7 ms·

Or DigitalOcean, which also offers many of the big-cloud perks like managed db, object storage, load balancers and kubernetes.

by amq 6y ago

4lun 6y ago
Yep, now that DO has managed DB instances it’s become my go to provider for most setups. Droplets (VPS) have generally worked out cheaper than EC2 (with more resources) for me. The bit that initially sold me on it a while ago was no more worrying about CPU credits, ie consistently maxing the CPU out at 100% then getting throttled, on the small instances (T2). Also the web interface isn’t a mishmash of 1000 services with different UX for each section. If DO isn’t cheap enough for people there’s also Vultr which works out even cheaper ($2.50 a month for 1cpu/512mb) if you want something similar (not baremetal).
- PetahNZ 6y ago
  Is the bottom of the barrel VM's really what AWS is aiming for though? Or is it the auto scaling, variable, HA workloads...
  - closeparen 6y ago
    Depending on the amplitude of your load cycle, it may be cheaper to just stay fully provisioned all the time on another provider.
- rozenmd 6y ago
  Do you host your entire stack on DO, or split compute and DB (and eat the latency hit)?
- sumedh 6y ago
  > Vultr which works out even cheaper ($2.50 a month for 1cpu/512mb) I can see that price on the pricing page but when I go the Deploy new server page, I cant see that price, the minimum is $5.
  - frafra 6y ago
    New York and Atlanta DC only. I wrote down pros/cons of various ~$5 and below VPS services in a Gist I have been maintaining for a couple of years: https://gist.github.com/frafra/4688b146ca6d55accb768c3557939477 https://gist.github.com/frafra/4688b146ca6d55accb768c3557939...
    - sumedh 6y ago
      Ah ok, I am using a $5 DO server as file server in Singapore, I thought I might save a few more bucks by moving to vultr but its ok $5 is pretty cheap.
    - mmahemoff 6y ago
      Hope you can add Linode here. I've been a long time user and it's a pretty good & popular option imo.
      - frafra 6y ago
        I use Linode, but it was $10 or more, while I've just seen there's also a $5 VPS called "Nanode". I added it to the list and I will test it more in the future. Thank you!
      - jwr 6y ago
        Not if you need any CPU performance to speak of. Given the misleading "vCPUs" that we are sold, I took some time to benchmark several major cloud providers and the results were… worrying: https://jan.rychter.com/enblog/cloud-server-cpu-performance-comparison-2019-12-12 https://jan.rychter.com/enblog/cloud-server-cpu-performance-... BTW, I run my SaaS on real servers from Hetzner. I figured I won't need instant auto-scaling anyway, and if you provision with ansible it doesn't really matter if it's an EC2 instance or a real server. What does matter is the price and the performance: I get servers which are significantly faster than anything you can get on AWS, and for a much better price. To be honest, I do not understand the drive towards AWS. It makes sense in micro-deployments (lightsail and/or lambda, when your usage is sporadic) and in large deployments that need dynamic scaling. But it does not make much sense anywhere in the middle.
- aficiomaquinas 6y ago
  If you are extremely cheap like me, only have to run cronjobs at certain times or only need your instances to be running at predictable times you can also use the [AWS Instance Scheduler](https://aws.amazon.com/solutions/implementations/instance-scheduler/ https://aws.amazon.com/solutions/implementations/instance-sc... ). At my last job we were running SAP on EC2 and we were able to lower our bill like 50% or so by only running the instance 9-5 Mon-Fri. Now I use the Instance Scheduler for running cronjobs every day on a T3a instance and it costs less than a $1 usd per month. You can also configure your cronjob to stop the instance once it ends, that way the scheduler will only need to start it and you'll save the most (./myscript && shutdown -h now)
johnklos 6y ago
They also offer spamming services, phishing & Trojan hosting, and will block abuse reports for weeks at a time :)
- mindslight 6y ago
  Put a different way: they won't assume your service is abusive based on a few reports, and will allow you some time to address complaints yourself.
- Nextgrid 6y ago
  Is there a better way to handle such incidents (serious question, no sarcasm)? I feel like being too receptive to abuse reports would allow anyone to take down your service by submitting fraudulent abuse reports.
mwcampbell 6y ago
There's one critical thing that DigitalOcean, Linode, Vultr, etc. don't provide though: multiple data centers in the same region ("availability zones") with automated cross-zone failover and private networking between zones.
- old-gregg 6y ago
  You were pre-conditioned to believe that it's a feature. Traditionally, datacenter itself is supposed to provide HA for both the power and the network. "Availability zones" exist for AWS convenience, not for yours. It allows for cheaper and simpler DC ops, removes the need for redundant generators, simplifies network design, and makes "under-cloud" maintenance easier. It's a feature for them, a headache for you, and a (brilliantly addressed) challenge for AWS product marketing.
  - closeparen 6y ago
    I don’t know about you, but I’ve been in several DC power failures where the fault was in the transfer switch. It sure is nice to have separate failure domains with low enough latency between them to pretty much ignore it in application architectures.
  - lumost 6y ago
    Colos will rarely lose power, but having your line cut due to a backhoe is pretty common. Even in top tier facilities I observed some loss of service every 6-12 months, add in some misconfiguration risk and Colo failure becomes a frighteningly common affair. This can be mitigated through redundant service providers, careful checks on shared interconnects and other measures - but having "hard" failure isolation at the facility level will also get you there with less chance of someone doing something dumb.
  - m3adow 6y ago
    I disagree. AZs are completely independent data centers kilometres apart. For any businesses which may need low latency but still want full HA (e.g. finance systems), it's a blessing. This requirement cannot be fully covered with separate data center regions, something like an airplane crash would still hit everything.
chromatin 6y ago
Not gonna lie, I have been scared to deploy to DigitalOcean after that debacle [0] posted here last year. It's worth the premium to me not to worry about that at night. Yes, AWS could shut me down too, but the probability seems lower. [0] "Digital Ocean Killed Our Company", Hacker News, May 2019. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20064169 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20064169

Or DigitalOcean, which also offers many of the big-cloud perks like managed db, object storage, load balancers and kubernetes.

by amq 6y ago

Or DigitalOcean, which also offers many of the big-cloud perks like managed db, object storage, load balancers and kubernetes.

4lun 6y ago

Yep, now that DO has managed DB instances it’s become my go to provider for most setups. Droplets (VPS) have generally worked out cheaper than EC2 (with more resources) for me. The bit that initially sold me on it a while ago was no more worrying about CPU credits, ie consistently maxing the CPU out at 100% then getting throttled, on the small instances (T2). Also the web interface isn’t a mishmash of 1000 services with different UX for each section. If DO isn’t cheap enough for people there’s also Vultr which works out even cheaper ($2.50 a month for 1cpu/512mb) if you want something similar (not baremetal).

PetahNZ 6y ago
Is the bottom of the barrel VM's really what AWS is aiming for though? Or is it the auto scaling, variable, HA workloads...
- closeparen 6y ago
  Depending on the amplitude of your load cycle, it may be cheaper to just stay fully provisioned all the time on another provider.
rozenmd 6y ago
Do you host your entire stack on DO, or split compute and DB (and eat the latency hit)?
sumedh 6y ago
> Vultr which works out even cheaper ($2.50 a month for 1cpu/512mb) I can see that price on the pricing page but when I go the Deploy new server page, I cant see that price, the minimum is $5.
- frafra 6y ago
  New York and Atlanta DC only. I wrote down pros/cons of various ~$5 and below VPS services in a Gist I have been maintaining for a couple of years: https://gist.github.com/frafra/4688b146ca6d55accb768c3557939477 https://gist.github.com/frafra/4688b146ca6d55accb768c3557939...
  - sumedh 6y ago
    Ah ok, I am using a $5 DO server as file server in Singapore, I thought I might save a few more bucks by moving to vultr but its ok $5 is pretty cheap.
  - mmahemoff 6y ago
    Hope you can add Linode here. I've been a long time user and it's a pretty good & popular option imo.
    - frafra 6y ago
      I use Linode, but it was $10 or more, while I've just seen there's also a $5 VPS called "Nanode". I added it to the list and I will test it more in the future. Thank you!
    - jwr 6y ago
      Not if you need any CPU performance to speak of. Given the misleading "vCPUs" that we are sold, I took some time to benchmark several major cloud providers and the results were… worrying: https://jan.rychter.com/enblog/cloud-server-cpu-performance-comparison-2019-12-12 https://jan.rychter.com/enblog/cloud-server-cpu-performance-... BTW, I run my SaaS on real servers from Hetzner. I figured I won't need instant auto-scaling anyway, and if you provision with ansible it doesn't really matter if it's an EC2 instance or a real server. What does matter is the price and the performance: I get servers which are significantly faster than anything you can get on AWS, and for a much better price. To be honest, I do not understand the drive towards AWS. It makes sense in micro-deployments (lightsail and/or lambda, when your usage is sporadic) and in large deployments that need dynamic scaling. But it does not make much sense anywhere in the middle.
aficiomaquinas 6y ago
If you are extremely cheap like me, only have to run cronjobs at certain times or only need your instances to be running at predictable times you can also use the [AWS Instance Scheduler](https://aws.amazon.com/solutions/implementations/instance-scheduler/ https://aws.amazon.com/solutions/implementations/instance-sc... ). At my last job we were running SAP on EC2 and we were able to lower our bill like 50% or so by only running the instance 9-5 Mon-Fri. Now I use the Instance Scheduler for running cronjobs every day on a T3a instance and it costs less than a $1 usd per month. You can also configure your cronjob to stop the instance once it ends, that way the scheduler will only need to start it and you'll save the most (./myscript && shutdown -h now)

johnklos 6y ago

They also offer spamming services, phishing & Trojan hosting, and will block abuse reports for weeks at a time :)

mindslight 6y ago
Put a different way: they won't assume your service is abusive based on a few reports, and will allow you some time to address complaints yourself.
Nextgrid 6y ago
Is there a better way to handle such incidents (serious question, no sarcasm)? I feel like being too receptive to abuse reports would allow anyone to take down your service by submitting fraudulent abuse reports.

mwcampbell 6y ago

There's one critical thing that DigitalOcean, Linode, Vultr, etc. don't provide though: multiple data centers in the same region ("availability zones") with automated cross-zone failover and private networking between zones.

old-gregg 6y ago
You were pre-conditioned to believe that it's a feature. Traditionally, datacenter itself is supposed to provide HA for both the power and the network. "Availability zones" exist for AWS convenience, not for yours. It allows for cheaper and simpler DC ops, removes the need for redundant generators, simplifies network design, and makes "under-cloud" maintenance easier. It's a feature for them, a headache for you, and a (brilliantly addressed) challenge for AWS product marketing.
- closeparen 6y ago
  I don’t know about you, but I’ve been in several DC power failures where the fault was in the transfer switch. It sure is nice to have separate failure domains with low enough latency between them to pretty much ignore it in application architectures.
- lumost 6y ago
  Colos will rarely lose power, but having your line cut due to a backhoe is pretty common. Even in top tier facilities I observed some loss of service every 6-12 months, add in some misconfiguration risk and Colo failure becomes a frighteningly common affair. This can be mitigated through redundant service providers, careful checks on shared interconnects and other measures - but having "hard" failure isolation at the facility level will also get you there with less chance of someone doing something dumb.
- m3adow 6y ago
  I disagree. AZs are completely independent data centers kilometres apart. For any businesses which may need low latency but still want full HA (e.g. finance systems), it's a blessing. This requirement cannot be fully covered with separate data center regions, something like an airplane crash would still hit everything.

chromatin 6y ago

Not gonna lie, I have been scared to deploy to DigitalOcean after that debacle [0] posted here last year. It's worth the premium to me not to worry about that at night. Yes, AWS could shut me down too, but the probability seems lower. [0] "Digital Ocean Killed Our Company", Hacker News, May 2019. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20064169 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20064169