Web Hosting Talk : Web Hosting Main Forums : Specialty Hosting and Markets : Game Servers : Dedicated in USA for online game

[K-Zodron]

Hey.

I'm running my own online game (www.zezeniaonline.com) and for the North American game world I would need a cheap dedicated box with good connections to players in the USA, Mexico and Canada. It's not really that complicated, and only about 80 - 100 players online at peak times, so hardware requirements for processor and hard drive aren't that high.

What it would need:

• Some kind of CPU that works (single core celeron works fine)
• 20GB+ HDD, I can settle with an even smaller one, though can be hard to find anything that crappy
• Good connection & VERY low ping to people in USA, Canada & Mexico (< 100ms), 10Mbit/s will do, traffic usage is ~50GB in / out total
• 1GB+ RAM
• Debian GNU/Linux as OS
• Located on the west coast of USA would fit best
• Cheap. I'm not looking for magical tricks at $ 30 / month, but perhaps about 50 - 70 dollars?

As you can see, h/w requirements itself aren't that picky. However, I do need a good connection and a cheap price (I don't get all the money in the world via the game's donations).

Currently the servers run at Joe's Datacenter. It works pretty good, and it's cheap, but for some reason the response times are not so good to the majority of players. This might be a software issue (not sure, though) but most likely it's just the location & the connection.

Appreciate any help, thanks!

[lemeneid]

Try looking in the offers section, 50-70 is a very good budget to work with for your kind of specs, you could even get something better. I do recommend tho that you get something with a better CPU and more ram as that will help increase the performance.

[RandyCram]

Take a look at www.BuzzServers.com - They have some sweet low cost deals on Dedicated Servers!

Or possibly with the spec and budget get yourself a VPS?

Good Luck

[K-Zodron]

Originally Posted by lemeneid

Try looking in the offers section, 50-70 is a very good budget to work with for your kind of specs, you could even get something better. I do recommend tho that you get something with a better CPU and more ram as that will help increase the performance.

Thanks for the tip, I'll keep an eye on that section.

<< snipped >>

Currently it's not commercial, that's correct, but we're looking to make some pocket money or something in the close future (3 - 6 months). Other than that, I don't think Florida is a really good location considering it's all the way to the east coast.

Originally Posted by RandyCram

Take a look at www.BuzzServers.com - They have some sweet low cost deals on Dedicated Servers!

Or possibly with the spec and budget get yourself a VPS?

Good Luck

Thanks for the link. Their locations and prices fit us well, I'll have to do a bit more research, though. I'd rather not have a VPS either, for various reasons.

[intellitech]

FYI: Ping times - to Florida (guide)

Min Avg Max
San Francisco, U.S.A.: Okay 66.3 68.7 73.9
Chicago, U.S.A.: Okay 48.5 49.7 52.7
Vancouver, Canada: Okay 71.2 71.9 74.6
Austin, U.S.A.: Okay 32.6 33.2 34.8

To South America - this would be very much dependent on who the uplink provider there is and who they would be peering through .... so, if you know WHERE your South America (what city or cities) your customers mainly connect through, then you could base your US based server to the "closest" peer ..

[K-Zodron]

Originally Posted by intellitech

FYI: Ping times - to Florida (guide)

Min Avg Max
San Francisco, U.S.A.: Okay 66.3 68.7 73.9
Chicago, U.S.A.: Okay 48.5 49.7 52.7
Vancouver, Canada: Okay 71.2 71.9 74.6
Austin, U.S.A.: Okay 32.6 33.2 34.8

To South America - this would be very much dependent on who the uplink provider there is and who they would be peering through .... so, if you know WHERE your South America (what city or cities) your customers mainly connect through, then you could base your US based server to the "closest" peer ..

Hmm...do you have any IPs to test on?

[intellitech]

You can test ping times on the following ip: 208.38.181.111

[volumedrive]

You should look for providers centrally located in the US for the best ping times. I would say Texas or Chicago would give you a wide range of providers and good price points. You *might* want to look at the east cost, but not sure how you pings would be.

[JohnJ]

Originally Posted by volumedrive

You should look for providers centrally located in the US for the best ping times. I would say Texas or Chicago would give you a wide range of providers and good price points. You *might* want to look at the east cost, but not sure how you pings would be.

A Texas or Chicago location would probably work out best. However, you could see some decent pings from the east coast.

[Katatonic]

Are you going to need a Windows licensed server?

[K-Zodron]

Originally Posted by Katatonic

Are you going to need a Windows licensed server?

No, Debian as the first post says.

[Katatonic]

Ah I missed that bit.

I checked out the game and it requires a downloadable client for Windows, so thought I'd put it out there.

[K-Zodron]

Originally Posted by intellitech

You can test ping times on the following ip: 208.38.181.111

Some USA players I asked to test it out said the ping times are much higher (120ms+) than to the server we currently have in MO, so I'm not really sure if changing is worth the effort. It'd be further away from Mexico, too.

Originally Posted by Katatonic

Ah I missed that bit.

I checked out the game and it requires a downloadable client for Windows, so thought I'd put it out there.

The client works natively on Linux as well.

[Jacob Wall]

Originally Posted by K-Zodron

Hey.

I'm running my own online game (www.zezeniaonline.com) and for the North American game world I would need a cheap dedicated box with good connections to players in the USA, Mexico and Canada. It's not really that complicated, and only about 80 - 100 players online at peak times, so hardware requirements for processor and hard drive aren't that high.

What it would need:

• Some kind of CPU that works (single core celeron works fine)
• 20GB+ HDD, I can settle with an even smaller one, though can be hard to find anything that crappy
• Good connection & VERY low ping to people in USA, Canada & Mexico (< 100ms), 10Mbit/s will do, traffic usage is ~50GB in / out total
• 1GB+ RAM
• Debian GNU/Linux as OS
• Located on the west coast of USA would fit best
• Cheap. I'm not looking for magical tricks at $ 30 / month, but perhaps about 50 - 70 dollars?

As you can see, h/w requirements itself aren't that picky. However, I do need a good connection and a cheap price (I don't get all the money in the world via the game's donations).

Currently the servers run at Joe's Datacenter. It works pretty good, and it's cheap, but for some reason the response times are not so good to the majority of players. This might be a software issue (not sure, though) but most likely it's just the location & the connection.

Appreciate any help, thanks!

Joes datacenter, as far as I know, is all cogent which is not the best for gaming.


I suggest Limestone networks, Netdepot(They are on the higher side but they have a great network), JaguarPC(They run on GNAX's network), The Planet, & Softlayer.

[sailor]

Originally Posted by Jacob Wall

Joes datacenter, as far as I know, is all cogent which is not the best for gaming.


I suggest Limestone networks, Netdepot(They are on the higher side but they have a great network), JaguarPC(They run on GNAX's network), The Planet, & Softlayer.

Jacob - I am not sure why you think we are on the high side - after a quick review of these sites out there we are actually on the low side - especially with our specials we have running.
For the pricing the OP is looking for he would need to go with our tranxactglobal.com servers and I dont see any servers at the others that would meet that pricing at 2 of them.

can you clarify?