Web Hosting Talk : Web Hosting Main Forums : Web Hosting : Windows Hosting : VPS for my requirements?

[Kalki]

Hi,
I'm developing a website which is expected to receive a high volume over a few months. I require a host that supports ASP.NET 3.5 and SQL Server 2005/8. I've looked at discountasp, but I don't know how they handle large volume of traffic. I'd prefer if the host was UK/European based and I'm looking to spend around £20 a month. I saw some VPS solutions, but a couple of sites said that they'd recommend VPS for testing purposes, before deploying to a dedicated server. I can't afford a dedicated server and don't want a VPS just to test with. I guess this leaves me with shared hosting. Are the sites wrong about VPS and are there any recommended hosts that can handle large traffic? I've looked at Rackspace, but they're slightly out of budget at the moment . Peer 1 don't seem to show prices, but I assume they're not going to be much different. Can DASP handle many users, or is it more for personal use?
Thanks for any advice

[HTTP404]

Windows Server 2003/2008 yes?
You looking for 1 VPS?
If you wre to use liniux, and cpanel you can easily cluster 2/3 servers together in different locations, hopefully balancing the strain and decreasing page load times.
Whats this nw website about?
If its videos youll need high bandwidth and diskspace
If its a forum i would recomend 1 website server and 1 SQL server.

[Softsys Hosting]

I believe, VPS is the right solution for you to start with. I'm not sure where you ready about VPS being a testbed because there are numerous small/medium sized production websites running on VPS's without any issue. However, can you let us know your how much bandwidth do you require since "Large volume" figure needs to be mentioned so that we can advice you about a perfect solution.

[Kalki]

Hi,
Thanks for the replies. We're planning on joining the Bizspark scheme and so I was thinking we could use a VPS to load our licensed SQL server onto it. Are VPS's recommended over shared hosting?
The website is more of a social-networking area (with a twist ), so there won't be large page sizes/transfers. It will just be a case of many users using it at a time. Number wise, within the first 6 months, we are expecting between 50,000-75,000 users - but there may be a surge to around 150,000 once the marketing department pushes its PR stuff.
Regarding where I heard about VPS's being used for prelaunch, I read it from here.

Great for Developers & Short Term Projects
Whether you are testing software, building a complex, database-driven application, or working on a bespoke development project, a VPS Root package is an ideal midway-point between shared hosting, with its inherent compromises, and dedicated hosting which may be too costly. Hostway Virtual Servers are highly practical for short-term, pre-launch projects as there is no minimum contract length. Post-launch, operations can move to a similarly structured dedicated solution, literally in minutes.

I may have misinterpreted it, but it seems like its saying that it's not a solution for post launch (in production) site.

Thanks for the advice.

[Softsys Hosting]

I am not sure but from what I remember, BizSpark licenses are just for development purposes and not for production use (similar to Technet/MSDN Subscription). If you are looking for production licenses, you can check out WebsiteSpark program where you'd be able to use licenses for production environment (either on VPS or dedi)

[Kalki]

I'm quite sure you can use the licenses for production use. You just can't 'resell' it so to speak. WebsiteSpark is the same, but I believe it's aimed at professional web developers. i.e. those making a living from web design/development, as opposed to 'software as a service' (bizspark).
More than happy to be corrected by anyone, but AFAIK that's the situation regarding the license .

Thanks

[akirah]

Have you tried looking at the offers section forum? You might find great offers there.

[VMhosts]

Many providers should be able to provide the required licences if they are using the Microsoft spla.

You can use a VPS in production, and may offer many advantages over a dedicated solution.

Depends really on the application and the provider

whatever solution you go for try and find someone who will give you a trial and stress test the system for the anticipated 150k user load. You need to make sure the solution scales.

Cheers

Michael

[allennbb]

You can find good windows hosting providers in your budget in hosting offers section of this forum.