is mostly going to be dependent on what the technology is using.

Security? Many storage infrastructure's for Cloud and/or VPS Cloud is using a variety of technologies to secure that data which may or may not include encryption. Just ask the host about this but generally it's not a concern for any modern technology.

Obviously I'm very pro-cloud, but I've been around a long time and for your application you would have many benefits in a Cloud environment over a single Dedicated server. It's all about the technology and like comparing a dedicated server from company X to company Y, Cloud is the same. Not all things Cloud are equal.

I agree with you at 100%.
What about the cost ?

I agree with you at 100%.
What about the cost ?

When comparing the exact same hardware specifications of a "Cloud Server" (I guess we should call it something), and a Dedicated Server, the Cloud Server is of course going to cost more, but as far as how much would entirely depend on the provider.

When comparing the exact same hardware specifications of a "Cloud Server" (I guess we should call it something), and a Dedicated Server, the Cloud Server is of course going to cost more, but as far as how much would entirely depend on the provider.

But when you know that 99% of dedicated server users over-estimate their needs, I think that with cloud, they can save money ?

Thank you for your posts, I really appreciate it.

But when you know that 99% of dedicated server users over-estimate their needs, I think that with cloud, they can save money ?

If they actually buy less resources, then yes. They should be able to tell pretty quick just how much they need, then can scale down or up the resources as necessary.

very informative posts :agree: subscribing :D
Could anyone name a few cloud providers with rock solid service and affordable price for beginners like me, please. Really appreciate it.

I'd like to know, from one of the cloud providers here, where your limit is to the scalability of the cloud. Eg:

The fastest networked storage I am aware of is 10 Gbps. (10 giga bits = 1.25 giga BYTES) To actually achieve this thruput, every storage node and every compute node and every switch would need a 10 Gbps port, no? Yet a single SATA link is capable of 6 Gbps ( = 0.75 giga BYTES) and an Intel SSD can do 250 MB/s = 0.25 giga BYTES, so it only takes 5-6 cheap 2.5" drives to outstrip the speed of an entire shared storage array providing storage for an entire cloud?

SAN: 1.25 GB/s
6 x cheap SSD's: 1.50 GB/s

And how many CPU's can you give my instance? Can you give it CPU's spanning multiple compute nodes? Or am I limited to just the cpu of a single compute node at any given time? IE, if your compute nodes are each 8 cores, can you give me a 64 core instance?

Ditto with the RAM. If your compute nodes each have 64 GB RAM, can I get an instance with more than that? Say I want 256 GB RAM?

Seems to me like right now a single dedicated server outstrips and outperforms what most clouds can do at their peak, and if I'm really worried about the redundancy, I can just deploy a mirror of my dedicated with heartbeat, drbd, mysql replication, repcached, etc and be good to go?

Or am I missing something? Can someone check my math? I gotta be, because from where I'm standing a dedicated server spanks a cloud in price/performance every time?

Hi there, I struggle with some questions and this place seems to be the right one to ask them. What advantages and disadvantages has cloud VPS hosting (with dedicated resources: CPU, Ram) when compared to 100% dedicated? And what about data security when hosting at VPS with cloud storage. Isn't dedicated better for data safety (whole hdd mine and only mine)? And also is cloud VPS good for hosting a forum, or I will get better performance with dedicated.

Thank you in advance for any suggestions.

Ideally, you would use the right solution for the right job. A cloud based server for web service, and a local storage model for mysql.



The fastest networked storage I am aware of is 10 Gbps. (10 giga bits = 1.25 giga BYTES) To actually achieve this thruput, every storage node and every compute node and every switch would need a 10 Gbps port, no? Yet a single SATA link is capable of 6 Gbps ( = 0.75 giga BYTES) and an Intel SSD can do 250 MB/s = 0.25 giga BYTES, so it only takes 5-6 cheap 2.5" drives to outstrip the speed of an entire shared storage array providing storage for an entire cloud?


You can achieve higher total throughputs, but, you are correct - the cloud can never achieve the same performance of a local storage model. The again, a local storage model can never give you the redundancy, elasticity and scalability of a cloud - and especially not anywhere near the price. It is certainly give and take

And how many CPU's can you give my instance? Can you give it CPU's spanning multiple compute nodes? Or am I limited to just the cpu of a single compute node at any given time? IE, if your compute nodes are each 8 cores, can you give me a 64 core instance?

Ditto with the RAM. If your compute nodes each have 64 GB RAM, can I get an instance with more than that? Say I want 256 GB RAM?

Are you running software or applications that are compliant with this?

Typically, you would be limited to the limits of a single host node. Lets say 24 vCPUs and 96 GB of RAM. The advantage though is if you need that many resources, you could get them, without issue as your instances would be fluid between physical nodes.

I imagine you will see CPU and RAM spanning multiple physical servers on single instances, once the related software and applications and compliant with such things.

Seems to me like right now a single dedicated server outstrips and outperforms what most clouds can do at their peak,

Well, A single dedicated server cannot provide elasticity and redundancy - performance wise, it will likely win. Though, A low end dedicated server without RAID or RAID1 or RAID5 with IDE or SATA drives - will probably not come anywhere near outperforming a cloud based on RAID10 and SAS drives on an enterprise grade SAN. So, you really need to look at higher end dedicated servers before you would see a real performance increase on a dedicated vs a Cloud. So unless you actually need more then 4 vCPUs and 8 GB RAM or so - you are likely MUCH better off in a local storage Xen or VMWARE VPS model, vs a lower end dedicated.

and if I'm really worried about the redundancy, I can just deploy a mirror of my dedicated with heartbeat, drbd, mysql replication, repcached, etc and be good to go?

and what is the actual cost of this? complexities in management, etc? this is why "cloud hosting" is thriving. You can get all of the benefits of high availability, gain elasticity and do it at a fraction of the cost. The one downside, is a performance hit vs good dedicated servers. Ideally, as I said above, you would use a combination of technologies. A basic cluster, where web service is on the cloud, and mysql service is on a local storage XEN or VMWARE based VPS. You get the best of both worlds - and likely less then a single dedicated server would cost..

because from where I'm standing a dedicated server spanks a cloud in price/performance every time?

I apologize, but, your math is off. You just need to better understand what the cost of dedicated servers are.. GOOD dedicated servers - RAID10, will beat a cloud on performance - but, on absolutely nothing else.

End of the day - right technology for the right job.. it really is that simple..

Are you running software or applications that are compliant with this?

Typically, you would be limited to the limits of a single host node. Lets say 24 vCPUs and 96 GB of RAM. The advantage though is if you need that many resources, you could get them, without issue as your instances would be fluid between physical nodes.

I imagine you will see CPU and RAM spanning multiple physical servers on single instances, once the related software and applications and compliant with such things.


feel strange quoting myself..

but, to correct myself - you can certainly look for providers that have built their clouds out on mainframe computing systems. I think you can get up to 1000 vCPUs (if not more) and a petabyte of RAM on a single physical server these days. I am not sure if anyone is delivering a cloud in this manner commercially yet - but, it will eventually happen - I know we have talked about it.

Andrew,

Hey, thanks a bunch, that helped a lot.

I find myself fascinated with the virtualization tech and the cloud tech and where it's all going.

Sounds to me like cloud is vps clustered? aka vps with redundancy?

I apologize, but, your math is off. You just need to better understand what the cost of dedicated servers are.. GOOD dedicated servers - RAID10, will beat a cloud on performance - but, on absolutely nothing else.

I think we're both right. You didn't dispute my numbers. But at the low end is where it breaks down, as you pointed out, a dedicated server isn't likely to scale down to shared hosting type accounts like a cloud service can.

The dedicated server I was quoting above with 6xSSD could be had for ~$1200 if you get the Intel 40's and a barebones supermicro with 8 GB RAM, a 4/6 core AMD chip and do some assembly. For most providers $1200 up front comes out to a couple hundred setup fee and around $100/mo, unmanaged. Can you point me to a cloud provider where I can get the IO of 6 intel SSD's, 8 GB RAM, and 4+ cores for $100/mo?

Ok, so that's bigger than I want. Where can I get a 2 core, 2xSATA, 4 GB RAM equivalent for $50/mo? (I suspect there's gotta be some of these out there?)

I'm genuinely interested. I want to run some benchmarks. ;-)

Any cloud hosts want to volunteer?

You wouldn't want low-end SSD's in a Cloud. They'll all fail within 6 months due to the high IO in a Cloud (besides your APP, constant data replication happening). We're building a Cloud right now w/ SSD but they're Intel X-25E's so they're hardly cost effective (but will be doing Database work so it's necessary).

Sounds to me like cloud is vps clustered? aka vps with redundancy?


Many current "Cloud" technologies are basically clustered VPS's. But the "truest of true" Cloud (I feel like I'm saying that a lot lately) is more than that. There's limited vertical scaling with VPS's, a Cloud requires that everything from the administration of the Cloud network to deploying applications is done from the web (many VPS technologies still use third party software, require Windows, etc).

We have done Virtualization since XenServer was XenSource (4 years) and that was a VPS. Don't get me wrong, that is very cool stuff and we still use it to this day but our Cloud applications are broken down into much smaller pieces, with further "control" to scale vertically, manage better, and of course provide redundancy and high availability. With a VPS you're still running a LAMP stack with 1 encapsulated OS normally. In a Cloud, we're doing that with a whole lot more, that are self-managed and highly scalable.

You wouldn't want low-end SSD's in a Cloud. They'll all fail within 6 months due to the high IO in a Cloud (besides your APP, constant data replication happening). We're building a Cloud right now w/ SSD but they're Intel X-25E's so they're hardly cost effective (but will be doing Database work so it's necessary).

I wasn't asking for SSD's in my cloud account. I was asking for "SSD-like performance" in my cloud account. I would expect that at a minimum you would have a rack or two of nice SAS drives powering your SAN, right? ;-) So I think what I was trying to point out is that networking tech is not fast enough (or when it is, it's not cost effective enough) to provide a high IO solution.

I find it kind of humorous that one of the other hot topics right now is about another cloud provider that can't seem to get decent performance out of their SAN: http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?t=992888

I wasn't asking for SSD's in my cloud account. I was asking for "SSD-like performance" in my cloud account. I would expect that at a minimum you would have a rack or two of nice SAS drives powering your SAN, right? ;-) So I think what I was trying to point out is that networking tech is not fast enough (or when it is, it's not cost effective enough) to provide a high IO solution.

I find it kind of humorous that one of the other hot topics right now is about another cloud provider that can't seem to get decent performance out of their SAN: http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?t=992888

Sorry my mistake then. :agree:

You're right, many Cloud providers do struggle with SAN technology. It's one of the big reasons we use AppLogic as it utilizes local storage (it turns each server's local storage into a SAN, still pooling over the network). SANs are alright too but it's a much larger challenge. If you have a small Cloud of 12 servers using local storage, you now have 12 independent, but redundant storage arrays. I have some Cloud's built with SATA and they outperform some of my RAID 10 SAS SAN's for the same amount of servers. :D

Sounds to me like cloud is vps clustered? aka vps with redundancy?

Hey there, I would not call a clustered VPS a "cloud". Though, I guess some would - so, who knows.

To me, Cloud is a very specific architecture. But, what I always recommend is to use the right architecture for the right job. What is really nice is when you cluster, and utilize the cloud as part of the cluster. For example. A customer with a very heavy DB application. What you can do is the following:

Web Service - Cloud Infrastructure
DB Service - 2* VPS servers with replication or load balancing

in this scenario, you are using a combination or technologies and architecture to achieve an "ideal" solution. Web service is run in the Cloud (elastic and redundant) and DB service is run on local storage VPS instances (so, a mini cluster) - and then, you can load balance or replicate the DB service if your need an HA element to the DB service.

This in my opinion is where the market is heading - there is no single "magic" solution (cloud, dedicated, VPS, whatever) for a customer. Typically, the right solution involves a combination of several technologies. This was he point I was trying to get at. I apologize if I was not overly clear initially...

Andrew, Yeah, there's a lot of different "cloud" implementations and a lot of intentional confusion thrown out there by hosting companies and vendors. Kind of frustrating. Agree though, using the right tool for the job is key. Trick seems to be knowing what tool that is...

CloudWeb, that's awesome about the combined local/network storage. What happens when local writes go faster than the network can replicate them out? Does it queue up the networked writes? (good for speed) Or does it slow down the local ones? (good for data integrity) Looking at their website, AppLogic looks pretty nice.

Looking at their website, AppLogic looks pretty nice.

If you are looking for storage options for cloud based architecture - AppLogic is nice. But, take a look at NetAPP and EMC - they are doing some pretty unique and advanced things.

Andrew, Yeah, there's a lot of different "cloud" implementations and a lot of intentional confusion thrown out there by hosting companies and vendors. Kind of frustrating. Agree though, using the right tool for the job is key. Trick seems to be knowing what tool that is...

CloudWeb, that's awesome about the combined local/network storage. What happens when local writes go faster than the network can replicate them out? Does it queue up the networked writes? (good for speed) Or does it slow down the local ones? (good for data integrity) Looking at their website, AppLogic looks pretty nice.

I'm not sure as we've never ran into that problem. For high IO applications we build out an application to "try" (if available) to schedule those higher IO instances on the same physical server as the primary feed for data. I believe it does help, but even then I'm not certain as I haven't dug that deep into the storage aspects of it as we just don't have any problems with it.

You can always build the servers on a 10gE network, or even Infiniband if you like to help that out.

Cloud VPS can become really expensive. Using Mirrored Dedicated Servers would be cheaper in the long run. =)

Cloud VPS can become really expensive. Using Mirrored Dedicated Servers would be cheaper in the long run. =)

I really apologize here, but, I absolutely must disagree with you here. The sole reason the "Cloud" has become such a huge marketing slogan, is because, if done correctly (ie not just marketing buzz) - delivers high availability and real elasticity at a fraction of what it used to cost. Both short term and long term.

Again, people really need to understand what it is they are trying to accomplish - and it is very easy to build a solution utilizing several different technologies to meet those requirements.

But, 1 thing I can absolutely assure you of - a legacy system with mirrored dedicated servers is not anywhere near as cost effective or reliable as a proper cloud setup...

Andrew,

If you were trying to build a 20 server "proper" cloud and still beat the price/performance ratio of a dedicated server cluster, what cloud tech would you use?

Looking at a lot of the software out there, there are some pretty big potential bottlenecks and single points of failure?

Honestly, it would take a book - literally - to answer and address these questions. But, I will make some general comments, in point form below. Still wway too long of a post coming, but, its as brief as I can keep it while addressing your questions. Hopefully you find them useful.

Andrew,
Looking at a lot of the software out there, there are some pretty big potential bottlenecks and single points of failure?

- a "proper" cloud would not contain a single point of failure. It is actually not difficult to do. The problem is, in order to avoid any single points of failure, there is a cost center with each aspect within the cloud. At the server level, you need enough network connections to accommodate the redundant networking. The cost of your networking and switching doubles and most importantly, the cost of your storage doubles.
- bottlenecks need to be managed and planned for in every environment. It is all a matter of capacity planning and ensuring enough excess capacity to accommodate growth spurts or spikes in usage. The key to any environment, whether traditional or cloud, is to understand just how much capacity you have available. Everything has a limit. The Cloud gives you a lot more flexibility and resilience to spiking, but, end of the day, it also has a limit. As a provider, this is a very difficult and complex equation to manage,as essentially, every single cloud provider is almost selling and unlimited model. As at any time, all of the users could add how ever much CPU and RAM they want. It is obviously impossible to keep enough resources around to accommodate an infinite scale on the users part. So, capacity planning and utilization metrics (preferably predictive ones) for ALL areas of the cloud are very very important.


If you were trying to build a 20 server "proper" cloud and still beat the price/performance ratio of a dedicated server cluster, what cloud tech would you use?


-well, we have built out such a cloud, so I think I can answer this, but, again, there are some generalities here
-what I "think" is a really difficult concept for everyone to wrap their heads around is the issue of performance. This really breaks down into a few components, and really, is the most complicated part of this entire industry shift. Clustering has always had the "exact" same challenges. Once you get off the backplane for reads and writes, performance will take a hit. There is simply no way to avoid this with the existing technology. Now, if you have local storage IDE or SATA and instead you use non-local SAS storage for example, well, often times, this performance hit is negated or becomes irrelevant. But, you simply cannot compare local storage RAID10 SAS to SAN based RAID10 SAS. Local, backplace access will be faster. But, this has been the case forever. I single server, even with the most modern technology, can only have so much CPU and RAM. Eventually, you need to start clustering, and offloading services to different physical nodes. Once you do this, you will see a performance hit. Then when you introduce load balancing, again, when done properly, data is on a SAN and the nodes in the load balanced array share that data. Once again, this is simply non local storage and performance will be impacted. We have not even gotten to Cloud Computing or Cloud hosting yet.
-Databases (whether that is mysql, pgsql, oracle, MSSQL, etc) have never functioned too well with non local storage. So, traditionally, what companies have done is first cluster off database servers onto different physical nodes then the other services (ie cluster). As soon as they did this, they accepted the slight hit to performance in return for the increased capacity, stability and security this sort of clustering offered. They then utilized a more advanced form of clustering (ie load balancing) as well as native database functionality (replication in mysql, clustering in SQL, etc) to achieve even higher capacity, high availability and some for (although inefficient) of scaling. Whats important with respect to databases, is there has never been a really good solution, under load, to effectively offload heavy DB service to SAN storage (and this has not really changed with the cloud)
-to answer your question, if you felt you needed a 20 server dedicated cluster to perform workload for a given environment, you should easily be able to trim this down to a 10-12 server virtualized environment (both cloud and local storage VM). You likely would need load balancers and ultimately SAN performance in each environment. You would also likely need local storage nodes and load balancers for data base services in each environment. What the combination of the cloud and local storage VMs would allow you to do is achieve high availability with less physical nodes and allow you granular control of the size of your instances in order to improve efficiency and ultimately performance. Ultimately, you are not locked into node sizes as you are with physical servers. If you decide you want to move CPU and RAM around to accommodate seasonal or marketing based (or anything else) changes to specific services within the legacy cluster - we are stuck, and typically means you are adding more net resources. The cloud defeats these legacy challenges - and I cannot stress this part enough - the cloud fundamentally does not change how data is handled when comparing it to legacy load balanced clusters with SAN attached storage.
-lastly - you really need to look at enterprise grade SANs. This was important with legacy load balancing and clustering, but, even more so with a Cloud. You are speaking some heavy workloads, very tight integration with virtualization platforms, etc.. Enterprise grade SANs will be literally 10-15 years ahead of anything that can be done with a homegrown SAN. Extensive caching, native iSCSI protocol that have been real world tested in the most challenging environments, real and seamless integration and accommodation for virtualization platforms, etc.. If you are going to offload data to a SAN (whether in traditional load balanced clusters or in a cloud), you absolutely overcome many of the performance challenges by utilizing technologies that have already addressed some of these issues.

Again, hopefully this helps..

Excellent post, well written.

Andrew, definitely helps, thanks a bunch.

Can I safely summarize with something like "the cloud works really awesome with CPU intensive applications, pretty good with balanced CPU/IO applications, and not so well for IO intensive stuff. (DB's)"?

Thanks again! Very informative.

Andrew, definitely helps, thanks a bunch.

Can I safely summarize with something like "the cloud works really awesome with CPU intensive applications, pretty good with balanced CPU/IO applications, and not so well for IO intensive stuff. (DB's)"?

Thanks again! Very informative.

in my opinion, that is pretty accurate. Except, I would change this statement "the cloud works...not so well for IO intensive stuff. (DB's)" to "no really heavy DB service works really well when storage is offloaded to a SAN, whether that be regular clustering, load balancing or Clouds"

Cheers and enjoy your weekend !

Wow, that's lots of useful information. I wasn't expecting so detailed answers. Thank you. Well, I have posted this thread because I hesitate with a choice of the right hosting solution for my community website. I have no doubt which company I want to use. I only hesitate between dedicated and cloud VPS. With cloud VPS I would have dedicated resources and cloud storage. I was a bit worried if cloud storage is less safe than local storage where I have a whole hard drive only for my self. But I hope this should not be a problem.

I think cloud storage would actually be quite a bit safer. Usually there's a lot more thought that goes into proper replication and backup of a SAN.

No matter which way you go, always, always keep your own local backups.