<== Site Review (2017-05-01) ==>

VPS.net

This web site is hosted on an SSD Virtual Private Server hosted by VPS.Net. I have an account with two cores which costs $12.00 a month. I put my email server on a separate single core server for $6.00 a month.

I used the coupon GIVEME10 to get a $10 credit. A single core server costs $6 a month. Using the coupon meant that I could try the account for free.

The downside of a dedicated server is that that the user has to set up the account! VPS offers an assisted start up service.

The first step to setting up an account is choosing the operating system. I went with the Ubuntu brand of Linux because the Ubuntu community provided easy to understand instructions on setting up web servers.

I was able to get going by following online instructions from askubuntu.com and other sources. Of course, I already knew exactly what I wanted.

I created my email server first. I am an IT traditionalist. I believe that email should be hosted on its own separate service. Email servers have different usage patterns and security profiles from web sites. As I have multiple domains, I get a ton of spam; So, I think it is best to keep them separate.

Email is a disk intensive application. An SSD drive is a super fast memory chip. The SSD server can parse tens of thousands of emails in just a few seconds.

I decided I did not want to waste any of my site's resources on cpanel; So, I bushed up on my basic computer skills and started using PuTTY over SSH. I use Notepad++ to write code. Notepad++ can communicate with the server via SSH. I am extremely happy with this new set up.

I also decided to switch from MySQL to SQLite3. SQLite3 is an embedded database and is better suited for environments where the database and web server run on the same machine.

But, lets get back to the review ...

VPS.net is a leading developer for virtual private servers and cloud servers developed by the UK2 Group. The UK2 Group is the primary domain name server for England.

Back in 2008, The UK2 group bought the Logan-based web host Westhost to expand their web based offerings and provide technical support in the United States.

This site (The Community Color Directories) was hosted on Westhost cloud account at the time of the merger. UK2 Group kept its Utah based technical support and expanded its Utah based data centers. This new server seems able to handle several thousand hits an hour without a problem.

I moved my site from Westhost to VPS in 2017 as I wanted to run the sites on the new SSD VPS offered by VPS. An SSD drive is a memory chip. If you want a fast site and aren't afraid of Linux; I would recommend the VPS SSD account.

If you are looking for a cloud account with great support; I would still recommend Westhost.