Anyone use DigitalOcean or Linode?

[Darth-Apple]

I've been using the same VPSs from a particular company for several years now. They've been great and always have served our purposes well, but there are some very tight CPU usage restrictions on what we are allowed to use. It hasn't been problematic in the past, but coupled with increasing CPU steal times and busier websites, we're starting to run into some limits that we weren't seeing before.

I set up an account with both Linode and DigitalOcean to get an idea of what else is out there. I'm also purposefully trying to pay more than what we are paying currently (to avoid the CPU steal problems that some dirt-cheap LEB hosts have), so I put this one to the test. I ran a quick geekbench on both Linode and DigitalOcean, and both performed pretty well with virtually no steal time whatsoever. (Single core: DO 615, Linode ~554, vs. our current host at ~400).

Seems like either would be perfect for what we need at this point. Anyone use either of these hosts before, or have any recommendations?

 

[meetdilip]

I have heard only good things about them so far. Another point is that they are comparatively costly.

 

[Darth-Apple]

Yeah, they are definitely pricey. I'm okay with paying a little more because I will likely need to use the CPU pretty heavily during peak hours (consolidating three projects into one). With cheaper VPS hosts, this could be considered abuse, so I'd rather pay more for a host that provisions their nodes to allow this sort of thing.

It looks like I'll be paying about $20/month or so on either. It's not unaffordable, but it's definitely on the higher end pricing-wise. 2 cores and 4GB of RAM is a very good VPS though, and it's still far cheaper than running on AWS... 😛

 

[Smokey]

I used to use digitalocean to host my private Phantasy Star Online Blue Burst server from around 2012-2017, they are very good, but can become somewhat pricey if you use more than the bandwidth allocated.

 

[catgirl]

I use DigitalOcean for my forum and other websites I run. They've always been reliable for me. The only downside is it can get expensive once you start using a ton of bandwidth or need additional CPUs/RAM resources to keep your website running smoothly. On the upside while there is an additional cost to use Digitalocean, you get access to amazing customer service, easy resizes, nearly perfect uptime, and more to deal with traffic spikes.

 

[Darth-Apple]

I just switched to DigitalOcean. I'm pretty happy so far.

I was originally on the $15/mo plan with 2CPUs and 2GB of RAM, but I benched DO and it was quite a bit faster than my previous host and didn't really have as much CPU steal time as before. The load ended up being much more stable than on my previous host, so I was actually able to downgrade pretty comfortably to one core without a problem at all. I've even got 3 websites hosted on the same VPS and it's been pretty stable.

So far, so good. I'll probably need to upgrade again in the next few months, but 2 cores or $15 isn't bad. And 2 cores on a good host can handle a lot.

Thanks for the input, I'm pretty happy myself so far. 🙂