I'm looking for a company offering a cloud-based Windows reseller account. Shameless self-promotions welcome. Requirements:
- Reseller hosting (not dedicated or VPS - it should be fully managed)
- A control panel with a provisioning API - eg Plesk or H-Sphere
- Windows, with MS-SQL
- Cloud features: Automatic fail-over, load balancing, full redundancy
- North American location
- Minimal plan to start, but scalable; cost is not a major concern as I'll be passing it on to my clients, but it ought to be less expensive than a dedicated server, as my clients have very small / low-volume sites.

Note: I've already looked through the Offers section.

I currently use JodoHost, which is excellent, but they don't offer the cloud features my clients are asking for.

I'm looking for a company offering a cloud-based Windows reseller account. Shameless self-promotions welcome. Requirements:
- Reseller hosting (not dedicated or VPS - it should be fully managed)
- A control panel with a provisioning API - eg Plesk or H-Sphere
- Windows, with MS-SQL
- Cloud features: Automatic fail-over, load balancing, full redundancy
- North American location
- Minimal plan to start, but scalable; cost is not a major concern as I'll be passing it on to my clients, but it ought to be less expensive than a dedicated server, as my clients have very small / low-volume sites.

Note: I've already looked through the Offers section.

I currently use JodoHost, which is excellent, but they don't offer the cloud features my clients are asking for.

Hello,

to clarify...

Are you looking for a cloud server for your company in order to resell shared accounts on it? (ie via a control panel)

OR

Are you looking to resell cloud servers as separate instances to your customers?

Are you looking for a cloud server for your company in order to resell shared accounts on it? (ie via a control panel)

OR

Are you looking to resell cloud servers as separate instances to your customers?

More like the first option, but I wouldn't call it a "server", what I'm looking for is a scalable reseller account.

Thanks.

More like the first option, but I wouldn't call it a "server", what I'm looking for is a scalable reseller account.

Thanks.

Scalable Windows 2008 64-bit applications are a bit of work to design to be truly Cloud built with not only redundancy but high availability and scalable vertically beyond one physical server. Few companies are doing this. We are doing it, but it's not a cheap sub $100 service either.

Since cost is a concern, I would recommend sticking with more of a traditional VPS on a Cloud until you reach the point that you need to vertically scale beyond one physical server. Once you are ready, the technology is there to do what you need and a whole lot more. Once you decouple management at the OS and Application level it really starts to change how things work.

More like the first option, but I wouldn't call it a "server", what I'm looking for is a scalable reseller account.

Thanks.

Understood. Whether you call it a "cloud server", "cloud hosting", "cloud VPS", "cloud vm", etc.. I "think" you are looking for an environment, on cloud type of infrastructure - which would allow you to create hosting accounts (via a control panel) and resize your instance (CPU, RAM, Disk) as required? is this correct?

If I understood this properly, then a few comments for you. Your options will be quite limited for providers that 1) support windows in the cloud, 2) support control panels on these instances, 3) will manage this instances for you, 4) will provide windows 2008 64bit with a control panel.

This is a pretty unique blend of requirements and not very common yet in the cloud arena.

Having said this, I would completely agree with my colleague. You should be looking at windows2008 and sql2008 (vs older windows technology). Windows2008 is built with considerations for the cloud in mind. You can seamlessly get the OS to resize CPU, RAM, Disk, etc - and you can achieve cross computational support where you can scale beyound the limits of a single physical server.

Having said this, LONG before you get to that point, you will likely want to offload SQL service to something "not" cloud based. Maybe a utility VPS or something similar. The issue here is that very very heavy DB service really is not meant for the Cloud yet. For standard hosting, there is no issue at all - but, once you grow to the point where you are worried about expanding your instance beyound the physical capabilities of a single server, then you will want to look at such things.

Hsphere is a control panel you mentioned, and it can seamlessly accomplish this (ie IIS service on a cloud instance and sql service on a local storage utility VPS type of model). A basic little services cluster, using the right infrastructure for the right job on scale (ie cloud for IIS and utility VPS for SQL)

Hope this helps..

Understood. Whether you call it a "cloud server", "cloud hosting", "cloud VPS", "cloud vm", etc.. I "think" you are looking for an environment, on cloud type of infrastructure - which would allow you to create hosting accounts (via a control panel) and resize your instance (CPU, RAM, Disk) as required? is this correct?
Yeah, you got it. :-)

I think you are right, I've run across quite a few Linux-based offerings that are exactly what I want, but non under Windows. Unfortunately, whereas I'm comfortable managing Linux servers, I have no experience with Windows machines, so I was looking for a "fully managed" solution, but without the commitment to a full-sized server.

I'm currently looking at gigenetcloud.com; this might be the closest I can get. Thank you both for pointing me in the right direction.

I'd recommend you do at least a month of testing and watch your uptime very carefully with them and any cloud host you're considering. I'm still examining various Windows cloud platforms and most either disapoint for stability issues, or pricing if you scale them past a 1 or 2 cpu units with more than a couple gigs of ram.

Yeah, you got it. :-)

I think you are right, I've run across quite a few Linux-based offerings that are exactly what I want, but non under Windows. Unfortunately, whereas I'm comfortable managing Linux servers, I have no experience with Windows machines, so I was looking for a "fully managed" solution, but without the commitment to a full-sized server.

I'm currently looking at gigenetcloud.com; this might be the closest I can get. Thank you both for pointing me in the right direction.

not a problem at all. Just be prepared, that if you want to host IIS and SQL, the minimum amount of RAM you will need for 2008 is probably around 1.5GB as a baseline for Windows and SQL 2008 requirements.

If you are looking for a control panel, that will usually have a baseline RAM requirement as well. So, if you can get something that offloads the CP service to different servers, it would likely help you a lot as well.

I'd recommend you do at least a month of testing and watch your uptime very carefully with them and any cloud host you're considering. I'm still examining various Windows cloud platforms and most either disapoint for stability issues, or pricing if you scale them past a 1 or 2 cpu units with more than a couple gigs of ram.

testing and watching uptime and performance is certainly good advise...

pricing is pretty well known as far as costs of CPU and RAM goes. Providers may vary slightly per GB - but, end of the day, that is the cost of these things.

best of luck in your continued search...

Just curious if the OP found a provider? Maybe a review could be provided?

Eric

Sorry, a little late replying.

I did end up going with gigenetcloud after looking at a few other alternatives. It worked out OK for now, cost is right (~$25/month), and it does the job.

Even though the gigenetcloud service is not technically "managed", the support staff did help me set up a control panel and get things going. It's still overwhelming learning how to use Windows (security, backups, etc), so I'd still rather have a fully managed "reseller" panel if it became available.