VPS questions - I'm lost

[Guest]

OK guys, hope someone can gimme some answers here. Many years ago I signed up on the RP free reseller account and never did anything with it.

Fast-forward many many years later and I find myself in a bind financially, but most importantly, and career-wise.

I came back to RP thinking I might be able to do something with it, but who am I kidding. I don't know much about hosting other than shared hosting. So instead, I decided I'm going to dabble in affiliate marketing with various niche sites so I need to get hosting.

So I'm thinking maybe I might just go with the $10 (wholesale) OpenVZ VPS hosting account since it's a monthly billing.

Problem is, when I went to go sign up, I noticed you have to choose a an OS. Now I'm, lost. lol.

I understand that a VPS is like having more than one OS on a PC but I know nothing about these server OSs.

So which OS do I choose and what do I have to do after I pay for the hosting? Do I have to set up or configure the OS or something before I can use the account to put up websites, install script, etc, etc.?

What else do I need to take into consideration before I decide if VPS is right for me?

[c.ivanov]

Hello,

The OS of the VPS/Dedicated Server depends on the control panel that you want to use.

If you want to have a Hepsia based VPS/Dedicated server that do not requires knowledge and experience of managing a server, the OS is not a factor.

The cPanel control panel however is only supported with CentOS. The OS selection is a priority for clients that are managing their VPS with no control panel - directly from the command line.

If you order a Hepsia based VPS you will receive a pre-configured server. You do not have to configure anything before hosting your domains and installing your applications except may be some PHP configurations that can be easily adjusted from the control panel.

Best Regards,
Cvetan Ivanov

[clivejo]

A VPS is a Virtual Private Server. From your point of view it operates like an actual server. You will have a fixed amount of RAM, set amount of CPU and diskspace, you can then install the Operating System and what ever software you wish. However, behind the scenes your server is not real, it lives on a much bigger server, or might actually be running on a number of bigger servers(a cloud). This is what is meant by the word "virtual" as it doesn't really exist!

As c.ivanov explained RSP allow you to configure a VPS to act like a Hepsia account (with the familiar control panel we have grown to love). This allows people with no server management experience to host websites quickly and easily. But you can also install an OS on it and set it up to do much much more than just serving web pages! However, you do need to have a reasonable level of knowledge in order to do this. The choice of OS can be daunting. Personally I tend to go more towards Debian/Ubuntu dsitros because these I know more about and they come second nature. Others will tell you to go with CentOS or other Linux distributions.

Just so you know there is an offer on at the minute, up until the 31st January, where you get the first 3 months for $3 - See the blog post for more info - http://blog.resellerspanel.com/virtu...-packages.html So this makes ordering one and playing with it that little bit more appealing to new customers.

[Guest]

Thanks for the replies. However, I am still wondering about one thing...maintenance. Even if all I want to do is use my VPS account to host sites using Hepsia CP, is it not true that:

1. There are weekly (or at least somewhat frequent) maintenance tasks that need to be done on a VPS that require you to either pay RP to do it or have knowledge enough to do it yourself?

2. If something goes wrong I need to have knowledge to "fix" things myself to get my site(s) back up and running or pay RP to do it?

[clivejo]

* DISCLAIMER * I dont work for RSP, and my comments are what I believe to be true, however I might be wrong!

I believe that if you have a Hepsia Controlled VPS then the actual server maintenance can only be done by RSP support staff. You wont be given root access to it. Security updates etc are therefore performed by support staff using a back end system that RSP have developed to look after their network and servers.

The reason I believe this to be true is that when I heard about Heartbleed I opened a ticket for my Hepsia based VPS to ask about fixing it. I was informed that the problem had already been fixed and was directed to a website which could test the server for the exploit. Meanwhile another VPS which I self manage had to be patched manually and took me a while to figure out!

[Guest]

Then why does RP sell separately "managed services"?

https://resellerspanel.com/virtual-private-servers/managed-support/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j236nBQCYng

So, it seems to me that unless you know how to run/maintain/troubleshoot a server, VPS is a big mistake if you aren't willing to or can't afford to pay for managed service at $45/month or for labor at $60/hr in a one-off scenario.

But I may be wrong, which is why I started this thread lol.

[clivejo]

With the managed services you are paying for someone else to do the work for you. These tasks include backups, updating the OS, real time monitoring of the server and getting it back online if it fails, installing custom or non-standard software and problem solving. With self-managed you have to do all this yourself. For most people the backup would be the most valuable service. Doing this yourself can be slow and time consuming!

But on the plus side, VPS servers can offer a huge speed increase in webpage access times. You get a static IP and all the websites on your server share it rather than total random sites on the shared cloud hosting. So there are pros and cons to it!

[Guest]

Well, I guess I'll have to learn how to backup a server OS and do backups and reboots. I haven't the slightest clue.

[maxa]

I have a OVZ VPS with Hepsia. You manage it just like the shared hosting accounts. The only difference I have noticed is that there are no backups. But that is easily solved via the Remote Backups function, available in Hepsia (Files menu), where Hepsia makes automatic backups to Google Drive (or DropBox if you prefer).

[clivejo]

@maxa quite true. The backup in Hepsia is a great feature. But again, if something did happen to your website, recovering from a backup takes time and some skill. Especially if a database is involved. Basically if your plan is managed, RPS support would do this all for you, so you have to weigh up the pros and cons.

[bigtime.php]

---Disclaimer: I am also not apart of RSP support and I just wanted to give some input---

@toolsavvy - Keep in mind that the base Hepsia OpenVZ VPS plan only really provides enough SSD disk space (12 GB) to host just 1 “professional site.” The VPS plans are more designed for raw power and speed and the virtualization separates your site from sharing resources and an IP with other sites. It’s also very easy to increase the VPS server resources when needed as your site grows.

RSP has done an outstanding job producing a Control Panel (Hepsia) that actually gives you the ability to host a site on a VPS or Dedicated server and manage it all as if you had a simple shared hosting account. Hence you are given the power of a VPS or Dedicated server without the normal complexities with managing such accounts. That's why the Hepsia based OpenVZ VPS plans are so popular. Not to mention you can also manage your domain names, SSL Certificates, and more within the same Control Panel. It’s a great set up.

A Hepsia based VPS control panel operates within a chroot-ed environment created by RSP. Within this environment you mainly need to focus on backing up your own website files and databases. Focus on backing these up using the awesome remote backup solution within the Hepsia CP (google drive accounts come with 15 gb of free storage). With a Hepsia based VPS it has already been “pre-configured” within a “chroot-ed environment” and this configuration will last a good while (so don’t worry too much). And I would like to believe RSP will help you out in the “rare” event that a Hepsia Based VPS goes offline or actually crashes.

Here is a rather quick break down of some steps you could take:

--Focus on “only” 1 professional niche site. Build a brand. Write quality, helpful content in your own voice. Affiliate sales will eventually become a natural by-product of your time, hard work, and how helpful you actually are to others. Oh ya, it’s going to take lots of time too.

--Get the Hepsia based OpenVZ VPS (base plan). Hurry, it’s only 3 dollars for the first 3 months (offer ends Jan. 31st, 2016). You can cancel anytime, if you find this all to be too overwhelming.

--Choose OS version: Debian 7.0 Wheezy (64 bit). I like this one (although I’d like to see Debian 8.0 Jessie offered soon on VPS’s).

--Host a domain within the Hepsia CP.

--Install Wordpress for the hosted domain using Hepsia’s easy web application installer (Wordpress now powers 25% of the entire web - just do it).

--Purchase an SSL certificate (the web is going all SSL) and have RSP set it up for you. Subsequently, create a .htaccess file in the root of your website files and 301 redirect users to the SSL version of your domain. Also input the SSL version as your site address within your Wordpress settings. You can also go into your wp-config file and add a line to force SSL over admin.

--Get a Google account that comes with 15 gigs of free Drive storage.

--Back up your website files and database using the awesome remote backup feature within the Hepsia CP.

--If you ever need to recover from a backup, it’s not too difficult to recover a “Wordpress” site. It essentially consist of your database and your WP Content folder. I’d first delete your existing files and database just in case it’s a hack. Start fresh with a clean wordpress install and new database. Then use phpMyAdmin to drop the existing database tables and then import in your clean backed up database. Now go into your Wordpress files and upload your backed up WP Content folder replacing the existing one. Double check your settings in your wp-config file and any .htaccess files. Log back into Wordpress and activate the plugins etc….

There are other details, plugins, and settings I would recommend to secure Wordpress and speed it up even more, but this post would go on forever.

I already type way too much.

As clivejo has said, it does take some time and skills to do this stuff the right way. It’s not for everybody, but I believe you can learn it if your willing. And RSP has created a great Hepsia CP to help make things much easier - even on VPS and Dedicated servers.

[Guest]

12GB is only enough space for 1 website? Please explain.

I've had websites in the past from static 10 page sites to ecommerce shopping cart sites and none have even come close to 12GB of space.

Is this perhaps because of the OS? If so, how much space would you say you actually have to play with after everything is installed on that 12GB drive?

[clivejo]

You can run more than one website off an OZ01. Granted the OS takes up a about 4Gb, and in the case of Hespia CP, you also have to factor in that the database and emails are also stored locally but there should be lots of room for several websites.

Maybe someone who has just got an OZ01 can visit the SolusVM CP and let us know how much free space is available after install without anything configured. Or even RSP support, would you guys know?

[Guest]

I contacted RS via chat. I spoke to Tim who had me on hold for a little while as he consulted with Tech Support on this question. He said that tech support said you would have about 9-10GB left after hepsia and Debian 64-bit installed.

IMHO, that's still plenty of space for a few fledgling websites.

At any rate, thanks for all the into. I'm gonna bite soon before the promo ends.

[bigtime.php]

@toolsavvy - I was suggesting if you are going to build a “professional site.” Maybe using “professional site” might not have been the best choice of words. But what I meant was one main site that contained a lot of quality content and needed functionality (i.e. wordpress plugins etc....….).

So for a big site that you put a lot of effort into: - you would have the Debian 64bit OS, Hepsia, your chosen CMS (I suggested Wordpress), any Wordpress plugins installed (some large sites have 20 or more plugins installed), any static content, and any needed local storage for your database. And you would want some SSD space left over for the sites growth.

And let’s not forget the “other” resources involved: CPU, RAM, and Traffic (of course you could off load some of these other resources by efficiently caching your site and maybe utilizing a CDN service).

As clivejo has said, you can install and run more than one site on an OZ01. And if they are simple 10 to 25 page sites then sure you should be fine. No big deal. Once you start adding in more content and complexity to any one given site then the resource usage will begin to rise. You will get a good feel for it as time goes on.

The OpenVZ Hepsia based VPS’s are really great server set ups. You will be fine. You’ll definitely want to pull the trigger before the promo ends - getting 3 months to figure it all out for so little money is a great deal.